Video Summary
Do I have to pay income tax on the money I received from an estate? The answer is no, you don’t, unless the money that you are receiving was interest, or other income from the sale or generated dividends or from estate assets. So let, if there’s a bank account, in the decedent’s name, I’ll say a hundred thousand dollars, and, and then that’s distributed to you, it’s cash. So there’s no income tax that you have to pay on that money. If there is a piece of real estate involved and the property is then sold, and then you get a portion of the sales proceeds of the from the sale of the real estate again, you don’t have to pay any income tax on it. If the property was sold for the same value as what it was at the time of the decedent died, that’s called a step up in basis, under the probate code. And, what that means is that when someone passes away, the Internal Revenue Service values, the property here says your basis or what you have to pay tax on is based upon the value as of the date of death versus the sales price. So, if the property is sold shortly after someone dies, then there’s not going to be any tax that has to be owed. If the property was not sold shortly after the person dies, it’s many years later, then you need to establish the value as the date of death and then subtract that from the amount that is sold. And then you would have to pay long-term capital gains on a portion of that. Sometimes you may receive dividends from stock that’s in the estate and that’s usually shown to you through a fiduciary tax return. And it’s called a K one. That’s many times offset by the attorney fees and cost. Of course this is, you know, it’s very specific because if you have a very large estate with lots of money coming in, well that would be one thing. Or if it’s a very small estate, then probably you’re not going to wind up having to pay any income tax on this. And the same things go if you get life insurance. You don’t have to pay on the death benefit if you receive some interest that had accumulated on the cash surrender value of the life insurance, well that is taxable income to you. Same thing with annuities that you have to pay tax on that money that you receive. Same thing with IRAs and 401, if you have any questions, give me a call at (727) 847-2288.