Photo by ssteege1.

Death and taxes are but two of the only certainties in life, and even in death the government will get you on taxes. D.C. certainly isn’t complaining about that, though.

The Washington Business Journal reported yesterday that the city is far exceeding projections on estate tax collections, the money that D.C. gets when a rich residents passes on:

In June, the District collected $55.54 million in estate taxes, $5.5 million more than the chief financial officer projected the city would collect the entire year. Estate tax collections for fiscal 2012 have already topped $92 million, blowing away the CFO’s $50 million forecast with still three months left to go in the fiscal year.

This isn’t the first time that the death of wealthy residents had padded city coffers—D.C. ended its 2011 fiscal year with a $240 million surplus, $34 million of which came from inheritance and estate taxes.

While the D.C. CFO wouldn’t say which residents were to thank for the recent windfall, WBJ reporter Michael Neibauer hazarded a guess—it could have been Washington Wizards owner Abe Pollin, who died in late 2009, or heiress and philanthropist Isabelle Scott, who died in late 2011.

D.C. taxes all estates valued at over $1 million.