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Pickaway County, OH Probate Information
Quick facts
| Category | Current rules |
|---|---|
| Court | Pickaway County Probate Court, the probate division of the Pickaway 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 Pickaway County Court of Common Pleas, Probate Division, the court's own site brands it the Pickaway County Probate & Juvenile Court, and the county government styles it the Pickaway County Juvenile & Probate Court. 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 in the courthouse in Circleville. The elected probate judge is also the clerk of the probate court (R.C. 2101.11(A)(1)(a)), and the court staffs its own probate deputy clerks, so estates, wills and guardianships are filed with the probate court directly. The Pickaway County Clerk of Courts, (740) 474-5231, is in the same building and serves the general, criminal and domestic relations work; it does not open estates, and its P.O. Box 280 is not the probate court's mailing address |
| Courthouse | Pickaway County Courthouse, 207 South Court Street, Circleville, OH 43113. The court publishes no room or floor number for the probate office. The 1890 courthouse also houses the general division of the Court of Common Pleas and the Juvenile Division, so ask for the Probate Court when you arrive |
| Mailing address | The court publishes no separate post office box, so mail filings go to 207 South Court Street, Circleville, OH 43113. Under Local Rule 57.4 the court will not return file-stamped copies by mail unless you send the copies you want stamped together with a self-addressed stamped envelope. Call (740) 474-3950 before mailing an original will |
| Phone | (740) 474-3950 for probate. This is the line the court publishes on its Court Contacts page, its Location page, the footer of every page of its site and the title page of its own local rules, and the county publishes the same number (verified July 2026). Two other lines at the same court are not for estates: juvenile is (740) 474-3117 and marriage licenses (740) 474-1524 |
| Fax | (740) 477-3852 for probate, published on the court's Court Contacts page and in Local Rule 57.1. This is a working filing channel, not just an office fax: see the e-filing row. Juvenile's fax, (740) 474-8451, is a different number |
| Office hours | Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., closed on all major holidays. The court publishes those hours on its Court Contacts and Location pages, and its own Local Rule 53.1 states that the Probate Court is open for the transaction of business from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday through Friday, except holidays designated by the court. Two local closures catch people out: the court's published 2026 holiday schedule closes it at noon on the three Circleville Pumpkin Show days, Wednesday October 21, Thursday October 22 and Friday October 23, 2026, and at noon on Christmas Eve, Thursday December 24, 2026 |
| 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)), $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. On top of those items each probate court sets its own advance deposit for costs by local rule, up to $125.00 (R.C. 2101.16(E)), and may add computerization and dispute-resolution charges (R.C. 2101.162, R.C. 2101.163). Pickaway County publishes its own cost per case type on its Probate Costs & Fees page and in Appendix E of its local rules, headed September 2, 2024: $200.00 for a full estate with or without a will, $150.00 for no administration with or without a will, and $100.00 for a summary release with or without a will (verified July 2026). Local Rule 58.1(B) collects the Appendix E amount as a deposit when you file, with any balance of court costs due when an account or entry is filed. Payment is by credit card, debit card, cash or money order; the court accepts no personal checks, and only counsel may use business checks. Confirm the current figures with the court at (740) 474-3950 before you file |
| Local forms | None for an estate application, but the local rules carry local forms as appendices. You file the statewide Standard Probate Forms prescribed by the Supreme Court of Ohio, which is where the court's own Probate Forms menu item sends you. The local rules then add Appendix A-1, the facsimile filing cover page required with any fax filing, Appendix A-2, the credit or debit card authorization form, Appendix B-1, the computation of attorney fees, and Appendix G, the computation schedule for administrator or executor fees. Local Rule 52.1 requires computer-generated forms to reproduce the exact wording and blank lines of the standard forms |
| E-filing | None, but fax filing is permitted. Pickaway County Probate Court runs no electronic-filing system, and its only online payment program belongs to the Juvenile Court. What it does allow is filing by facsimile transmission to (740) 477-3852 under Local Rule 57.1: the fax copy is the effective filing, no source document need be filed afterwards, no extra fee is charged, the Appendix A-1 cover page must accompany it, a filing may not exceed 25 pages, service copies may not be faxed, original wills and codicils are not accepted by fax, and costs must be paid before the filing is accepted. Otherwise you file on paper at the counter in Circleville or by mail |
| Case search | Yes. The court publishes a public online record search, CaseLook, whose case-type filters include estate cases, guardianship cases, trusteeship cases, civil cases, miscellaneous cases and marriage records. You can search by party name, case number, file date or hearing date, and a case page shows the decedent, the fiduciary, the appointment date, a case timeline and the full docket with the costs applied. Estate cases filed as far back as the 1950s came up in a July 2026 search. Document images are not published on it, so copies of filings are requested from the court. The court's own link uses an insecure address that failed on testing; use the secure address https://caselook.pickawaypjcourt.com/search/6503 |
| Remote appearance | Nothing is published. The court's local rules govern recording of proceedings, continuances and courtroom conduct but say nothing about telephone or video appearances, so ask the court at (740) 474-3950 whether a particular hearing can be handled remotely. Local Rule 56.1 requires an application to continue a hearing at least seven days beforehand, absent an emergency |
| Website | https://www.pickawaypjcourt.com/ is the court's own site, carrying the Probate Costs & Fees page, the estates guidance, the local rules and the record search. It is also the site the Supreme Court of Ohio's trial-court directory links for the Pickaway County Probate Division. The court's former domain, pickawaycourt.com, is dead: it now serves a suspended-hosting page, so any older reference to it, and to an email address at it, is stale |
Before you begin — know the assets and liabilities
Before you file anything in Pickaway 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 this county, different published costs: $200.00, $150.00 and $100.00 respectively on the court's own schedule headed September 2, 2024. Those routes and their dollar ceilings are statewide and are explained on the Ohio state page. The court's own estates page publishes what to bring: the death certificate, the original will if there is one, the filing fee, the names and addresses of all next of kin and of anyone named in the will, the funeral bill, and bank account and stock certificate numbers. Turning up without the funeral bill is a common reason a small-estate filing stalls here, because Local Rule 75.2 requires it for both a release and a summary release.
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 recorded transfer on death designation affidavit (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 in Circleville lists the estate accurately the first time.
Which court handles jurisdiction
Pickaway County Probate Court in Circleville is the single probate filing office for the whole county. Everything is at one address, 207 South Court Street, and there is no branch, satellite or district office. The court serves every part of the county's roughly 502 square miles, including Circleville, the county seat and the county's only city, the villages of Ashville, South Bloomfield and Commercial Point in the fast-growing north, and the townships, among them Scioto, Darby, Washington, Walnut, Circleville and Saltcreek. The county's population was estimated at 62,158 in 2024 by the Ohio Department of Development's county profile, and the northern villages and townships along the Columbus edge are where most of the recent growth has been. A family living in Ashville or Commercial Point is closer to Columbus than to Circleville, but the estate of a Pickaway County resident is still filed in Circleville.
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 Pickaway County, file in Pickaway County Probate Court, even if they died in a hospital in Columbus, Chillicothe or Lancaster, which is common here because the county has no large hospital of its own. Ohio's statute says resident, not domiciled, and the probate court in which 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 Pickaway County's sits in Circleville. Proximity to Franklin County makes no difference: a Pickaway County resident's estate does not belong in Columbus.
Several offices share the 1890 courthouse at 207 South Court Street, and only one of them opens estates. Pickaway County Probate Court, reached at (740) 474-3950, is the probate division of the Court of Common Pleas and is where wills, estates, guardianships, trusts, name changes and marriage licenses are handled; the same elected judge also runs the Juvenile Division on (740) 474-3117, so a caller may hear the office answer as the Probate & Juvenile Court. The general division of the Court of Common Pleas, (740) 474-6026, and the Pickaway County Clerk of Courts, (740) 474-5231, handle civil, criminal and domestic relations work and have nothing to do with opening an estate. Two offices you will need are not in the courthouse at all: the Pickaway County Recorder, at 110 Island Road Suite G, records a certificate of transfer for real estate, and the Pickaway County Auditor, at 110 Island Road Suite F, holds the property records the court's Local Rule 61.1 lets a fiduciary use instead of a real estate appraisal.
The jurisdiction process
- Gather what the court asks for. Pickaway County Probate Court publishes the list on its own estates page: the death certificate, the original signed will if there is one, the filing fee, the names and addresses of all next of kin and of every person or entity named in the will, the funeral bill, and bank account and stock certificate numbers. Local Rule 60.2 requires a copy of the death certificate with an Application for Authority to Administer Estate, an Application for Release from Administration or a Summary Release from Administration, and requires you to delete any note of the decedent's Social Security number before filing. 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.
- Pick the route. The court's estates page sets out the three routes it administers and prices them separately: a full estate administration, a relief from administration where the estate is small enough (R.C. 2113.03), and a summary release from administration where it is smaller still and the applicant paid the funeral bill (R.C. 2113.031). The ceilings are statewide and are covered on the Ohio state page. Note one thing about the court's own page: it states the surviving-spouse summary release ceiling as $45,000, which is not a figure in the statute but the sum of the $40,000 allowance for support (R.C. 2106.13) and up to $5,000 of funeral and burial expenses (R.C. 2113.031).
- Get the statewide forms. Ohio uses one set of Standard Probate Forms prescribed by the Supreme Court of Ohio in every county, and Pickaway County publishes no local estate application form of its own; the court's Probate Forms menu item links the Supreme Court's library. 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 60.3 adds a local drafting requirement on Form 1.0: if the decedent was not married you must say so on the form, and where an heir or beneficiary has died you list that person, mark the name deceased, and list the people taking in that person's place indented beneath, so the relationships are apparent on the face of the document.
- File at the counter in Circleville, by mail, or by fax. The counter at 207 South Court Street is open Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Mail goes to the same address, and under Local Rule 57.4 you must enclose the copies you want file-stamped plus a self-addressed stamped envelope to get them back. Fax filing to (740) 477-3852 is permitted under Local Rule 57.1: the faxed copy is the effective filing, no extra fee applies, the Appendix A-1 cover page must go with it, the filing may not exceed 25 pages, service copies may not be faxed, and original wills and codicils are not accepted by fax. Local Rule 57.2 requires a street address for the attorney or fiduciary, with the fiduciary's address being a legal residence, the attorney's Supreme Court registration number on any filing needing an attorney signature, and the case number on every filing and attachment. Under Local Rule 57.3 originals need original signatures, all fiduciaries must sign where there are several, and an attorney may not sign for a fiduciary.
- Pay the county's published cost. The court's Probate Costs & Fees page and Appendix E of its local rules, headed September 2, 2024, both price a full estate with or without a will at $200.00, no administration with or without a will at $150.00, and a summary release with or without a will at $100.00 (verified July 2026). Those figures are deposits under Local Rule 58.1(B) and carry the statutory items inside them, including the $35.00 fiduciary appointment fee and the $15.00 fee to probate a will (R.C. 2101.16(A)). Pay by credit card, debit card, cash or money order; Local Rule 58.1 also allows cashier's, fiduciary, attorney, title company and trust company checks and electronic banking transactions, but no personal checks, and the balance of court costs is paid when a partial or final account or entry is filed.
- Give the notices the local rules put on you. Notice of probate of a will is proved as Civ.R. 73(E) allows (Local Rule 59.1). Where a bond is filed, the surety's name, address and telephone number must be included (Local Rule 59.2). If you are applying to be executor or trustee and you do not live in Ohio, Local Rule 60.1 requires you to hire an Ohio-licensed attorney of record and to do one of three things: place a substantial amount of the decedent's personal assets in a custodial depository in Pickaway County, serve with an Ohio-resident co-fiduciary, or post a bond. Plan for that before you apply, because it can change who applies.
- 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. Pickaway County's schedule prices records at $1.00 per page and authenticated copies at $2.00 to certify plus $1.00 per page, so ask for enough certified copies for every institution the estate deals with while you are at the counter.
- Send the Medicaid estate recovery notice within 30 days where it applies. Ohio requires the person responsible for the estate of a decedent who was subject to the Medicaid estate recovery program, or whose spouse was, to submit a completed medicaid estate recovery notice form to the administrator of the medicaid estate recovery program not later than 30 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. This applies to a release from administration too, which surprises people.
- File the inventory within three months, and expect a non-oral hearing. 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). In Pickaway County, Local Rule 60.5 then has the deputy clerk set a NON-ORAL hearing date and hand the Notice of Hearing back to you or your attorney to serve by certified mail on the surviving spouse and all next of kin in an intestate estate, or on all beneficiaries in a testate estate, unless notice is waived; you may prove delivery with the certified mail card or a printout of the postal tracking result. On valuation, Local Rule 61.1 lets you use the Pickaway County Auditor's property record value for real estate instead of appointing an appraiser, attaching a copy of that valuation to Form 6.1 or Form 5.1, and gives NADA average retail as the value of a motor vehicle. Local Rule 75.8 requires the inventory to give the address and parcel number of any real estate and requires court approval before any estate asset is sold, distributed or spent ahead of the inventory.
- 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 Medicaid estate recovery exception (R.C. 2117.061). Ohio requires no newspaper advertisement of the grant of letters. Local Rule 64.1 requires every valid debt the fiduciary paid to be disclosed in the fiduciary's account.
- 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 on Form 13.6 may be filed instead (R.C. 2109.301). The account goes in on Form 13.0 (Fiduciary's Account) with the itemized receipts and disbursements on Form 13.1 and, under Local Rule 64.3, a Certificate of Service of Account to Heirs or Beneficiaries on Form 13.9. Local Rule 64.2 has every account examined by a deputy clerk first, bars handwritten accounts, requires the closing statement where real estate was sold, and requires all outstanding costs to be paid in full when each account is filed. Where Ohio real estate passes through the estate, apply for a Certificate of Transfer on Form 12.0 and record the certificate with the Pickaway County Recorder at 110 Island Road Suite G, not at the courthouse.
Executor duties
File the annual report while the estate stays open. This is the local duty most often missed. Local Rule 60.4 requires the fiduciary of an estate, or the attorney of record, to file an Annual Report with the court on the anniversary date of the estate opening, explaining the status of the estate and the reason administration is continuing. It sits on top of the statutory accounting duties, so an estate that runs past its first anniversary in Pickaway County owes a filing the Revised Code alone would not call for.
Get court approval before touching an asset ahead of the inventory. Local Rule 75.8(D) requires prior court approval for the sale, distribution or expenditure of any estate or guardianship asset before the inventory is filed. The same rule requires the inventory to give the address and parcel number of the decedent's real estate, lets you attach the appraiser's original signed appraisal instead of having the appraiser sign the inventory itself, and bars approval of the inventory unless any required bond is sufficient. Where several fiduciaries were appointed, all of them sign the inventory.
Value real estate the cheap way if you can. Local Rule 61.1 lets the fiduciary use the market value in the Pickaway County Auditor's property records as the readily ascertainable value of real estate instead of appointing an appraiser, attaching a copy of that valuation to Form 6.1 or Form 5.1, and the same is accepted for land in another Ohio county. If you do appoint an appraiser, the court will approve active Ohio-licensed real estate brokers and salespersons, active members of recognized appraiser associations, and other county residents such as bank loan officers whose experience the court accepts. Coins, stamps, books, artwork and similar items need a separate application naming a specialist appraiser with a statement of qualifications, and a motor vehicle is valued at NADA average retail.
Sign the account personally, and disclose every debt you paid. Local Rule 64.1 requires accounts to be signed personally by the fiduciary with the fiduciary's full name, current residence address and telephone number, requires every appointed fiduciary to sign, and requires all valid debts the fiduciary paid to be disclosed in the account. The attorney cannot sign the account for the fiduciary (Local Rule 57.3(B)).
Follow the court's account format. Local Rule 64.2 has every account submitted to a deputy clerk for examination before it is filed, bars handwritten accounts, requires the itemized receipts and disbursements on Form 13.1 and a closing statement itemizing the disbursements where real estate was sold, and requires all outstanding costs to be paid in full when each account is filed. Vouchers need not be filed in a decedent's estate provided Form 13.0 is filed and the Certificate of Service of Account to Heirs or Beneficiaries on Form 13.9 goes in with it (Local Rules 64.2(D) and 64.3), or you can file vouchers from specific pecuniary beneficiaries with consents from the rest. Unless notice is waived in writing, the fiduciary serves the Notice of Hearing on Account on the surviving spouse and residuary beneficiaries in a testate estate, or on the surviving spouse and next of kin in an intestate estate, and on counsel for any represented party. The court may ask for the supporting calculations, and an account will not be accepted where a required bond does not cover the personal property on hand plus a year's projected income.
Use the court's own fee computation sheets when you ask to be paid. Where the fiduciary or the attorney asks the court to approve compensation, Pickaway County publishes the computation forms: Appendix G is the computation schedule for administrator or executor fees, and Appendix B-1 is the computation of attorney fees, built on the Appendix B schedule the court describes as a guide rather than a minimum or maximum. Local Rules 71.1 to 71.7 govern counsel fees, an attorney serving as fiduciary, early payment of attorney fees, contested fee hearings, contingency fee agreements and extraordinary services, and Local Rule 72.1 provides that an executor or administrator may seek a commission calculated in conformity with R.C. 2113.35.
Forms and documents
Probate forms in Pickaway County
Pickaway County publishes no local estate application forms, and its own site says so by implication: the Probate Forms item in the court's menu links straight to the Supreme Court of Ohio's probate forms library rather than to a county library. Ohio uses one set of Standard Probate Forms prescribed by the Supreme Court of Ohio in all 88 counties. The Supreme Court's own forms page states it plainly: although the forms are provided by the Supreme Court of Ohio, they should be filed in the local county court, and the local court may have additional forms that must be filed. In Pickaway County those additional forms live in the appendices to the court's local rules rather than on a forms page.
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) with Form 6.1 (Schedule of Assets), 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) with Form 13.1 (Receipts and Disbursements), Form 13.6 (Certificate of Termination) and Form 13.9 (Certificate of Service of Account to Heirs or Beneficiaries). Pickaway County's local rules name Forms 1.0, 5.1, 6.1, 13.0, 13.1, 13.6 and 13.9 specifically, so the rules and the current statewide library line up. 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 local additions are the rule appendices. Appendix A-1 is the facsimile filing cover page that must accompany any fax filing, and Appendix A-2 is the credit or debit card authorization form used to pay costs on a fax filing; Local Rule 57.1 requires both, and the card information is kept out of the case file. Appendix B and Appendix B-1 are the court's counsel fee schedule and the computation of attorney fees form, which the court describes as a guide rather than a minimum or maximum. Appendix C and Appendix C-1 cover other fiduciary compensation, Appendix E is the September 2, 2024 cost schedule, and Appendix G is the computation schedule for administrator or executor fees. One formatting rule matters if you use software: Local Rule 52.1 requires computer-generated forms to reproduce the exact wording and the blank lines of the standard forms, and the signature on the filing certifies that they do.
| Resource | What it provides |
|---|---|
| Supreme Court of Ohio Standard Probate Forms, decedent's estate (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | The statewide forms you file in Pickaway County, including Forms 1.0, 2.0, 4.0, 4.5, 5.0, 5.1, 5.10, 6.0, 6.1, 7.0, 12.0, 13.0, 13.1, 13.6 and 13.9, with the numbered waivers and notices |
| Supreme Court of Ohio probate forms library (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | The full probate library the court's own Probate Forms menu item links, covering guardianship, trust, adoption and name-change sets as well as estates, and carrying the note that the local court may require additional forms |
| Pickaway County Probate Division local rules (pickawaypjcourt.com) | The court's own rules and the local forms in their appendices: hours (Rule 53.1), copies (Rule 55.1), fax filing and its cover page (Rule 57.1 with Appendices A-1 and A-2), filing contents and signatures (Rules 57.2 and 57.3), costs (Rule 58.1 with Appendix E), Form 1.0 contents (Rule 60.3), the annual report (Rule 60.4), inventory notice (Rule 60.5), appraisal (Rule 61.1), accounts (Rules 64.1 to 64.3), release from administration (Rule 75.2) and the fee computation schedules (Appendices B, B-1, C, C-1 and G) |
| Pickaway County Probate Court costs and fees (pickawaypjcourt.com) | The court's own cost per case type, including the estate, release, summary release, guardianship, trust and name-change lines, and the accepted forms of payment |
| Pickaway County Probate Court estates guidance (pickawaypjcourt.com) | The court's plain-language description of the three estate routes, the steps in each, and the what-to-bring checklist for a first trip to the counter |
Fees
Ohio splits probate costs in two. Most fee items are set statewide by statute in R.C. 2101.16(A), but the number a family actually pays when it opens an estate is the amount its own probate court sets by local rule: the statute caps a local-rule advance deposit for costs at $125.00 (R.C. 2101.16(E)), and a court may add computerization charges of up to $3.00 and up to $10.00 and a dispute-resolution charge of up to $15.00 (R.C. 2101.162, R.C. 2101.163), so published totals differ county to county. Pickaway County Probate Court publishes its own schedule in two places that agree on every estate line: the Probate Costs & Fees page on its website, and Appendix E of its local rules under the heading September 2, 2024. Local Rule 58.1(B) makes the Appendix E deposit mandatory on filing, states the court will not accept the filing otherwise, and provides that the balance of court costs is paid when the final account, a partial account or an entry is filed. Appendix E itemizes each total, which is how the statutory pieces show through: the release and summary release lines each carry $20.00 to the indigent guardianship fund, matching the allocation in R.C. 2101.16(C), and the full estate, release, summary release, will-for-record and wrongful-death lines each carry a $10.00 computer fund charge and a $3.00 computer research charge, the maximums R.C. 2101.162 allows; a few single-component lines, such as the $25.00 will for deposit, do not. Figures below are the court's own, read July 2026; confirm them at (740) 474-3950 before you file, and note that the adoption lines on the website are higher than those in the September 2024 appendix, so the website is the newer of the two documents.
| Item | Amount | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Full estate, with or without a will | $200.00 | The court's deposit to open a full administration, the same figure whether or not there is a will. Appendix E breaks the $200.00 into five components, among them the $10.00 computer fund and $3.00 computer research charges the court also lists separately on its fees page, which are the maximums R.C. 2101.162 lets a probate court add. The statutory $35.00 fiduciary appointment fee and $15.00 will-probate fee (R.C. 2101.16(A)) come out of this total rather than being charged on top of it (Probate Costs & Fees page and Appendix E, September 2, 2024) |
| No administration, with or without a will | $150.00 | The court's label for an application to relieve an estate from administration (R.C. 2113.03), filed on Forms 5.0 and 5.1. The statutory component is the $60.00 fee for relieving an estate from administration or granting a summary release (R.C. 2101.16(A)), of which $20.00 goes to the county's indigent guardianship fund (R.C. 2101.16(C)), and Appendix E's breakdown of the $150.00 carries exactly that $20.00 indigent guardianship fund share alongside the $10.00 computer fund and $3.00 computer research charges |
| Summary release, with or without a will | $100.00 | The court's line for a summary release from administration (R.C. 2113.031), filed on Form 5.10. Appendix E breaks the $100.00 down the same way as the release line, including the $20.00 indigent guardianship fund share and the $10.00 and $3.00 computerization charges |
| Application and entry to release assets under $200.00 | $50.00 | A short filing the court prices separately for a tiny asset, shown as a single component on Appendix E. Ask the court whether your matter fits this line before assuming it does |
| Real estate only | $50.00 | The court's line where the only thing to be handled is Ohio real estate. The schedule has no separate certificate-of-transfer item, so confirm with the court what a Form 12.0 filing will cost in your case |
| Will for record only, will for deposit only | $50.00 record only, $25.00 deposit only | Filing a will for record where it need not be admitted to probate opens and closes a case, and future activity requires reopening the estate (Local Rule 59.3). Depositing a will with the court for safekeeping during the maker's lifetime costs $25.00, which the court's estates page states as well |
| Reopening an estate or a no-administration case | Varies, call the court | The only estate line on the court's schedule with no fixed figure. Call (740) 474-3950 |
| Wrongful death | $175.00 | Where a wrongful-death claim is administered through the estate. Local Rule 70.1 governs the settlement of wrongful death and survival claims and Local Rule 70.2 sets a status conference |
| Civil actions in probate, such as a complaint to sell real estate or a will contest | $150.00 | The schedule's civils line. A jury trial in a probate civil action needs a further $250.00 deposit within seven days of the entry scheduling it (Local Rule 5.1), and a land sale proceeding carries a title-examination fee of at least $100.00 taxed as costs plus a minimum $250.00 for each appointed guardian ad litem (Local Rule 65.1) |
| Copies and certified copies | $1.00 per page for records, $2.00 to certify plus $1.00 per page | The court's schedule prices records at $1.00 per page and authenticated copies at $2.00 to certify plus $1.00 per page, and an authenticated record application and entry at $15.00. Certified copies of the letter of authority are what banks and title companies ask for. Separately, Local Rule 55.1 gives the first nine pages of any non-confidential public record at no cost, with page ten onward at ten cents per page |
| Computer fund, computer research | $10.00, $3.00 | Charged on the full estate, release, summary release, will-for-record and wrongful-death lines and shown separately on the court's schedule. These are the maximum computerization charges R.C. 2101.162 permits a probate court to add |
| Guardianship, trust, name change | $275.00 incompetent, $175.00 minor, $100.00 trust, $100.00 name change | Not estate filings, but often needed alongside one. An incompetent or emergency guardianship is $275.00 and carries a $150.00 investigator fee, a minor guardianship is $175.00, a conservatorship is $175.00, a trust is $100.00 and an adult or minor name change is $100.00 |
| Accepted payment | Card, cash or money order | The court's page states credit, debit, cash or money order, no personal checks, and business checks only from counsel. Local Rule 58.1(A) also allows cashier's, fiduciary, attorney, title company and trust company checks and electronic banking transactions. The court's online payment program serves the Juvenile Court, not probate |
Timeline
- Filing to appointment: not published. The court publishes no filing-to-hearing window and no hearing calendar for estates. Where a will is being admitted or a fiduciary appointed, ask the deputy clerks at (740) 474-3950 what the current wait is when you file.
- Inventory: within three months after appointment (R.C. 2115.02), on Form 6.0. The deputy clerk then sets a non-oral hearing date on the inventory and returns the Notice of Hearing to you or your attorney to serve by certified mail unless notice is waived (Local Rule 60.5). Non-oral means you are not expected to appear and argue, but the notice still has to go out and the proof of delivery still has to reach the court before the hearing date.
- Release from administration and summary release: the court may waive a noticed hearing where the applicant shows that no beneficiary or creditor will be prejudiced (Local Rule 75.2(A)), which can take a step out of the route where the facts allow. Every summary release applicant, and every commissioner appointed for an estate released from administration, must file a report of distribution within 30 days of the approval or the appointment (Local Rule 75.2(D)).
- Medicaid estate recovery notice: within 30 days of letters being granted or of an application for release or summary release being filed, where the decedent or the decedent's spouse was subject to the program (R.C. 2117.061), certified to the court on Form 7.0.
- Creditor claims: six months after the date of death (R.C. 2117.06), not six months from any advertisement, and Ohio requires no newspaper advertisement of the grant of letters. The one statutory exception is the Medicaid estate recovery program's later window (R.C. 2117.061(D)).
- Annual report while an estate stays open: Pickaway County adds a requirement most Ohio counties do not. Local Rule 60.4 requires the fiduciary or the attorney of record to file an Annual Report with the court on the anniversary date of the estate opening, explaining the status of the estate and why administration is continuing.
- Accounts: a final and distributive account within six months after appointment unless a statutory exception applies (R.C. 2109.301(B)(1)), and otherwise an account not later than thirteen months after appointment unless partial accounts are waived or a certificate of termination is filed (R.C. 2109.301(B)(4)). Local Rule 64.2(M) lets the court extend an account by up to a further six months beyond that thirteen-month point, and says any extension after that needs an application and the fiduciary's personal appearance at a hearing on it, for good cause.
- If a citation issues for a late filing: an account filed under a citation must reach the court no later than 2 p.m. on the day before the citation hearing (Local Rule 64.2(B)). The court can also cite the attorney of record for a delinquent inventory, account or guardian's report and bar new appointments until the delinquency is cured (Local Rule 64.2(N)).
- Continuances and extensions: an application to continue a hearing, pre-trial or trial must be submitted at least seven days before the scheduled date absent an emergency (Local Rule 56.1(B)), and an application to extend the time for an inventory, account or guardian's report must be signed by both the fiduciary and the attorney of record (Local Rule 56.2).
Local nuance
Pickaway County-specific considerations
The court's old website is dead, and so is the email address on it. This is the most likely way to get bad information about this court. Pickaway County Probate Court used to publish at pickawaycourt.com; that domain now serves a suspended-hosting page, and the email address that used to be on it no longer reaches the court. The live site, and the one the Supreme Court of Ohio's trial-court directory links for the Pickaway County Probate Division, is https://www.pickawaypjcourt.com/. The court publishes no email address at all on its current Court Contacts page, so use the phone, the fax or the counter.
You cannot e-file, but you can fax a filing. Pickaway County runs no electronic-filing system, which is normal for a small Ohio county, and its online payment program belongs to the Juvenile Court. What is less usual is that Local Rule 57.1 permits filing by facsimile transmission to (740) 477-3852 and treats the faxed copy as the effective filing, with no requirement to send the source document afterwards, though you must keep it until the case is closed and produce it if the court asks. The conditions are specific: the Appendix A-1 cover page must accompany the filing, a filing may not exceed 25 pages, service copies may not be faxed, an exhibit that will not transmit must be replaced by an insert page and filed separately within five court days, original wills and codicils are not accepted by fax, and nothing is filed until costs are paid, which is what Appendix A-2, the card authorization form, is for. A fax that arrives without the cover-page information can be dropped into a file of failed faxed documents and never filed at all.
Two half-days a year the counter closes at noon for the Pumpkin Show. Circleville's Pumpkin Show is a genuine planning fact for this courthouse, not local color. The court's published 2026 holiday schedule closes it at noon on Wednesday October 21, Thursday October 22 and Friday October 23, 2026, and again at noon on Christmas Eve. Everything else is the usual state and federal holiday list. If you are driving to Circleville in late October, check the schedule first.
An out-of-state executor has to clear a local hurdle. Local Rule 60.1 is the rule most likely to change who applies. An applicant seeking appointment as executor or trustee who does not live in Ohio must employ an Ohio-licensed attorney as attorney of record and must also do one of three things so the assets stay in Pickaway County during administration: place a substantial amount of the decedent's personal assets in a custodial depository in the county, serve with an Ohio-resident co-fiduciary, or post a bond. An out-of-state adult child who expected to handle a parent's estate alone and unrepresented should read that rule before filing.
A release from administration runs through a commissioner here. The court's own estates page describes the release route as including the appointment of a commissioner responsible for paying debts and distributing assets according to the order relieving the estate from administration, followed by a report of distribution with receipts. Local Rule 75.2(D) puts a 30-day deadline on that report. The same rule requires the applicant for either a release or a summary release to exhibit a copy of the death certificate with the Social Security number redacted and a copy of the paid funeral bill or a contract showing the obligation to pay it, and it lets the court waive a noticed hearing where nobody is prejudiced.
The court's own page overstates one small-estate number. The estates page states the summary-release ceilings as $5,000 for a non-spouse applicant and $45,000 for a surviving spouse. The $5,000 figure is statutory (R.C. 2113.031). The $45,000 is not: it is the sum of the $40,000 allowance for support (R.C. 2106.13) and up to $5,000 of funeral and burial expenses, and the spouse route also requires that the funeral expenses were prepaid or that the spouse paid them or is obligated in writing to pay them. Treat the $45,000 as arithmetic, not as a threshold, and check the components against your facts.
The case search is unusually good for a county this size, and its link is broken. The court publishes CaseLook, a public record search whose case-type filters include estate, guardianship, trusteeship, civil and miscellaneous cases as well as marriage records. A case page gives the decedent, the fiduciary, the date of appointment, a timeline showing when letters were issued or a certificate of termination filed, and the docket with the costs applied against the deposit; a July 2026 search returned estate cases filed in the 1950s. Two caveats: document images are not published, so copies come from the court, and the court's own navigation points at an insecure address that failed repeatedly. Use https://caselook.pickawaypjcourt.com/search/6503. The court's disclaimer notes the data can lag a filing by at least twenty-four hours and that verified information must be requested from the court.
Copies are cheap at the counter and the records run deep. Local Rule 55.1 gives you the first nine pages of any non-confidential public record at no cost, with page ten onward at ten cents per page, which is a better rate than the schedule's $1.00 per page for records and worth knowing before you order a large file. The court's genealogy page lists estate records from 1810 to the present, along with marriage records from 1810 and birth and death records from the late 1860s to 1908, and asks for a self-addressed stamped envelope with a mail request.
Recent updates
| Date | Change |
|---|---|
| September 2, 2024 | The court's current probate court costs schedule carries this date. It appears both as Appendix E of the court's local rules, headed PROBATE COURT COSTS September 2, 2024, and on the court's Probate Costs & Fees page, and the two agree on every estate line: $200.00 for a full estate with or without a will, $150.00 for no administration with or without a will, $100.00 for a summary release with or without a will. It is later than the cost and fee update the court's former website announced as effective February 1, 2023. The adoption lines on the website are higher than those in the appendix, so the website is the newer of the two documents; the estate lines are the same in both (source: Pickaway County Probate Court costs and fees page and Appendix E of its local rules, verified July 2026). |
| 2025 | The court changed websites. Pickaway County Probate Court used to publish at pickawaycourt.com; that host now serves a suspended-hosting page, and the email address published on it no longer reaches the court. The live site is pickawaypjcourt.com, which is what the Supreme Court of Ohio's trial-court directory links for the Pickaway County Court of Common Pleas, Probate Division. Archived copies show the former site serving through spring 2025 and the replacement in place by May 2025. Any reference to the old domain, or to an email address at it, is stale (source: Supreme Court of Ohio trial courts directory, the court's own site and the Internet Archive, verified July 2026). |
Page last reviewed: July 2026.
Scenarios
| Situation | Likely path in Pickaway County | Where Sunset helps |
|---|---|---|
| Surviving spouse, co-owned home | If the Circleville-area home was held jointly with right of survivorship, or was covered by a transfer on death designation affidavit recorded with the Pickaway 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. Where other assets stood in the decedent's sole name, the spouse files in Pickaway County Probate Court: Form 2.0 with Form 4.0 and Form 1.0 where there is a will, leading to letters testamentary, or Form 4.0 with Form 1.0 where there is none, leading to letters of administration, at the court's published $200.00 full estate cost. Where the spouse inherits everything, the estate may instead qualify to be relieved from administration on Forms 5.0 and 5.1 (R.C. 2113.03), which the court prices at $150.00 and which can proceed without a noticed hearing where nobody is prejudiced (Local Rule 75.2(A)). Bring the paid funeral bill either way. | Asset discovery to confirm how the home and the accounts are titled and what actually has to reach the court. Packet generation for the Pickaway 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 | Read Local Rule 60.1 first: an out-of-state applicant for appointment as executor must retain an Ohio-licensed attorney of record and must also place a substantial amount of the personal assets in a custodial depository in Pickaway County, serve with an Ohio-resident co-fiduciary, or post a bond. That hurdle does not apply to an application to relieve the estate from administration, so where the estate is small enough an interested party can apply on Forms 5.0 and 5.1 (R.C. 2113.03) for the court's $150.00 cost instead of running a full administration. A release still needs the Medicaid estate recovery notice within 30 days where the program applied (R.C. 2117.061) and does not shorten the six-month creditor window (R.C. 2117.06). With no e-filing, an out-of-state child files by mail to 207 South Court Street, Circleville, OH 43113, or by fax to (740) 477-3852 under Local Rule 57.1, and can watch the docket on the court's CaseLook search rather than flying in. | 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 or faxed to Circleville 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 at the court's $200.00 cost: with no will the parent files Form 4.0 with Form 1.0, 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 Local Rule 61.1 lets the parent use the Pickaway County Auditor's property record value instead of paying an appraiser, attaching that valuation to Form 6.1. Nothing may be sold, distributed or spent before the inventory is filed without court approval (Local Rule 75.8(D)). A sale through the court is a civil proceeding at $150.00, with a title-examination fee of at least $100.00 taxed as costs and a minimum $250.00 for any guardian ad litem (Local Rule 65.1); where the property is transferred to heirs rather than sold, the route is a Certificate of Transfer on Form 12.0, recorded with the Pickaway County Recorder at 110 Island Road Suite G. If the estate is still open a year on, the Annual Report under Local Rule 60.4 comes due. | 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 |
|---|---|
| Pickaway County Probate & Juvenile Court (pickawaypjcourt.com), (740) 474-3950 | The filing office for estates, with the court's own estates guidance, the what-to-bring checklist, the costs and fees page, the local rules and the record search. Deputy clerks can say whether a document is appropriate for filing but, as the court's own disclaimer states, are not permitted to give legal advice |
| Pickaway County Probate Court costs and fees (pickawaypjcourt.com) | The court's own cost per case type, including the $200.00 full estate, $150.00 no administration and $100.00 summary release lines, and the accepted forms of payment |
| Pickaway County Probate Division local rules (pickawaypjcourt.com) | The court's own rules and local forms: hours in Rule 53.1, copies in Rule 55.1, fax filing in Rule 57.1 with the Appendix A-1 cover page, costs in Rule 58.1 with the September 2, 2024 schedule at Appendix E, the annual report in Rule 60.4, inventory notice in Rule 60.5, appraisal in Rule 61.1, accounts in Rules 64.1 to 64.3, and release from administration in Rule 75.2 |
| Pickaway County Probate Court record search, CaseLook (caselook.pickawaypjcourt.com) | The court's public online case search, covering estate, guardianship, trusteeship, civil and miscellaneous cases and marriage records. Use this secure address; the court's own navigation link uses an insecure one that failed on testing. Document images are not published, so copies are requested from the court |
| Pickaway County Probate Court genealogy records (pickawaypjcourt.com) | What the court holds and how to ask for it: estate records from 1810 to the present, marriage records from 1810, and birth and death records from the late 1860s to 1908, with a self-addressed stamped envelope for a mail request |
| Supreme Court of Ohio Standard Probate Forms, decedent's estate (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | The statewide forms used in every Ohio county, including Pickaway, with the numbered waivers and notices |
| Supreme Court of Ohio trial courts directory (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | The official court name and the current link for the Pickaway County Court of Common Pleas, Probate Division, useful for confirming you are on the court's real site |
| 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 Southeast and Central Ohio, Chillicothe office (lasco.org), 740-773-0012 or 800-686-3668 | Free civil legal help for eligible low-income residents. Its Chillicothe office at 73 East Water Street covers Fairfield, Fayette, Jackson, Pickaway, Pike and Ross counties, so this is the legal-aid program for Pickaway County. Confirm 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 lawyer referral (ohiobar.org) | Referrals to Ohio probate attorneys. The court's own FAQ page also points people looking for an attorney to the Pickaway County Bar Association |
| Supreme Court of Ohio registered lawyer referral services (supremecourt.ohio.gov) | The list of lawyer referral and information services registered with the Supreme Court of Ohio, with the geographic area each serves |
When to hire an attorney
Many Pickaway 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 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 out-of-state property, or when a guardianship for a minor or an incompetent adult has to run alongside the estate. Two local factors push toward counsel here. Local Rule 60.1 requires an out-of-state applicant for appointment as executor or trustee to employ an Ohio-licensed attorney of record, so for that applicant a lawyer is not optional. And the court's local rules put real drafting work on the filer, from the Form 1.0 layout in Local Rule 60.3 to the notice service in Local Rule 60.5 and the account format in Local Rule 64.2. The court is explicit that its deputy clerks are not permitted to give legal advice and may only determine whether documents are appropriate for filing. Sunset can connect families to a vetted Ohio probate attorney serving Pickaway County and the surrounding central 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, Pickaway County real estate and unclaimed property, so you know the estate's value and which estate settlement route fits before you file in Circleville.
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 with the Pickaway County Probate Court at the counter, by mail or by fax.
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 Pickaway 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 Pickaway County?
With the Pickaway County Probate Court at the Pickaway County Courthouse, 207 South Court Street, Circleville, OH 43113. It is the probate division of the Pickaway 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, not with the Pickaway County Clerk of Courts, which is in the same building and handles civil, criminal and domestic relations work. File in Pickaway County if the person was a resident of the county at the time of death (R.C. 2113.01), even if they died in a hospital in Columbus or Chillicothe.
Is there e-filing for probate in Pickaway County?
No, but you can fax a filing. Pickaway County Probate Court runs no electronic-filing system, and the online payment program on its site belongs to the Juvenile Court. Local Rule 57.1 does permit filing by facsimile transmission to (740) 477-3852 and treats the faxed copy as the effective filing, with no source document to send afterwards, provided the Appendix A-1 cover page goes with it, the filing is 25 pages or fewer, you do not fax service copies, and costs are paid before the filing is accepted. Original wills and codicils are not accepted by fax. Ohio has no statewide probate e-filing system: the large metro counties run their own and most smaller counties, including Pickaway, are paper.
How much does it cost to file probate in Pickaway County?
The court publishes its own figures on its Probate Costs & Fees page and in Appendix E of its local rules, headed September 2, 2024: $200.00 for a full estate with or without a will, $150.00 for no administration with or without a will, which is the court's label for relieving an estate from administration, and $100.00 for a summary release with or without a will (verified July 2026). Local Rule 58.1(B) collects each amount as a deposit when you file. The deposits include the statutory items, such as the $35.00 fiduciary appointment fee and the $15.00 fee to probate a will (R.C. 2101.16(A)), and they include a $10.00 computer fund and $3.00 computer research charge. Certified copies of the letter of authority cost $2.00 to certify plus $1.00 per page. Pay by credit card, debit card, cash or money order; the court takes no personal checks. Call (740) 474-3950 to confirm before you file.
How do I look up a Pickaway County probate case online?
Use the court's own record search, CaseLook, at caselook.pickawaypjcourt.com. Accept the disclaimer, then search by party name, case number, file date or hearing date with the Estate Cases filter on; guardianship, trusteeship, civil and miscellaneous cases and marriage records are searchable too. A case page shows the decedent, the fiduciary, the appointment date, a timeline of the case and the full docket with costs applied, and a July 2026 search turned up estate cases filed as far back as the 1950s. Document images are not published, so ask the court for copies of filings. Use the secure address: the court's own navigation link uses an insecure one that failed on testing.
What forms do I need for probate in Pickaway County?
The statewide Standard Probate Forms prescribed by the Supreme Court of Ohio. Pickaway County publishes no local estate application form, and the Probate Forms item in the court's menu links the Supreme Court's library. 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 or Form 5.10 for a summary release. The local additions are the appendices to the court's local rules: the Appendix A-1 fax cover page, the Appendix A-2 card authorization, the Appendix B-1 attorney fee computation and the Appendix G administrator or executor fee computation. If you generate forms from software, Local Rule 52.1 requires them to reproduce the standard forms word for word, blank lines included.
What are the hours and the phone number for the Pickaway County Probate Court?
The court is open Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., and is closed on all major holidays. It publishes those hours on its Court Contacts and Location pages, and its own Local Rule 53.1 states the same. The probate line is (740) 474-3950 and the probate fax is (740) 477-3852; juvenile is (740) 474-3117 and marriage licenses (740) 474-1524, and the Pickaway County Clerk of Courts, (740) 474-5231, does not open estates. Two local closures are easy to miss: the court's 2026 holiday schedule closes it at noon on the three Circleville Pumpkin Show days, October 21, 22 and 23, 2026, and at noon on Christmas Eve. The court publishes no email address, and any address at its former pickawaycourt.com domain is dead.
Can I file probate papers by mail in Pickaway County?
Yes. The court publishes no separate post office box, so mail goes to 207 South Court Street, Circleville, OH 43113. Do not use the P.O. Box 280 that appears with the Pickaway County Clerk of Courts, which is a different office. Under Local Rule 57.4 the court will not return file-stamped copies by mail unless you enclose the copies you want stamped and a self-addressed stamped envelope. Call (740) 474-3950 before mailing an original will, and remember that an original will cannot be sent by fax.
Do I have to travel to Circleville to settle an estate in Pickaway County?
Not usually just to file. Papers can be mailed to 207 South Court Street or, within the limits of Local Rule 57.1, faxed to (740) 477-3852, and you can follow the docket on the court's CaseLook search, so a filer living in the north of the county or out of state can run an uncontested estate largely by mail and phone. Plan on Circleville for a hearing and for picking up certified copies of the letter of authority, which banks and title companies ask for. Ask the court at (740) 474-3950 whether a particular hearing can be handled by phone or video: the local rules say nothing about remote appearances, so nothing is published either way.
Is the probate court the same as the juvenile court in Pickaway County?
It is the same court and the same elected judge, in two divisions. One judge presides over both the Probate Division and the Juvenile Division of the Pickaway County Court of Common Pleas, the court brands itself the Pickaway County Probate & Juvenile Court, and both divisions sit at 207 South Court Street, so the phone may be answered that way. The divisions do keep separate lines, separate deputy clerks, separate fax numbers and separate local rules: estates, wills, guardianships, trusts, name changes and marriage licenses are probate matters on (740) 474-3950. The arrangement is common in Ohio's smaller counties and does not change the law that applies to your estate.
Does an estate stay open in Pickaway County without extra filings?
No. Pickaway County adds a local duty most Ohio counties do not: Local Rule 60.4 requires the fiduciary or the attorney of record to file an Annual Report with the court on the anniversary date of the estate opening, explaining the status of the estate and why administration is continuing. That sits on top of the statutory schedule, which asks for a final and distributive account within six months of appointment unless an exception applies and, unless partial accounts are waived or a certificate of termination is filed, an account not later than thirteen months after appointment (R.C. 2109.301). Local Rule 64.2(M) lets the court extend an account by up to six further months beyond that thirteen-month point, and anything later needs an application and the fiduciary's personal appearance at a hearing on it.
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.