<prompt> Human: I originally posted this as a reply to a recent front page advice animals post about mental illness. The post struck a chord with me due to the way my mother went. However, it was quickly lost to load more comments purgatory. Since I put some thought and time into typing it up, I figured it might prove more useful in PF.I wanted to share some knowledge I acquired the hard way:Understand that a will holds no bearing on retirement accounts. Accounts such as 401ks and IRAs have their own beneficiary designations, and are under no obligation to follow a will, even if notarized. If these beneficiary designations are not filed with the financial institutions holding the retirement accounts, the accounts must be claimed by the estate of the deceased. At that point, a will comes into play and the estate can pay out to the beneficiaries designated in the will.But, heres the kicker: for large accounts, the tax man cometh. Now, if beneficiaries are on file, then the deceaseds IRA becomes a beneficiary IRA in the name of the beneficiaries. And while you must immediately begin Required Minimum Distributions RMDs, the RMDs will be based on the IRS tables for your remaining life expectancy, and so the required withdrawals will be quite low in most cases, and can be spread out over many years, minimizing the tax exposure of that income. Without beneficiaries on file, the decedents estate becomes the beneficiary, and estates do not have life expectancies. In this case, the IRS grants you only 5 years to withdraw all the funds. You can withdraw it any way you like, but at the end of the year in which the 5th anniversary of the date of death occurs, you must have withdrawn the full account value.My parents made a pretty good living and died relatively young, and so their retirement accounts were sizable. Many tax credits and deductions are unavailable when such an event temporarily puts your income at such a level. My brother and I lost a lot of my parents life savings because of the tax hit. My parents were very good about setting up their wills and a living trust, and Im sure they thought their wills covered all their wealth and possessions. I bet most people believe that, but for 401ks and IRAs this is not true.It may sound cold to think about making sure you can claim your dead parents wealth, but isnt that what they would have wanted?  <response>: good info. it doesnt sound cold. too many people hide their head in the sand about estate planning as if people are never going to die if you dont discuss it. it inevitably leads to problems. my family is a bit far in the other direction, but id prefer that. 