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Darke County, OH Probate Information
Quick facts
| Category | Current rules |
|---|---|
| Court | Darke County Probate Court, the probate division of the Darke County Court of Common Pleas under the Ohio Revised Code (R.C. 2101.01). Its formal name in the Supreme Court of Ohio's trial-court and local-rules listings is the Darke County Court of Common Pleas, Probate Division, and the court styles itself the Darke County Probate/Juvenile Court on its own site. One elected probate judge presides over both the Probate Division and the Juvenile Division, which is common in Ohio's smaller counties |
| Filing office | The probate court's own office at 300 Garst Avenue in Greenville. The elected probate judge is also the clerk of the probate court (R.C. 2101.11(A)(1)(a)), so wills, estates, guardianships and name changes are filed with the probate court directly. The Darke County Clerk of Courts, at 504 South Broadway, (937) 547-7335, serves the general and domestic relations divisions and does not open estates |
| Court location | 300 Garst Avenue, Greenville, OH 45331. This is the Probate and Juvenile Court's own building, not the Darke County Courthouse: the county courthouse at 504 South Broadway houses the General and Domestic Relations Divisions, the Clerk of Courts, the Auditor and the Recorder, so do not go there to open an estate |
| Mailing address | The court publishes no separate post office box, so mail filings go to 300 Garst Avenue, Greenville, OH 45331. Call or email the court before mailing an original will or another original document |
| Phone | (937) 547-7345 is the probate line the court publishes on its own Probate Court Contacts page (verified July 2026). The juvenile side of the same court uses (937) 547-7350. One caution: a tap-to-call link on the court's Location page carries a different final digit, so dial 547-7345 |
| [email protected]. The court's home page carries a notice, read July 2026, that it is experiencing ongoing phone issues and asks the public to email this address if a call is not going through. The court's contact page also lists a chief deputy clerk for estates with a direct email address | |
| Fax | (937) 547-1945, published on the court's own contact and location pages. A fax number is not a filing method here: the court's local rules contain no facsimile-filing provision |
| Office hours | Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., closed on all legal holidays. The 4 p.m. closing took effect June 1, 2026 under a notice the court posted on its own home page; before that the court closed at 4:30 p.m., which is still what Local Rule 1 of its 2021 local rules says. The court publishes a 2026 holiday schedule. Because this is a small combined probate and juvenile court, confirm the counter is staffed before driving to Greenville |
| Filing fee | Ohio sets most probate fee items by statute: $35.00 to appoint a fiduciary and $15.00 to probate a will (R.C. 2101.16(A)), and $60.00 to relieve an estate from administration or to grant a summary release. On top of those items each probate court sets its own deposit by local rule and may add computerization and dispute-resolution charges (R.C. 2101.162, R.C. 2101.163); R.C. 2101.16(E) lets a court require an advance deposit for costs of up to $125.00 at the time of application. Darke County posts its own deposit schedule, and those posted deposits are what you bring to the counter: $300.00 for a full administration, $180.00 for a release from administration, $140.00 for a summary release, and $145.00 for a will with a summary release, all applied toward the final costs of the case (Darke County Probate Court, Court Costs and Deposits, verified July 2026). Confirm the current figure with the court before you file |
| Local forms | None for estates. The court's Probate Forms page states that the Darke County Probate Court does not provide forms for self-represented filers and that the forms to use are the ones provided by the Supreme Court of Ohio, so you file the statewide Standard Probate Forms. The court does publish two local documents: an Estate Information handout explaining estate administration, and a Public Records Request form. Local Rule 19 requires every filing for which a standard probate form exists to be made on that form |
| E-filing | None. Darke County Probate Court has no electronic-filing system for estates, and its local rules contain no electronic-filing and no facsimile-filing provision. You file on paper, in person at 300 Garst Avenue or by mail. The only thing the court accepts online is a marriage license application, which is not an estate filing |
| Case search | Yes. The court runs an online record search, branded CaseLook, that covers probate case types including estates, guardianships, trusteeships, marriage, civil and miscellaneous cases. You accept the court's disclaimer, then search by name, by case number or by file date, and complete a CAPTCHA; no registration or login is required. The court's own notice warns that the delay between a court filing and its posting can be at least twenty-four hours and may be longer, and that verified records must be requested from the court or inspected at the office during business hours |
| Remote appearance | Nothing is published. The court's local rules set notice, motion and hearing requirements but say nothing about telephone or video appearances, so ask the court whether a particular hearing can be handled remotely |
| Website | https://www.darkeprobatejuvenile.org/ (the court's own site, which carries the hours, the address, the probate phone line, the court cost and deposit schedule, the forms page and the record search) and https://darkeprobatejuvenile.org/pdf/probateRules-20210914.pdf (the Probate Division's local rules, hosted by the court itself). The Supreme Court of Ohio's trial-court directory lists the same website and the same local-rules file for Darke County probate |
Before you begin — know the assets and liabilities
Before you file anything in Darke County, know exactly what is in the estate. Which Ohio route fits depends on whether there is a will, on who inherits, and on the value and titling of the assets, because a full administration, a release from administration and a summary release are different filings with different forms, different notice steps and, in Darke County, different posted deposits. Those routes and their dollar ceilings are statewide and are explained on the Ohio state page. Getting this right before your first trip matters here: the court publishes no forms for self-represented filers and no e-filing, so a wrong or incomplete filing means another drive to Greenville or another round of mail.
Identify every bank and credit-union account, retirement plan, brokerage holding, life-insurance policy, vehicle, and parcel of real property, along with every debt, before you file. How each asset is titled decides whether it passes through the estate at all: property held jointly with right of survivorship, accounts with a named beneficiary, and land covered by a transfer on death designation affidavit recorded with the Darke County Recorder before death (R.C. 5302.22) go directly to the survivor or beneficiary and never reach the probate court. Sunset's asset-discovery work, searching more than 2,300 financial institutions, exists for this step, so that the application you hand across the counter on Garst Avenue lists the estate accurately the first time.
Which court handles jurisdiction
Darke County Probate Court in Greenville is the single probate filing office for the whole county. Everything is at one address, 300 Garst Avenue, and there is no branch, satellite or district office. The court serves every part of the county, including the city of Greenville, the county seat, and the villages of Ansonia, Arcanum, Bradford, Burkettsville, Castine, Gettysburg, Gordon, Hollansburg, Ithaca, New Madison, New Weston, North Star, Osgood, Palestine, Pitsburg, Rossburg, Union City, Versailles, Wayne Lakes and Yorkshire, along with the surrounding townships. Darke County covers more than 600 square miles by the county's own account, and it is largely farmland, so a filer at the county's edge can be a long drive from Greenville. Because papers can be mailed to the court, most of an uncontested estate can be handled without repeated trips, and the distance matters mainly for a hearing.
Go to 300 Garst Avenue, not to the county courthouse. This is the local detail that trips people up in Darke County: the Probate and Juvenile Court has its own building on Garst Avenue, while the Darke County Courthouse at 504 South Broadway houses the General and Domestic Relations Divisions of the Court of Common Pleas, the Clerk of Courts, the Auditor and the Recorder. Three different offices in Greenville answer to three different phone numbers: the probate court at (937) 547-7345, the Clerk of Courts at (937) 547-7335, which serves the general and domestic relations divisions and does not open estates, and the Darke County Recorder at (937) 547-7390, which is where a transfer on death designation affidavit or a certificate of transfer is recorded. Use the number and address the probate court publishes on its own site.
Venue for an Ohio estate is the county where the decedent was a resident at the time of death (R.C. 2113.01). If the person lived in Darke County, file in Darke County Probate Court, even if they died in a hospital in Dayton, Piqua, Troy or across the line in Indiana. Ohio's statute says resident, not domiciled, and the probate court of the county where the will is admitted is the court that grants letters. Ohio has no probate district, circuit or regional overlay: all 88 counties have their own probate court, seated at the county seat (R.C. 2101.01(A)), and Darke County's sits in Greenville.
The jurisdiction process
- Gather the documents. Collect the original signed will if there is one, a certified copy of the death certificate, the applicant's contact details and identification, the names and addresses of the surviving spouse, children, next of kin, legatees and devisees, and a list of the assets and debts with values. A person named in a will to settle the estate is an executor; a person appointed where there is no will is an administrator; Ohio's umbrella term for either, used throughout the Revised Code and the forms, is fiduciary.
- Read the court's own Estate Information handout. Darke County Probate Court publishes a short handout on its forms page that walks through what estate administration is, who may be appointed, what the fiduciary's duties are, and how a release from administration differs from a full administration. It is the closest thing this court publishes to a filing guide. Treat its dollar figures as background only and check them against the statutes and the court's current cost schedule, because the handout is dated 2022 and describes the summary release route with a single combined dollar figure rather than the statutory components.
- Get the statewide forms, because the county publishes none. Ohio uses one set of Standard Probate Forms prescribed by the Supreme Court of Ohio in every county, and the Darke County Probate Court states plainly that it does not provide forms for self-represented filers and that the forms to use are the Supreme Court's. For a full administration the load-bearing items are Form 1.0 (Surviving Spouse, Children, Next of Kin, Legatees, and Devisees), Form 2.0 (Application to Probate Will) where there is a will, and Form 4.0 (Application for Authority to Administer Estate). Before appointment the application must name the surviving spouse and next of kin and state in general terms what the estate consists of and its probable value (R.C. 2113.07). Local Rule 19 requires every filing for which a standard probate form exists to be made on that form, and computer-generated versions must keep the standard numbering.
- File on paper at 300 Garst Avenue or by mail. There is no e-filing and no fax filing in Darke County: take the completed forms to the probate court's counter at 300 Garst Avenue, Greenville, OH 45331 between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. Monday to Friday, or mail them to the same address. Do not go to the county courthouse on South Broadway. If the court's phone does not connect, its home page asks you to email [email protected], and that is the practical way to ask what the office needs on intake.
- Pay the posted deposit. Darke County publishes its own deposit schedule: $300.00 for a full administration, $180.00 for a release from administration, $140.00 for a summary release and $145.00 for a will with a summary release, with the schedule stating that all deposits are applied toward final costs (verified July 2026). Those figures sit on top of Ohio's statutory fee items, including $35.00 to appoint a fiduciary and $15.00 to probate a will (R.C. 2101.16(A)). Ask what to bring before you file, because Appendix A of the court's 2021 local rules still shows $250.00 for an application to probate a will and for an application to appoint an administrator, and the posted web schedule is the newer of the two.
- Take the appointment and collect the letters. On an admitted will the court issues letters testamentary to the executor; with no will it issues letters of administration to the administrator (R.C. 2113.05). Either way the appointment is recorded on Form 4.5 (Entry Appointing Fiduciary; Letter of Authority), and the certified letter of authority is what banks, transfer agents and title companies rely on. Darke County charges $2.00 for a certified copy on its posted schedule, so ask for enough copies for every institution the estate deals with while you are at the counter. Under Local Rule 16 the court will not appoint more than three fiduciaries absent special circumstances set out in the application, and where there are several all of them must sign every paper unless the court says otherwise.
- Send the Medicaid estate recovery notice within 30 days where it applies. Where the decedent or the decedent's spouse was subject to the Medicaid estate recovery program, the person responsible for the estate must submit a completed medicaid estate recovery notice form to the administrator of the medicaid estate recovery program not later than thirty days after letters are granted or an application for release or summary release is filed (R.C. 2117.061). Compliance is certified to the court on Form 7.0, and Darke County's posted schedule carries a $12.00 line for a will and Medicaid filing. This applies to a release from administration too, which surprises people.
- File the inventory within three months. The fiduciary must file an inventory of the decedent's real and personal property within three months after appointment unless the court grants an extension for good cause (R.C. 2115.02), on Form 6.0 (Inventory and Appraisal). Darke County's Local Rule 18 says the court will grant one extension for good cause shown, and that a late inventory draws the same past-due letter and contempt citation procedure the court uses for late accounts. Where the decedent owned real estate and attorney fees will be determined, the attorney for the estate must file with the Inventory and Appraisal a statement that record title has been examined back to the instrument before the decedent acquired the property.
- Handle creditor claims. In Ohio all claims against the estate must be presented within six months after the date of death, whether or not an executor or administrator was appointed in that period, and a claim presented later is forever barred (R.C. 2117.06), subject to the narrow Medicaid estate recovery exception in R.C. 2117.061. Ohio requires no newspaper advertisement of the grant of letters. Darke County's posted schedule charges $16.00 to file a claim, plus $3.00 per additional page.
- Account, then close. The fiduciary must render a final and distributive account within six months after appointment unless one of the statutory exceptions applies, and where the sole heir or beneficiary is also the fiduciary a certificate of termination may be filed instead (R.C. 2109.301). The account goes in on Form 13.0 (Fiduciary's Account) with vouchers or proof supporting every disbursement, keyed into the account by number and presented in the order listed, and the court returns the vouchers to the fiduciary after verifying them against the account (Local Rule 18). Where an attorney's fee is being determined, a computation on the court's own appendix form, signed by both the attorney and the fiduciary, is filed with the final account. Where Ohio real estate passes through the estate, apply for a Certificate of Transfer on Form 12.0 and record the certificate with the Darke County Recorder.
Forms and documents
Probate forms in Darke County
Darke County publishes no local estate forms, and it is unusually direct about it. The court's Probate Forms page states that the Darke County Probate Court does not provide forms for self-represented filings and that law offices may use the forms provided by the Supreme Court of Ohio. Ohio uses one set of Standard Probate Forms prescribed by the Supreme Court of Ohio in all 88 counties, and those are the forms you file in Greenville. Local Rule 19 puts it as a requirement: every filing for which a standard probate form exists must be made on that form, and a computer-generated version must carry the same numbering as the standard form.
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). An out-of-state decedent with Ohio property is handled through ancillary administration on Form 4.1 (R.C. Chapter 2129). 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 two documents Darke County does publish are worth downloading. The Estate Information handout explains estate administration, the fiduciary's duties, what property must be appraised, and how a release from administration differs from a full administration; it is dated 2022, so check its figures against the statutes and the court's current cost schedule. The Public Records Request form is how you ask the court in writing for copies of what is in a file. Neither is a filing form for an estate.
| Resource | What it provides |
|---|---|
| Supreme Court of Ohio Standard Probate Forms, decedent's estate (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | The statewide forms you file in Darke County, including Forms 1.0, 2.0, 4.0, 4.1, 4.5, 5.0, 5.1, 5.10, 6.0, 7.0, 12.0 and 13.0, with the numbered variants and waivers |
| Darke County Probate Court probate forms (darkeprobatejuvenile.org) | The court's own forms page: the statement that it provides no forms for self-represented filers, the Estate Information handout, and the Public Records Request form |
| Darke County Probate Court Estate Information handout (darkeprobatejuvenile.org) | The court's plain-language explanation of estate administration, the fiduciary's duties, appraisals, and the difference between a full administration and a release from administration. Dated 2022, so verify its dollar figures |
| Darke County Probate Division local rules (darkeprobatejuvenile.org) | The court's own rules and appendices: hours (Rule 1), record copies (Rule 2), deposits for court costs (Rule 3 and Appendix A), counsel fees (Rule 6 and Appendices B and D), motions (Rule 11), releases from administration (Rule 13), multiple fiduciaries (Rule 16), exceptions (Rule 17), the case management program for estates (Rule 18) and the standard-form requirement (Rule 19) |
Fees
Darke County Probate Court posts its own court cost and deposit schedule, which is unusual for a small Ohio county and makes the cost of a filing here easy to plan. Ohio fixes the fee ITEMS by statute, including $35.00 to appoint a fiduciary and $15.00 to probate a will (R.C. 2101.16(A)) and $60.00 to relieve an estate from administration or to grant a summary release, and it lets each probate court add its own charges and require an advance deposit for costs of up to $125.00 by local rule (R.C. 2101.16(E)), plus optional computerization and dispute-resolution charges (R.C. 2101.162, R.C. 2101.163). What a reader actually hands over at the counter on Garst Avenue is the posted deposit below, and the court's schedule states that all deposits are applied toward the final costs of the case.
The figures below are the estate-side lines of the court's posted Court Costs and Deposits table, read on the court's own site and verified July 2026. Confirm them before you file: the schedule can change without notice, and Appendix A of the court's 2021 local rules still carries older figures for some of the same filings, including $250.00 for an application to probate a will and $250.00 for an application to appoint an administrator, with a note that deposits may be taken in lesser amounts if the court authorizes it.
| Filing | Deposit |
|---|---|
| Full administration | $300.00 |
| Release from administration | $180.00 |
| Summary release | $140.00 |
| Will and summary release | $145.00 |
| Will for reference only | Exact costs, so ask the court |
| Will and Medicaid filings | $12.00 |
| Claim against the estate | $16.00, plus $3.00 per additional page |
| Certified copy | $2.00 |
| Name change | $200.00 |
| Minor settlement | $100.00 |
| Civil action, land sale, determination of heirship | $150.00, per Appendix A of the court's local rules; the posted web schedule shows $125.00 for civil actions and $150.00 for civil, so confirm which applies to your filing |
| Guardianship of an incompetent person | $300.00 |
| Guardianship of a minor | $200.00 |
Two related figures are worth knowing. Attorney fees are not court costs, but Darke County's local rules attach guideline schedules for counsel fees in a full administration, in a release from administration and in a land sale, and the rules state in capitals that those schedules are not minimum or maximum fee schedules; the court may review a fee on its own motion where applying the percentages produces a disparity. A computation of counsel fees on the court's own appendix form, signed by the attorney and the fiduciary, is filed with the final account, and fees are not paid before the estate is closed without the court's consent. Separately, the court's local rules also attach a computation schedule for administrator and executor compensation under R.C. 2113.35.
Timeline
- Inventory: within three months after appointment (R.C. 2115.02). Darke County's Local Rule 18 states that the court will grant one extension for good cause shown.
- Creditor claims: within six months after the date of death (R.C. 2117.06), subject to the Medicaid estate recovery exception in R.C. 2117.061. This runs from death, not from your appointment, so it may be well under way by the time you are appointed.
- Final account: within six months after appointment unless a statutory exception applies (R.C. 2109.301). Subsequent accounts are due yearly under Local Rule 18.
- Late inventory or account: the court mails a past-due letter in the first week of the quarter following the due date warning that a contempt citation will issue if the filing is not made within 30 days. If nothing is filed within 35 days a citation goes out by certified mail to the fiduciary and by regular mail to the attorney, ordering them to appear and show cause, and the court will not accept the inventory or account for filing until the citation hearing has been held (Local Rule 18).
- Objections to an inventory or an account: set for a pretrial conference within 30 days after the objection is filed, where the issues are narrowed, a discovery timetable is agreed and the hearing date is set (Local Rule 18).
- Land sale that has not closed: any land sale not concluded within six months from the date of filing is set for a pretrial conference within ten days after the six months expire. The attorney of record and the fiduciary must attend, and a written status report addressing the efforts to sell and when the case will close is filed at least seven days before (Local Rule 18).
- Wrongful death settlement: the hearing is held within 30 days of filing the application, or within 15 days after appointment where a guardian or guardian ad litem has to be appointed first (Local Rule 18).
- Estate still open after 27 months: the court sets a review conference, and the fiduciary and the attorney present a status report (Local Rule 18).
Local nuance
Darke County-specific considerations
Three Darke County specifics change what a filer actually does. First, the address: the Probate and Juvenile Court is at 300 Garst Avenue, not in the Darke County Courthouse at 504 South Broadway, which houses the General and Domestic Relations Divisions, the Clerk of Courts, the Auditor and the Recorder. Second, the phone: the court's own home page carries a standing notice that it is experiencing ongoing phone issues and asks the public to email [email protected] if a call does not go through, and a tap-to-call link on the court's Location page carries a wrong final digit, so dial (937) 547-7345 rather than tapping. Third, the hours: the court moved to 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday to Friday effective June 1, 2026, while Local Rule 1 of its 2021 local rules still says the office is open until 4:30 p.m. The posted 4 p.m. closing is the current one.
The court publishes no forms for self-represented filers, and says so directly: its Probate Forms page states that the Darke County Probate Court does not provide forms for self-represented filings and that the forms to use are the ones provided by the Supreme Court of Ohio. What the court does publish is an Estate Information handout and a Public Records Request form. Read the handout for orientation, but treat its numbers with care. It describes the summary release route as available where the estate assets do not exceed $45,000; there is no such threshold in the Revised Code. That figure is the sum of two cited components, the $40,000 allowance for support for a surviving spouse or minor children (R.C. 2106.13) and up to $5,000 of the decedent's funeral and burial expenses (R.C. 2113.031), and the surviving-spouse route carries its own conditions about who has paid the funeral bill. The handout is dated 2022 and Local Rule 12 is older still, and both carry references to a state death-tax filing that no longer applies: Ohio's estate tax was repealed for deaths on or after January 1, 2013, so for a current death there is no state death-tax return and no consent to transfer to obtain.
Two further local rules shape a Darke County filing. Motions and responses must be in writing with the proper case heading and number and accompanied by a memorandum on the related law, and the court rules on the pleadings without a hearing unless a party or the court asks for an oral hearing and the court grants it (Local Rule 11). And the court may grant an exception to any of its local rules on application for good cause shown (Local Rule 17), which is worth knowing if a deadline or a format requirement is a genuine problem in your estate.
Recent updates
| Change | What it means |
|---|---|
| Office hours shortened effective June 1, 2026 | The Darke County Probate/Juvenile Court posted a notice on its own home page that, effective June 1, 2026, its hours are 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. The court's Hours and Location pages now both show 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., where an archived copy of the same page from April 2026 showed 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Local Rule 1 of the court's 2021 local rules still states 4:30 p.m.; the posted hours are the current ones (verified July 2026) |
| Standing phone-outage notice, email route given | The court's home page carries a notice that it is experiencing ongoing phone issues and asks the public to email [email protected] if a call is not going through. The same notice appears in an archived copy of the page from April 2026, so it is not a one-day banner (verified July 2026) |
| Posted deposit schedule now higher than the local rules' appendix | The court's posted Court Costs and Deposits table shows $300.00 for a full administration, while Appendix A of its local rules, in a file dated 2021, still shows $250.00 for an application to probate a will and $250.00 for an application to appoint an administrator. Treat the posted web schedule as current and confirm the total with the court before filing (verified July 2026) |
Page last reviewed: July 2026.
Scenarios
| Situation | Likely path in Darke County | Where Sunset helps |
|---|---|---|
| Surviving spouse, co-owned home | If the Greenville-area home was held jointly with right of survivorship, or was covered by a transfer on death designation affidavit recorded with the Darke County Recorder before death (R.C. 5302.22), it passes to the survivor outside probate and the court is not involved in the house itself. If other assets stood in the decedent's sole name, the spouse files in Darke County Probate Court at 300 Garst Avenue: Form 2.0 and Form 4.0 with a will, leading to letters testamentary, or Form 4.0 alone with no will, leading to letters of administration, on a posted $300.00 full-administration deposit. Where the spouse inherits everything, the estate may qualify to be released from administration rather than fully administered (R.C. 2113.03), a shorter filing on Forms 5.0 and 5.1 with a posted $180.00 deposit. | Asset discovery to confirm how the home and the accounts are titled and what actually has to reach the court. Packet generation for the Darke County filing, whether a full administration or a release. A vetted attorney referral if the title or a claim turns out to be contested. |
| Out-of-state adult child, small estate | Where the whole estate is worth $35,000 or less, or $100,000 or less where a surviving spouse inherits everything, an interested party can apply to relieve the estate from administration on Forms 5.0 and 5.1 instead of running a full administration (R.C. 2113.03). A release still carries the Medicaid estate recovery notice duty where it applies (R.C. 2117.061) and does not shorten the six-month creditor window (R.C. 2117.06). Because Darke County has no e-filing, an out-of-state child files by mail to 300 Garst Avenue, Greenville, OH 45331, and can follow the case afterwards on the court's online record search, which includes estate cases. If the phone will not connect, email [email protected]. | Asset discovery to establish the estate's value from out of state and confirm which route it qualifies for. Packet generation for the release or the full administration, assembled so it can be mailed to Greenville and accepted the first time. |
| Parent settling a predeceased child's estate, home must be sold | Because real property has to be sold, this goes through a full administration: with no will the parent files Form 4.0 in Darke County Probate Court, is appointed administrator, and receives letters of administration; with a will the parent probates it on Form 2.0 and receives letters testamentary. The inventory follows within three months (R.C. 2115.02) on Form 6.0, and where the child owned real estate and attorney fees will be determined, the estate's attorney files a record-title examination statement with the Inventory and Appraisal (Local Rule 18). A land sale that has not concluded within six months of filing is set for a pretrial conference within ten days after those six months, with the fiduciary required to attend and a written status report filed beforehand. Where the property is transferred to heirs rather than sold, the route is a Certificate of Transfer on Form 12.0, recorded with the Darke County Recorder. Any hearing is at 300 Garst Avenue in Greenville. | Asset discovery for the child's accounts, insurance and real property. Packet generation for the administration and the inventory. Attorney referral where the sale, a mortgage payoff or a dispute among heirs makes counsel worthwhile. |
Self-help resources
| Resource | What it offers |
|---|---|
| Darke County Probate/Juvenile Court (darkeprobatejuvenile.org), (937) 547-7345 | The filing office for estates: hours, the 300 Garst Avenue address, the probate phone line, the court cost and deposit schedule, the forms page and the record search. Court staff can explain procedure but are barred from giving legal advice or telling you which forms to file or how to complete them |
| Darke County Probate Court court costs and deposits (darkeprobatejuvenile.org) | The court's posted deposit schedule, including $300.00 for a full administration, $180.00 for a release from administration, $140.00 for a summary release and $2.00 for a certified copy, all applied toward final costs |
| Darke County Probate Court record search (darkeprobatejuvenile.org) | The court's online CaseLook search, covering estate, guardianship, trusteeship, marriage, civil and miscellaneous probate cases, by name, case number or file date. No registration; a CAPTCHA applies, and posting can lag a filing by at least a day |
| Darke County Probate Court Estate Information handout (darkeprobatejuvenile.org) | The court's own plain-language guide to estate administration and the fiduciary's duties. Dated 2022, so verify its dollar figures against the statutes and the current cost schedule |
| Darke County Probate Division local rules (darkeprobatejuvenile.org) | The court's own rules: deposits (Rule 3 and Appendix A), counsel fees (Rule 6), motions (Rule 11), the estate case management program with the inventory, account, citation, objection and land-sale timetables (Rule 18) and the standard-form requirement (Rule 19) |
| Supreme Court of Ohio Standard Probate Forms, decedent's estate (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | The statewide forms used in every Ohio county, including Darke, with the numbered variants and waivers |
| Supreme Court of Ohio, Ohio trial courts directory (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | The official court name and website for the Darke County Court of Common Pleas, Probate Division, alongside the county's general, domestic relations, juvenile and municipal courts |
| Supreme Court of Ohio local rules of court (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | The statewide index that links each county's probate-division local rules, useful if an estate touches more than one county |
| Darke County offices directory (mydarkecounty.com) | Contacts for the county offices an estate touches, including the Darke County Recorder, (937) 547-7390, for a transfer on death designation affidavit or a certificate of transfer, and the Clerk of Courts, (937) 547-7335, which does not open estates |
| Ohio Legal Help (ohiolegalhelp.org) | Plain-language Ohio probate guides, including release from administration and summary release, from a statewide non-profit. Not a government site, so confirm court contact details with the court itself |
| Legal Aid of Western Ohio (lawolaw.org) | Free civil legal help for eligible low-income residents. Ohio Legal Help's legal-aid finder returns this program for Darke County, and LAWO says it serves 32 northwest and west central Ohio counties from offices including Dayton and Springfield. Confirm coverage and that it can take a probate matter before relying on it |
| Ohio Legal Help: find your legal aid (ohiolegalhelp.org) | Confirms which legal-aid program covers a given Ohio county and how to apply |
| Ohio State Bar Association public resources (ohiobar.org) and Supreme Court of Ohio lawyer referral services (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | Ways to find an Ohio probate attorney, and the Supreme Court's list of certified lawyer referral and information services, useful in a county with a small local bar |
When to hire an attorney
Many Darke County estates are uncontested and can be handled without an attorney, particularly where a surviving spouse inherits everything and the estate qualifies to be relieved from administration rather than fully administered. Consider counsel when a will is contested or a dispute among heirs is likely, when farmland, a farm business or other real property has to be sold or divided, when the estate is insolvent or a creditor is pressing a claim inside the six-month window (R.C. 2117.06), when a wrongful-death or injury claim is part of the estate, when the estate includes a business or property across the line in Indiana, or when a guardianship has to run alongside the estate. The practical local factor is that this court publishes no forms for self-represented filers and says so on its own site, its deputy clerks are barred from advising which forms to file or how to complete them, and its Estate Information handout recommends that all fiduciaries seek legal counsel because a fiduciary who does not perform the duties properly can be cited by the court or sued by beneficiaries. Sunset can connect families to a vetted Ohio probate attorney serving Darke County and the surrounding western Ohio counties.
How Sunset helps
Find the accounts and assets. Sunset searches more than 2,300 financial institutions and public records to surface bank and credit-union accounts, retirement plans, brokerage holdings, life insurance, Darke County real estate and unclaimed property, so you know the estate's value and which Ohio route fits for estate settlement before you drive to Greenville.
Generate the probate packet. Sunset assembles the paperwork for your route, whether a full administration or an application to relieve the estate from administration, on the statewide Standard Probate Forms, ready to file on paper with the Darke County Probate Court at 300 Garst Avenue or by mail.
Find a local probate attorney. When a matter is contested or otherwise calls for counsel, Sunset connects families to a vetted Ohio probate attorney serving Darke County.
Sunset is free for families. Revenue comes from bank partners that pay Sunset while estate funds sit in an FDIC-insured estate account ($3M coverage).
Frequently asked questions
Where do I file for probate in Darke County?
With the Darke County Probate Court at 300 Garst Avenue, Greenville, OH 45331. Do not go to the Darke County Courthouse at 504 South Broadway: that building holds the General and Domestic Relations Divisions, the Clerk of Courts, the Auditor and the Recorder, while the Probate and Juvenile Court has its own building on Garst Avenue. The probate court is the probate division of the Darke County Court of Common Pleas (R.C. 2101.01), and because the elected probate judge is also the court's clerk (R.C. 2101.11(A)(1)(a)), estates are filed with the probate court itself and not with the Clerk of Courts. File in Darke County if the person was a resident of the county at the time of death (R.C. 2113.01).
What are the hours and the phone number for the Darke County Probate Court?
The court is open Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., and is closed on all legal holidays under a schedule it publishes. The 4 p.m. closing took effect June 1, 2026; Local Rule 1 of the court's 2021 local rules still says 4:30 p.m., and the posted hours are the current ones. The probate line is (937) 547-7345 and the juvenile line for the same court is (937) 547-7350. Two cautions: the court's home page says it is experiencing ongoing phone issues and asks you to email [email protected] if your call does not go through, and a tap-to-call link on the court's own Location page carries a wrong final digit, so dial 547-7345.
Is there e-filing for probate in Darke County?
No. Darke County Probate Court has no electronic-filing system for estates, and its local rules contain no electronic-filing or fax-filing provision, so everything is filed on paper in person at 300 Garst Avenue or by mail to the same address. The one thing the court takes online is a marriage license application, which is not an estate filing. Ohio has no statewide probate e-filing system: the large metro counties run their own and most rural counties, including Darke, are paper.
Can I look up a Darke County probate case online?
Yes. The court runs an online record search branded CaseLook that covers estate cases as well as guardianships, trusteeships, marriage, civil and miscellaneous probate cases. You accept the court's disclaimer, then search by name, by case number or by file date, and complete a CAPTCHA; there is no registration or login. The court's own notice warns that the gap between a filing and its appearance online can be at least twenty-four hours and may be longer, so for anything you need to rely on, request the record from the court or inspect the file at the office during business hours. The court publishes a Public Records Request form for written requests.
What forms do I need for probate in Darke County?
The statewide Standard Probate Forms prescribed by the Supreme Court of Ohio. The Darke County Probate Court states on its own forms page that it does not provide forms for self-represented filings and that the forms to use are the Supreme Court's, and Local Rule 19 requires every filing for which a standard probate form exists to be made on that form. For a full administration the core items are Form 1.0 (Surviving Spouse, Children, Next of Kin, Legatees, and Devisees), Form 2.0 (Application to Probate Will) if there is a will, Form 4.0 (Application for Authority to Administer Estate), Form 6.0 (Inventory and Appraisal) and Form 13.0 (Fiduciary's Account); for a smaller estate, Forms 5.0 and 5.1 to be relieved from administration. The court does publish an Estate Information handout, which is background reading rather than a form.
How much does it cost to file probate in Darke County?
Darke County posts its own deposit schedule, and those are the numbers to plan around: $300.00 for a full administration, $180.00 for a release from administration, $140.00 for a summary release, $145.00 for a will with a summary release, $16.00 to file a claim plus $3.00 per additional page, and $2.00 for a certified copy, with all deposits applied toward the final costs of the case (verified July 2026). Ohio fixes the underlying fee items by statute, including $35.00 to appoint a fiduciary and $15.00 to probate a will (R.C. 2101.16(A)), and lets each court require an advance deposit for costs of up to $125.00 by local rule (R.C. 2101.16(E)). Confirm the total before you file, because Appendix A of the court's 2021 local rules still shows $250.00 for an application to probate a will and for an application to appoint an administrator.
How long does a Darke County estate take?
The statutory spine is the same everywhere in Ohio: the inventory is due within three months of appointment (R.C. 2115.02), creditor claims must be presented within six months of the date of death (R.C. 2117.06), and a final and distributive account is due within six months of appointment unless a statutory exception applies (R.C. 2109.301). Darke County adds its own enforcement timetable in Local Rule 18: a past-due letter in the first week of the quarter following a missed inventory or account deadline, a contempt citation if nothing is filed within 35 days, and no acceptance of the late filing until the citation hearing has been held. An estate still open after 27 months is set for a review conference with a status report. The court's own Estate Information handout says most estates should be finalized within six months of the fiduciary's appointment.
Do I have to travel to Greenville to settle an estate in Darke County?
Not usually just to file. Papers can be mailed to the probate court at 300 Garst Avenue, Greenville, OH 45331, so a filer at the county's edge or living out of state can open and run an uncontested estate largely by mail, email and phone, and can follow the docket on the court's online record search. Plan on Greenville for a hearing and for picking up certified copies of the letter of authority, which cost $2.00 each on the court's posted schedule and are what banks and title companies ask for. Nothing about telephone or video appearances is published, so ask the court whether a particular hearing can be handled remotely.
Is the probate court the same as the juvenile court in Darke County?
It is the same court and the same judge, in two divisions. One elected judge presides over both the Probate Division and the Juvenile Division of the Darke County Court of Common Pleas, the court brands itself the Darke County Probate/Juvenile Court, and both divisions share the building at 300 Garst Avenue, with separate phone lines: (937) 547-7345 for probate and (937) 547-7350 for juvenile. That arrangement is common in Ohio's smaller counties. Estates, wills, guardianships, trusts and name changes are probate matters. It does not change the law that applies to your estate, but it does mean the office is small, so calling or emailing ahead is worth the time.
The court's handout says a summary release covers estates up to $45,000. Is that right?
Not as a statutory threshold. The Darke County Probate Court's Estate Information handout is dated 2022 and describes the surviving-spouse summary release route as available if the estate assets do not exceed $45,000, but no such figure appears in the Revised Code. The statute measures the estate against the $40,000 allowance for support for a surviving spouse or minor children (R.C. 2106.13) plus an amount, not exceeding $5,000, for the decedent's funeral and burial expenses (R.C. 2113.031), and it attaches conditions about who has paid or is obligated to pay the funeral bill. A non-spouse applicant who has paid the funeral bill works from a much smaller ceiling. Run the arithmetic for your own estate rather than relying on the combined figure, and note that the same handout and Local Rule 12 also refer to a state death-tax filing that no longer applies, because Ohio's estate tax was repealed for deaths on or after January 1, 2013.
Shaped by the families we've helped
Thank you to the thousands of families who have trusted Sunset to help settle their loved ones' estates. This page is shaped by the questions they actually asked and the obstacles they actually hit — and that hard-won experience is what keeps it accurate, current, and genuinely useful to the families who come next.