I have a friend who owns 3 MGs that he bought back in the mid 80s. I was going to talk to him about the possibly of him giving me one of his MACs upon his death. His health is quiet well and wanted to talk to him about it now rather than later. In return for the MG transfer to me I would pick up his Funeral tab.


Questions I have are :
Who would take ownership of the MG while the F4 is pending?
Should I get the terms of this agreement done in writing now before he gets in poor health?
If I get the agreement in writing should I have it done by my lawyer or just have the agreement notarized?
Will the tax stamp have to be paid if it is transferred to my trust upon his death? Seams like I have heard that if a NFA item is on a F4 to a individual upon their death their was a grace period where the tax is not collected when being transferred to another.


Anything that I need to be aware of?

Honestly this seems like an unnecessary mess. Why not just buy it from him, transfer it to you now and go with him to meet with a funeral company and pre-pay his funeral expenses with the money you bought it as that seems to be his big concern.

Also most funerals cost more than the price of a MAC, which run $6-8k right now, so make sure you aren't committing to more than you can handle. What does he have in mind? Would hate for you to get this MG only to have a bill show up in the mail from the funeral company for like $10-20k

If it passes to you through his will it would be a tax-free Form 5 transfer.

And you'd likely be paying well over market by covering his funeral expenses.  Funerals are EXPENSIVE.

Just do a F4 transfer now, pay him for it, and be done with it.

I work at the funeral home. And will be buying it this year or next year.

I would be paying the funeral expenses at my cost.

the man knows he is going to die this year or next year?

or he's very old?

The only way I could see this working out is through a trust setup.

I'd talk to him about it, and if he is willing, go see a trust lawyer. Get a trust set up with the options you both agree upon and then form4 the gun into the new trust.

He’s in his 60s, Marine, retired from state police. Good health noting on the horizon.

Going to talk to him and see what he wants to do. He may not be interested. He has 1 kid a daughter. She has a live in with 2 kids.

Most fucked up thing I wii read this month.

I would agree with the other posters that this sounds unnecessarily complicated.

If you want a mac than just buy one now.  If you want to cut him a break on his funeral costs than just agree to do it.

I am about 99.99% sure that an informal handshake agreement doesnt have to be honored by his descendants once he dies.    I am not sure if even a formal sales contract has to be honored by his descendants after he dies.

It sounds like you would need to either put the gun in trust before he dies with you as the sole beneficiary or have him write you into his will so that you inherit it.  

All that said, it seems like a risky proposition to make some sort of arrangement to trade funeral costs potentially 10, 20, or 30 years down the line for such a politically fraught piece of property.   There is no guarantee that future machineguns transfers are not frozen, the transfer tax raised to $10,000, the standard/high cap mags used to feed them are banned,  machineguns are just outright banned or required to be "deactivated"....you know for the children.

At the end of the day who is to say you will even outlive him.  Do your descendants pay for the funeral in exchange for the Mac in this arrangement?

Either way, staring at potentially 20+ years before your 60 year old/good health friend will die per the actuarial tables is a long time to bank on the idea that legal machinegun ownership will be anything like it is today and that you could even take possession of the firearm that far down the road.

This.

The ensuing clusterphuck when he passes will be entertaining reading as well.

This reminds me of those old cartoons where the starving guy is looking at his friend and his friend looks like a huge steak or something. If you want a Mac, go buy one. This approach is...perilous. And cringey.