Clinton County, OH Probate Information

Ohio's statewide duties apply in Clinton County unchanged: file the inventory within three months of appointment (R.C. 2115.02), render a final and distributive account within six months unless a statutory exception applies (R.C. 2109.301), and let the six-month creditor window run from the date of death (R.C. 2117.06). What Clinton County adds are notice and paperwork duties that fall on the fiduciary rather than on the court, and they are the reason a self-represented executor here should read the local rules once through before the inventory is due.

You give the notices, on the court's forms. Local Rule 15.0 makes the fiduciary or the fiduciary's attorney give notice of the hearing on the inventory to the surviving spouse, the next of kin, the beneficiaries under the will, the attorneys known to represent any of them and anyone else the court designates, on the court's Appendix C form and served under the Rules of Civil Procedure; the notice must say that exceptions to the inventory may be filed in writing at least five days before the hearing, and the person giving notice must certify to the court who was served, in what manner and on what date. Notice may be waived under the Civil Rules, and the court may waive service of any notice its local rules require for good cause shown. Local Rule 15.1 puts the same duty on the fiduciary for the hearing on a final account, using the Appendix D form, with notice to all heirs in an intestate estate and all residuary beneficiaries in a testate estate, and the same five-day exceptions provision.

Your accounts have to arrive in a particular shape. Local Rule 15.2 requires every fiduciary account on the standard probate form and accompanied by an adding machine tape of the calculations, and Local Rule 15.3 requires the standard Schedule of Receipts and Disbursements with its own adding machine tape; extra pages may be appended if the format stays consistent and the receipts and disbursements are readily traceable to the standard form, but the rule expressly does not accommodate spreadsheets carrying extraneous information or figures that cannot be matched to the standard form. Supporting vouchers are not required from an executor or administrator, although the court may ask for them (Local Rule 15.4), which is a lighter rule than the one the court applies to guardians, conservators and testamentary trustees.

Deadlines are enforced, and the reminders are a courtesy rather than a right. Any request that would extend the time to file an inventory or an account more than sixty days beyond its original due date must be made by written motion signed by the fiduciary, and may be set for hearing (Local Rule 15.5). Where an inventory or account is delinquent the court mails a written Notice to File to the fiduciary and the attorney of record by ordinary first class mail to the most recent address in the court's file (Local Rule 15.7), and although the court says it will endeavor to notify the attorney of record ten days before mailing one, Local Rule 15.6 states plainly that this courtesy notice cannot be assured and that counsel must monitor filing deadlines independently. Failure to comply with the local rules may result in whatever sanctions the court determines and directs (Local Rule 21.0).

Closing the estate has its own local checklist. Before either the fiduciary's compensation or the attorney's fee is finally approved, and before the fiduciary is discharged, the computation of each must be filed on the court's Appendix F and G forms, and an attorney fee is not finally approved until the Certificate of Attorney on Appendix H has been completed and filed to reflect the status of matters in the estate (Local Rule 19.1). Except for good cause, neither is allowed at all while the fiduciary is delinquent in filing an account. Where the sole heir or beneficiary is also the fiduciary and a certificate of termination is filed instead of a final account (R.C. 2109.301), the court supplies the form as Appendix E.

Clinton County uses the statewide forms to open and run an estate, and adds a set of its own local forms that live in the appendices to its local rules. Ohio has one set of Standard Probate Forms prescribed by the Supreme Court of Ohio and used in all 88 counties, and the Clinton County Probate Court's own Forms page refers filers to the Supreme Court of Ohio's website rather than to a county form library, so there is no county-specific application to hunt for. What the county does add are the notices, cover pages and computations its local rules require, and those are genuinely mandatory: an attorney fee is not finally approved in a Clinton County estate until the local Certificate of Attorney has been filed.

The load-bearing statewide items for a decedent's estate are Form 1.0 (Surviving Spouse, Children, Next of Kin, Legatees, and Devisees), Form 2.0 (Application to Probate Will), Form 4.0 (Application for Authority to Administer Estate), Form 4.5 (Entry Appointing Fiduciary; Letter of Authority), Form 5.0 (Application to Relieve Estate From Administration) with Form 5.1 (Assets and Liabilities of Estate to be Relieved from Administration), Form 5.10 (Summary Release From Administration), Form 6.0 (Inventory and Appraisal), Form 7.0 (Certification of Notice to Administrator of Medicaid Estate Recovery Program), Form 12.0 (Application for Certificate of Transfer) and Form 13.0 (Fiduciary's Account). Confirm the current version on the Supreme Court of Ohio forms page before you file, because form numbering and titles are revised from time to time.

The Clinton County local forms an estate is most likely to touch are Appendix A, the Facsimile Filing Cover Page that must accompany every fax filing (Local Rule 4.04); Appendix C, the notice of hearing on the inventory (Local Rule 15.0); Appendix D, the notice of hearing on the account (Local Rule 15.1); Appendix E, the certificate of termination; Appendix F, the computation of the fiduciary's compensation, and Appendix G, the computation of the attorney fee, both of which must be filed before either is finally approved and before the fiduciary is discharged; and Appendix H, the Certificate of Attorney (Local Rule 19.1). Later appendices carry the court's guardianship forms, and Local Rule 10.6 requires gender designation filings on local forms, neither of which belongs to a decedent's estate. All of them are inside the local rules document, which is a scanned PDF, so print the page you need rather than expecting a fillable file.

Two format rules apply to everything you hand across the counter. Local Rule 2.1 requires original signatures on all pleadings, motions, entries, orders and applications except waivers and vouchers, and Local Rule 2.0 lets any clerk refuse a filing that is incomplete or not prepared in accordance with the statutes, the Rules of Superintendence and the local rules. A rejected filing can cost the estate $5.00 (Local Rule 2.2, revised August 17, 2021).

Clinton County is one of the Ohio counties that publishes its own figures, which means you can budget an estate here without guessing. The court's Court Costs Deposits page is headed Deposits for Court Costs, Effective April 7, 2023, and every figure below comes from it with that date. Ohio sets the underlying fee items by statute, including $35.00 to appoint a fiduciary, $15.00 to probate a will, $60.00 to relieve an estate from administration or grant a summary release, $10.00 for an inventory with appraisement, $12.00 for an account and $1.00 per page for certified copies with a $1.00 minimum (R.C. 2101.16(A)), and it lets each court add computerization and dispute-resolution charges (R.C. 2101.162, R.C. 2101.163). Ohio also caps an advance deposit required by local rule at $125.00 (R.C. 2101.16(E)). Clinton County's published figures are framed as a single deposit for court costs due at the time of filing, against the case's total costs, rather than as a filing fee, which is why the estate figure is higher than the statutory items alone; Local Rule 3.0 requires that deposit before any case may be opened or re-opened, refuses papers for filing until it is paid, and bills any balance owed later. Confirm the current amounts at (937) 382-2280 before you file.

How you pay is a real local constraint. The court's own payment notice states that cash and money orders are accepted and that credit cards are accepted subject to a fee of $2.00 or 3 per cent, whichever is greater, and that only attorneys may submit payment in the form of a check (verified July 2026). A family filing without counsel should therefore plan on cash, a money order or a card, and should expect the deposit to be due at the counter, since Local Rule 3.0 does not let a case be opened before it is paid. Local Rule 3.4 adds that even a party who has filed an affidavit of indigency to avoid prepaying costs must still deposit $35.00 with a mileage check before a summons, alias summons or subpoena will issue to the sheriff of a county outside Clinton County (Local Rule 3.4, citing R.C. 2303.16), and Local Rule 3.6 waives court costs otherwise assessable in guardianships sought because of county or state welfare department requirements, except for services the court and its deputies do not perform themselves, such as service of notices, publications, investigations and certifications.

Professional fees are guided by the local rules rather than left open. Local Rule 19.2 sets the court's schedule of attorney fees for estates at 5 per cent on the first $20,000.00 of probate property, real and personal, and 3 per cent on the balance, with a minimum of $300.00, plus 5 per cent of the sale price for real estate sold by a land sale proceeding or purchased by a surviving spouse under R.C. Chapter 2127 or R.C. Chapter 2106, also with a $300.00 minimum; a land sale is deducted from probate property in computing the estate fee, but the $300.00 minimum estate fee is allowed in addition to the land sale fee. For a release of an estate from administration the same schedule guides the attorney fee at $600.00 without real estate and $700.00 with real estate. Local Rule 19.1 makes compensation computed within the guideline rebuttably presumed reasonable and allowable in the absence of objection, requires the computation of both the fiduciary's compensation and the attorney's fee to be filed before either is finally approved and before the fiduciary is discharged, on the court's Appendix F and G forms, and bars an attorney fee from final approval until the Certificate of Attorney on Appendix H has been filed. Except for good cause, neither fiduciary compensation nor attorney fees are allowed while the fiduciary is delinquent in filing an account, and fees for extraordinary services are payable only on written application to and approval by the court. Local Rule 19.0 lets an attorney serving as both fiduciary and attorney for an estate be paid the fees allowable in both capacities. These are guidelines for what the court will approve, not a price list: what your attorney charges is a matter for your engagement.

Clinton County prices and gate-keeps the smaller Ohio routes separately, and its local rules add two conditions that catch self-represented filers. On price, the court's schedule effective April 7, 2023 sets the deposit for court costs at $95.00 for a Release Of Estate plus $1.00 per page for waivers, $80.00 for a Release (Summary), and $80.00 for a release for Medicaid purposes only, against $150.00 for a full Estate/Administration filing. That last line item is the court's own label and has no statewide equivalent, so ask the office at (937) 382-2280 which line your filing falls under before you pay. The release and summary release routes themselves, and their dollar ceilings, are statewide (R.C. 2113.03 and R.C. 2113.031) and are set out on the Ohio state page.

On procedure, Local Rule 17.0 states that no application for release of an estate from administration will be accepted for filing unless it, or an attachment to it, identifies the name, address and telephone number of the attorney preparing it and is also signed by that attorney, if any. Read together with the in-person rule in Local Rule 2.2, that means a release application prepared with an attorney's help must carry the attorney's details and signature, and an application prepared without an attorney should say so plainly on its face; ask the office how it wants that handled rather than leaving the block blank. Local Rule 17.1 then bars any order releasing an estate from administration unless a schedule of the assets showing values has first been filed, with any asset lacking a readily ascertainable value established to the court's satisfaction and subject to objection and disapproval, and unless no known creditor will be prejudiced by the order. That second condition has teeth: if the estate's assets appear insufficient to pay all creditors in full and the creditors have not consented in writing to the release, prejudice is presumed. A release from administration also does not shorten the six-month creditor window measured from the date of death (R.C. 2117.06), and where the decedent or the decedent's spouse was subject to Medicaid estate recovery the thirty-day recovery notice is still due (R.C. 2117.061(B)).

Page last reviewed: July 2026.