My mother died last June, and I'm executor for her estate. Total value of the estate is ~$400K, consisting of a house (willed to my brother) and various interest-bearing accounts (distributed equally, per the will.) Nothing is contested.
Q1: It took about 3 months from her death before I got her accounts closed and the money transferred to the estate account. The 1099's for these accounts show all earnings as being in my mother's name. (The total amount comes to ~$10K.) Can I just include these 1099 amounts in her final return? Or does the portion earned after her death need to be treated as 'estate income'?
Q2: Aside from possible interest income (per above), the only other estate income is a $7K IRA distribution. Altogether, this seems like it should be simple enough that I could do the 1041 myself (using, say TC Business). Any comments on this? Mostly, is it a matter of (carefully) getting numbers in the right boxes, or are there critical decisions to be made, that only someone familiar with the IRC would know?
TIA, George