Rollover for deceased spouse

IRA owner took a distribution with the intention of rolling over but died during the 60 days before rolling over.  Can his spouse beneficiary roll it over to their own IRA?



The IRS has allowed this with prior letter rulings, but the rollover must be completed within 60 days. More important, the IRA custodian will obviously have to accept the rollover. There could also be problems if the estate beneficiary is not the spouse.

There are a few rulings allowing an executor to complete a rollover.  I obtained one, PLR 201514020.  The others that I’m aware of are PLRs 200450057 and 201035044. Here is an article that I wrote on this subject in the June 2015 issue of Trusts & Estates which discusses this issue:  http://kkwc.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/IRA-Rollovers-Making-this-option-possible.pdf

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