Do IRAs and 401(k)s Go Through Probate in Arizona?

An IRA, 401(k), 403(b), 457(b) or TSP is a contract between you and the custodian or plan. The beneficiary designation on file with that custodian decides who gets the money, and it overrides your will and your trust. Arizona probate only touches assets that pass under a will or by intestacy, so a retirement account with a valid, living beneficiary never reaches the probate court. The heir contacts the custodian with a death certificate, opens an inherited IRA, and the account moves in weeks, not months.

Retirement accounts fall into probate in three situations. First, the form names your estate. Second, there is no form on file, which happens more often than people think after custodian mergers, 401(k) rollovers and old employer plans. Third, every named beneficiary died before you and you never named a contingent. In the second and third cases, the custodian's default rules apply. Many default to a surviving spouse first and then to the estate, but the order varies by custodian and plan document, so do not rely on it.

When the estate inherits, the damage is not only court time. An estate is not a designated beneficiary, so the SECURE Act payout rules get worse. If you die before your required beginning date (generally April 1 after the year you turn 73, or 75 if you were born in 1960 or later), the account must generally be emptied within five years. If you die after that date, the estate takes distributions over your own remaining single life expectancy. Either way, your children lose the 10-year window a direct designation would have given them, and that can push large distributions into higher brackets. The account is also exposed to creditor claims in the probate process.

Arizona has made the court route less painful for small estates, but retirement accounts rarely qualify as small. Effective September 26, 2025, House Bill 2116 raised the small estate affidavit limits under A.R.S. 14-3971 to $200,000 of personal property, collectible 30 days after death, and $300,000 of equity in Arizona real property, available six months after death with no personal representative appointed. A $600,000 IRA that defaults to the estate blows through that personal property limit, which means a full probate with a personal representative, a newspaper notice to creditors, and a four-month creditor claim period before the estate can close.

Arizona gives you a non-probate tool for nearly every asset, which is why a well-built plan can skip probate entirely. Retirement accounts and life insurance use beneficiary designations. Bank accounts use payable-on-death (POD) designations. Brokerage accounts use transfer-on-death (TOD) registration under Arizona's version of the Uniform TOD Security Registration Act. Real estate can pass by a beneficiary deed recorded under A.R.S. 33-405, and married couples can title a home as community property with right of survivorship. A revocable living trust covers whatever is left and adds incapacity planning.

For a household with $1.5M to $5M, the retirement accounts are often the largest single asset, so a missing or outdated form is the most expensive estate planning gap you can have. Pull the current beneficiary confirmation from every custodian and plan, including old 401(k)s and any annuity held inside an IRA. Confirm there is a primary and a contingent on every account, that the names and percentages match your current wishes, and that the per stirpes box is checked if you want a deceased child's share to go to that child's kids.

Two Arizona-specific traps deserve attention. First, if you divorced, Arizona's revocation-on-divorce statute (A.R.S. 14-2804) generally cancels an ex-spouse's designation on non-probate assets such as an IRA, but federal ERISA law controls 401(k) and other employer plans, and courts have held that the plan pays whoever is on the form. Update the form; do not count on the statute. Second, Arizona is a community property state, so an IRA funded during marriage is usually partly your spouse's property. Naming someone other than your spouse can trigger a consent requirement at many custodians, and a 401(k) requires written, notarized spousal consent under federal law.

Keep the tax side in view. A beneficiary designation that avoids probate but names the wrong heir can still cost money. Under the 2024 final RMD regulations, a non-spouse heir who inherits after your required beginning date must take annual RMDs in years one through nine and empty the account by year ten. Naming a child in a high bracket for a large pre-tax IRA, while a lower-bracket child inherits the Roth or the house, can cost the family more than probate would have. The beneficiary form is a tax document as much as an estate document.

• Naming the estate as beneficiary because an attorney said everything should go through the will, which forces probate and a faster five-year or life-expectancy payout.
• Never naming a contingent beneficiary, so the account falls to the custodian's default rules if the primary dies first or both spouses die together.
• Assuming the old 401(k) form from a former employer still reflects current wishes after a marriage, divorce, death or rollover.
• Relying on Arizona's revocation-on-divorce statute for a 401(k), when federal ERISA law means the plan pays the name on the form.
• Using the outdated $75,000 and $100,000 small estate affidavit limits when planning, rather than the $200,000 and $300,000 limits in effect since September 26, 2025.
• Funding a revocable trust with brokerage and real estate but leaving retirement accounts uncoordinated with the trust plan.