Beverly Gardiner Nance v. Iowa Department of Revenue

WATERMAN, Justice.

In this appeal, we must decide whether the court of appeals correctly held a taxpayer avoided an Iowa inheritance tax through a private postmortem family settlement agreement (FSA). The taxpayer's father-in-law, over five years before his death, signed a beneficiary form listing her as a contingent beneficiary of his brokerage account. That account transferred to her alone upon his death, and the Iowa Department of Revenue (IDOR) determined the estate owed the inheritance tax on the full account value. The decedent's grandchildren from his son's prior marriage sued the…