> I think the problem arose because your relative went to the
>> adviser of the current account and tried to transfer it that
>> way. Of course there was opposition on his part to losing an
>> account. The easier way is to go to Fidelity, set up the
>> transfer IRA account in the name of deceased, for benefit of
>> survivor, and Fidelity will handle all the paperwork for the
>> direct trustee to trustee transfer of the assets.
> Given that these are American Funds funds, which are loaded
> funds sold only through advisors, and (as far as I can tell)
> you can't even get a form without talking to an advisor,
> things are rather constrained.
>
> In other words, to do it the way you say (which I agree I'd
> prefer in normal circumstances), that means my relative has
> to sign up with some AF-approved advisor, get an IRA-BDA
> account created, and then do the transfer.
>
> However, if it is done as a "push" instead of a "pull", AF
> will send the money to Fido without my relative having to
> sign up with some AF advisor.
A long time ago my wife had an IRA at Prudential that included some mutual funds of Prudential. When we transferred the IRA to another account, Prudential just sold the in-house funds and transferred the cash over. Sounds like this could be a similar situation. If Fidelity can't hold the American Funds, they will have to be sold anyway if they want to transfer to Fidelity. Dennis
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>