Updated August 17, 2026. Quick answer: In Massachusetts, whether an heir needs a state credential depends on a line the statute itself draws, and the line is the answer; on the dealer question, a dealer is not required — the state does regulate transfers here, and this is not one it routes through a dealer; and on inheritance itself, the code names inheritance and then bounds what naming it buys you. Something has to be filed: 60 days, counted from the date the firearm is acquired by the heir or devisee through distribution of the estate. Every answer below is quoted from Massachusetts’s own code with the section named and linked, because this is a subject where being roughly right is not a category that exists.
What Massachusetts law settles, in four lines
| Question | What the code says | Section |
|---|---|---|
| Does the heir need a state permit, licence or card? | Depends | M.G.L. c. 140, § 129C(a)(iii), read against §§ 129B and 131 |
| Does the acquisition have to be reported? | Yes — 60 days | M.G.L. c. 140, § 121B(a)(1)-(2) |
| Does it have to go through a licensed dealer? | No | M.G.L. c. 140, § 128A(c) and (g) |
| Does the statute name inheritance at all? | Named, but limited | M.G.L. c. 140, § 129C(a)(iii) and § 121B(a)(2)(iii) |
What this covers. An ordinary estate transfer in Massachusetts: the person who died and the person inheriting are in the same state, and the firearm is an ordinary rifle, shotgun, pistol or revolver. Machine guns, suppressors, short-barrelled rifles and anything else registered under the National Firearms Act run on a separate federal track that is not this page, and neither is moving a firearm across a state line. The federal layer is set out separately.
Does the heir need a permit, licence or card
Whether an heir needs a state credential depends on a line the statute itself draws, and the line is the answer. In Massachusetts that answer reads depends. The section that settles it is quoted here rather than paraphrased:
(a) Possession of a firearm or ammunition for a particular purpose and limited time without being duly issued a license, permit or card under sections 129B, 131, 131A or 131F shall be permitted by: … (iii) an heir or devisee upon the death of the legal owner of the firearm or the ammunition for not more than 60 days after said firearm or ammunition is transferred into their possession and who shall also be permitted to sell or otherwise transfer said firearm or ammunition to a duly licensed person within this time period pursuant to section 128A.
— M.G.L. c. 140, § 129C(a)(iii), read against §§ 129B and 131
Does anyone have to be told, and by when
60 days, and the number is the smaller half of the answer. What it counts from is the date the firearm is acquired by the heir or devisee through distribution of the estate — which is the part a comparison table drops and the part that decides whether the deadline has already passed. It goes to Department of Criminal Justice Information Services (DCJIS), via the real-time Electronic Firearms Registration System (EFRS).
Firearm registration shall be completed at the time of firearm import, purchase, acquisition, manufacture or assembly; provided, however, that a firearm may be: (i) registered within 60 days if imported by a new resident of the commonwealth; (ii) registered within 7 days if imported by a licensed dealer, gunsmith, distributor or manufacturer; (iii) registered within 60 days if acquired by an heir or devisee through distribution of an estate
Does it have to go through a licensed dealer
A dealer is not required — the state does regulate transfers here, and this is not one it routes through a dealer. The claim that an inherited firearm always has to be transferred through a licensed dealer is not true as a flat statement in any state in this table, and in Massachusetts the section that settles it reads:
(c) An heir or devisee upon the death of a firearm or ammunition owner, a person in the military, police officers and other peace officers, a veteran’s organization and historical society, museums and institutional collections open to the public may: (i) sell or transfer firearms and ammunition therefor, to a federally licensed firearms dealer, or a federal, state or local historical society, museum or institutional collection open to the public; and (ii) sell or transfer no more than 4 firearms and ammunition therefor per calendar year to: (A) a person with a license to carry under section 131; (B) an exempted person under section 129C; or (C) a person with a firearm identification card under section 129B; provided, however, that for transfers and purchases of firearms that are not rifles and shotguns that are not large capacity or semi-automatic, the transferee shall have a valid permit to purchase under section 131A.
What the code says about inheritance itself
The code names inheritance and then bounds what naming it buys you. Being named and being released are different things. What follows the naming is the bound — a window that closes, a route that only works one way, or an exemption from the paperwork but not from the licence.
an heir or devisee upon the death of the legal owner of the firearm or the ammunition for not more than 60 days after said firearm or ammunition is transferred into their possession and who shall also be permitted to sell or otherwise transfer said firearm or ammunition to a duly licensed person within this time period pursuant to section 128A
What is specific to Massachusetts
- The 60 days are an accommodation, not a permission slip. An heir may hold the firearm unlicensed for that window and may use it to sell or transfer to someone licensed; what the window does not do is turn into ownership. M.G.L. c. 140, § 129C(a)(iii), read against §§ 129B and 131
- Massachusetts registers firearms electronically, and the estate route has its own deadline written into the registration statute rather than a form of its own. M.G.L. c. 140, § 121B(a)(1)-(2)
- An heir may hand the firearm to a dealer without limit, or directly to a licensed individual up to four times in a calendar year. The cap is on the direct route only. M.G.L. c. 140, § 128A(c) and (g)
- The chapter never uses the word inheritance. Its vocabulary is “heir or devisee” and “distribution of an estate”, which is why a keyword search of this statute comes back empty and the rule is still there. M.G.L. c. 140, § 129C(a)(iii) and § 121B(a)(2)(iii)
What this page does not tell you
- The permit answer is a genuine “it depends”. It is recorded that way because the statute draws a line rather than giving one answer, and flattening it to yes or no would be wrong in half the cases.
- This is what the statute says, not what a court or a police department has done with it. No case law and no agency guidance was read. Where a code is silent, this page reports silence rather than filling it in.
- City and county rules sit on top and are not here. Several of these states let a city license or register firearms separately, and a local rule can add a step the state code does not mention.
- Who may possess is a separate question from how it transfers. A federal or state bar on possession — a felony conviction, a protective order, an involuntary commitment — attaches to the person and reaches an inherited firearm exactly as it reaches a bought one.
- A gun trust is a different mechanism and is covered separately. What a gun trust does and does not do is its own question, and it is mostly a federal one.
- This is general information, not legal advice. On this subject a wrong step is not a paperwork problem, so the sections are linked for you to read and a probate lawyer in the state is the right next call if anything here is close.
Sources
Every answer on this page comes out of a 51-jurisdiction table built from statute text: 204 cells, 201 of them read from a state’s own code and 3 from an official state publication, with 0 resting on a secondary source of any kind. 175 quotations were machine-checked against the bytes of the page each came from, with 0 failures. 22 of the 204 cells are flagged because the text is verbatim but the date of the copy it came from could not be confirmed at the state’s own site.
| What it supports | Section | Tier | Read on |
|---|---|---|---|
| Does the heir need a state permit, licence or card? | M.G.L. c. 140, § 129C(a)(iii), read against §§ 129B and 131 | statute | 2026-08-17 |
| Does the acquisition have to be reported? | M.G.L. c. 140, § 121B(a)(1)-(2) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
| Does it have to go through a licensed dealer? | M.G.L. c. 140, § 128A(c) and (g) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
| Does the statute name inheritance at all? | M.G.L. c. 140, § 129C(a)(iii) and § 121B(a)(2)(iii) | statute | 2026-08-17 |
The other states with their own page: California, Illinois, New Jersey, New York, Hawaii, Connecticut, Maryland, Washington, Michigan, Texas. All 51 jurisdictions are in the by-state table.
General consumer information, not legal advice. State codes are as published by the cited source on 2026-08-17 and change without notice; the statute and a lawyer in the state govern.