# Moving money after account owner dies **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 12, 2025, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969 "2025-04-12T21:06:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![filmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7993a0/32.png) [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2025, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/21 "2025-04-12T23:56:20Z")
> [@commasense](#): > > My sister and I are her sole heirs, my sister is her executor, and one or both of us are named as beneficiaries of her various bank and investment accounts. There is no disagreement between us about the division of the funds: we are going to split them evenly. (The total in question is well under $50,000.) One thing to keep in mind in a situation like this is that you’ll likely end up with unequal amounts because there will be unequal amounts in the various accounts. Depending on who’s the beneficiary of each account, you’ll get some accounts and your sister will get some others. So maybe you end up with $30k and your sister gets $20k. It’ll be up to you both at the end to decide if the person with the most writes a check to the other person to equalize things. That has nothing to do with the estate, probate, or the executor. Basically, the money will be handled like this: - Joint account with mom and someone else: That someone else gets the money - Account where mom is the only owner and a beneficiary is specified: The beneficiary gets the money - Account owned by a trust: Handled however the trust specifies It’s the stuff left over that will be handled by the will. So if there’s an account where your mom was the only owner and there wasn’t a beneficiary, that will be distributed according to the will. But it sounds like your mom won’t have much of that since she used trusts and beneficiaries. That might mean the only stuff for the will to distribute might be the household goods, furniture, car, and stuff like that. It sounds like the financial accounts all might have a joint owner or beneficiary and will be moved to the new owners outside of will. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/22 "2025-04-13T02:39:20Z")
> [@commasense](#): > > My mother died a few days ago. (Thanks in advance for your condolences.) > > My sister and I are her sole heirs, my sister is her executor, and one or both of us are named as beneficiaries of her various bank and investment accounts. There is no disagreement between us about the division of the funds: we are going to split them evenly. (The total in question is well under $50,000.) > > We have online access to all the accounts and can easily transfer money from them to our own accounts right now. > > The question is: is there any reason we shouldn’t do so before the banks are officially notified about her death? Once they find out, will they find it unusual or suspicious or criminal that money was moved shortly after her death? Could we get in some kind of trouble, or will they be fine with it as long as no one complains? I’m not an expert so you may want to consult with an actual lawyer. But I do a lot of work in banking operations. Most of the compliance part that I’ve been involved with relates to making sure the customer is who they say they are when they open an account (CIPs, KYC/AML, credit checks, etc) or anti fraud, not the part that happens after someone dies. So take that with a grain of salt. I imagine a couple of things could happen: 1. A fraud alert is tripped by some system noticing a withdrawal has been made after the owner has died 2. Depending how you transfer the money (wire transfer or ACH) it may not clear settlement. Or nothing happens. As far as the bank is concerned, the account was accessed legitimately and a legitimate transaction occurred. I don’t think you would be creating any crime anyway as you and your sister are named as sole beneficiaries. But you may create some bureaucratic headaches for yourselves. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/23 "2025-04-13T12:27:35Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Typically these are called pay on death / transfer on death (POD/TOD) designations. I’m treasurer of our HOA, and since we have a fair number of older residents, many of our dues payments are made by check. Lately I’d been noticing checks with POD on them, and been wondering what that meant. Thanks for the education! ---
**Author:** ![chela](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chela/32/21582_2.png) [@chela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chela)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/24 "2025-04-13T14:35:57Z")
I’m watching my spouse go through this now and I have to sit on my hands and leave the room when he gets on the phone to lil bro who is executor. It’s been months and months and a fairly straightforward estate is not yet settled. It’s complicated by his declining health and inevitable divorce. It’s been difficult to get straight answers and shit that should’ve been done by now he struggles to complete. Also he has control issues esp wrt to money and is getting strong pushback from another sibling to write the damn checks. So lil bro is dragging it out. Lil bro also has, I’ll call them unusual, behaviors wrt to banking. Stuff that makes no sense to us, the way he and his wife manage their income, whatever. Just write the damn checks to beneficiaries already! ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/25 "2025-04-13T15:54:36Z")
My FIL passed away a few weeks ago, my wife is handling all the financials. His bank accounts were frozen by the bank soon after, waiting for my wife to complete the probate process. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/26 "2025-04-13T15:59:45Z")
How did they find out? ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/27 "2025-04-13T16:06:34Z")
> [@commasense](#): > > How did they find out? My guess is when SS clawed back the final month’s benefits. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/28 "2025-04-13T16:16:00Z")
Okay, we haven’t gotten the death cert yet, so SSA doesn’t know, nor any other organization, other than the hospital. Do hospitals or state governments automatically notify other organizations/companies about deaths, or is it up to the survivors? ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/29 "2025-04-13T16:37:17Z")
> [@commasense](#): > > Okay, we haven’t gotten the death cert yet, so SSA doesn’t know, nor any other organization, other than the hospital. My understanding is that funeral homes generally notify SS - and that would most likely be before the family receives the death certificate. And banks typically check records against check the SS death master file monthly or even weekly. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Girlfriend](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.girlfriend/32/193_2.png) [@Dr.Girlfriend](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Girlfriend)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/30 "2025-04-13T17:36:07Z")
I used to work for a small credit union and we would monitor the obituaries in the newspaper. That’s probably not practical at a larger institution but we were small enough that we could do that. We wouldn’t necessarily freeze an account when we found out the owner died, but we would flag it and monitor any activity until the account was closed out. ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/31 "2025-04-13T18:40:56Z")
FWIW: When my dad died, my sister and I were taking care of moving my mom into assisted living, and getting the house put on the market, etc. My parents had a trust that stipulated that we were both 50/50 beneficiaries. We had agreed that using my dad’s credit card to pay for expenses made the most sense, so we didn’t have to re-imburse one another after the fact. She was pumping gas, and (for whatever reason) called the credit card company to ask them a question, and as soon as she mentioned my father’s death, they cut off the card. She had to pay with a different card to get her gas. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/32 "2025-04-13T22:14:10Z")
> [@doreen](#): > > My understanding is that funeral homes generally notify SS This was my impression too. Once the death happens the notification wheels are in motion. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2025, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969/33 "2025-04-13T22:20:12Z")
Then presumably the Maryland state anatomy board may do so in our case. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moving-money-after-account-owner-dies/1016969.md?page=1)