Can You Roll Over an HSA? Deadlines, Transfers, and IRA Moves

Yes, you can move money from one Health Savings Account to another, and the HSA rollover rules give you two ways to do it: a direct trustee-to-trustee transfer with no annual limit, or an indirect rollover where the funds pass through your hands and must land in the new account within 60 days. You get only one indirect rollover per 12-month period. Miss the deadline and the money becomes taxable income, plus a 20% additional tax if you are under 65.¹²

Direct Transfer or Indirect Rollover

A direct trustee-to-trustee transfer moves money between institutions without your personal account ever touching it. You tell the new HSA provider to pull the funds, and they handle the paperwork with the old custodian. The IRS places no cap on how many direct transfers you can do in a year, so switching providers repeatedly is allowed.¹ Expect your current provider to charge a closing or outbound transfer fee.³

An indirect rollover puts the money in your hands first. Your current custodian sends you a check or wires the funds to your personal account, and the clock starts. You have 60 days from the date you receive the distribution to deposit the full amount into the new HSA, and you can only do this once in any 12-month period.¹ Direct transfers are the safer default. Unless you have a specific reason to take possession of the cash, there’s little upside to accepting the tax risk that comes with an indirect rollover.

What a Missed 60-Day Deadline Costs

If you don’t get the money into the new HSA within 60 days, the entire distribution counts as taxable income for that year. On top of ordinary income tax, the IRS adds a 20% additional tax if you are under age 65.² Depending on your bracket, that combination can consume a third or more of the balance. And because you only get one indirect rollover per 12 months, a failed attempt locks you out of trying again for a year.

Relief If Something Went Wrong

The IRS recognizes three ways to get relief from a missed 60-day deadline when circumstances were genuinely beyond your control:⁴

An automatic waiver applies if the financial institution caused the delay, you followed all procedures, the institution had the funds before the 60-day period expired, and the deposit is completed within one year of when the original 60-day window started.
Self-certification lets you write a letter to the receiving trustee stating that one of the IRS-approved reasons prevented the on-time rollover.
A private letter ruling is a formal request to the IRS, weighed against factors like hospitalization, disability, incarceration, or postal errors.

These paths exist for real emergencies, not forgotten checks. If there’s any chance the money could slip your attention, use a direct transfer instead.

If Your HSA Holds Investments

Most HSA custodians accept incoming transfers only in cash, so if your current account holds mutual funds or other securities, they usually have to be sold before the transfer can go through.⁵ A handful of providers support in-kind transfers, but that’s the exception. The liquidation step is the main reason custodians quote a two-to-six-week processing window; the sale itself is quick, but the administrative handoff adds time.⁶

This matters especially for indirect rollovers. If your investments have to be sold before the check goes out, that delay counts against your 60-day clock. Build in buffer, or route through a direct transfer where the timing pressure disappears.

How to Complete the Transfer

For a direct transfer, the receiving institution does most of the work:

Open the new HSA if you don’t already have one.
Request a transfer form from the new custodian. You’ll need your old provider’s name, address, and your account number.
Submit the form through the new provider’s online portal, by fax, or by mail. The new custodian contacts your old provider to initiate the transfer.
Wait two to five weeks for the funds to arrive, sometimes longer.⁵
Confirm receipt by checking the new account balance and asking for written confirmation.

For an indirect rollover, request the distribution from your current custodian, receive the funds, and deposit the exact amount received into the new HSA within 60 days. The rollover does not count against your annual contribution limit, so it will not push you over the 2026 caps of $4,400 for self-only coverage or $8,750 for family coverage.¹⁷

Tax Forms You’ll Receive

Both custodians report the movement to the IRS. Your former provider issues Form 1099-SA showing the distribution from the old account.⁸⁹¹⁰ You report the activity on Form 8889 with your return. If the amounts on either form don’t match your actual transaction, contact the custodian before filing. Keep the transfer request forms and confirmation letters for at least three years.

Moving IRA Money Into an HSA

A separate provision lets you move funds from a Traditional or Roth IRA into your HSA through a Qualified HSA Funding Distribution. This is a once-in-a-lifetime election.¹¹ One narrow exception: if you make the initial transfer while covered by a self-only HDHP and later switch to family coverage in the same tax year, you can make one additional transfer.

The transferred amount cannot exceed the HSA contribution limit for your coverage type in the year of the transfer, which for 2026 is $4,400 for self-only and $8,750 for family coverage.⁷ The money has to move directly between the IRA and HSA trustees; you can’t take a check.

After the transfer, you must stay in a qualifying HDHP for 12 months from the month of the distribution. If you drop that coverage during the testing period for any reason other than death or disability, the transferred amount gets added to your gross income and hit with a 10% additional tax.¹¹ SEP and SIMPLE IRAs qualify only if the employer is no longer making contributions for the tax year in question.

Rollovers After Medicare Enrollment

Enrolling in any part of Medicare ends your eligibility to make new HSA contributions, but it does not affect your ability to move existing HSA funds. The IRS specifically states that you do not have to be an eligible individual to roll over from one HSA to another.¹ Your balance carries forward and you can keep transferring it between custodians on the same rules as before.

Watch the enrollment timing separately from the rollover itself: signing up for Social Security after age 65 automatically triggers Medicare Part A, sometimes retroactively up to six months, which affects how you prorate contributions for that year.

What Happens to an HSA When Someone Dies

A rollover in the estate sense depends on who is named as beneficiary. If the beneficiary is the surviving spouse, the account simply becomes the spouse’s own HSA with no immediate tax consequence.¹

If anyone other than a spouse inherits the HSA, the account stops being an HSA on the date of death. The full fair market value becomes taxable income to the beneficiary in the year of death, reduced by any qualified medical expenses of the deceased that the beneficiary pays within one year.¹ If the estate is the beneficiary, the value lands on the decedent’s final return. Naming a spouse is often the difference between a smooth continuation and a large one-year tax bill.

1
Internal Revenue Service. Publication 969, Health Savings Accounts and Other Tax-Favored Health Plans
2
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 223 – Health Savings Accounts
3
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. CFPB Highlights the Hidden Costs of Health Savings Accounts
4
Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Plans FAQs Relating to Waivers of the 60-Day Rollover Requirement
5
Fidelity Investments. Transfer a Health Savings Account to Fidelity
6
Optum. Transfer Your HSA
7
Internal Revenue Service. Revenue Procedure 2025-19
8
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Forms 1099-SA and 5498-SA
9
Internal Revenue Service. About Form 5498-SA, HSA, Archer MSA, or Medicare Advantage MSA Information
10
Internal Revenue Service. Form 5498-SA HSA, Archer MSA, or Medicare Advantage MSA Information
11
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 408 – Individual Retirement Accounts