St. Johns County Probate Court: Where to File and What to File

Where the St. Johns County Probate Court Actually Sits

St. Johns County probate is heard in the Seventh Judicial Circuit, at the Richard O. Watson Judicial Center at 4010 Lewis Speedway in St. Augustine, where Division 46 takes every probate, guardianship, incapacity, and trust case in the county. Filings go through the St. Johns County Clerk of the Circuit Court and County Comptroller, which answers on the main line at (904) 819-3600 and takes probate email at probate@stjohnsclerk.com.

St. Johns County has one court building and it is not downtown. The judicial center sits inside the county government complex on Lewis Speedway, about two miles north of the historic district, and the historic courthouse buildings downtown take no probate filings. No branch office is published as taking one either, so every estate in the county goes to the same address. The Clerk’s counter runs Monday to Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

St. Johns probate case numbers carry the prefix CP, in the form the division prints in its own subject-line example, and guardianship carries GA on the same pattern.

The probate counter is at the Richard O. Watson Judicial Center, 4010 Lewis Speedway, St. Augustine, FL 32084, Monday to Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., (904) 819-3600. The Clerk publishes no room, no floor and no direct probate line, so the main number is the way in and probate email goes to probate@stjohnsclerk.com. Two local habits are worth knowing before you drive over. The office asks that a death certificate be filed with the original will, which no statute requires and neither neighbouring clerk asks for, and it says plainly that it publishes no probate forms and cannot help you choose one, because the probate rules expect an attorney in most of these cases. St. Johns County has one court building, and no branch office is published as taking a probate filing.

• The clerk’s probate page for St. Johns County
• Seventh Judicial Circuit judges directory
• Administrative orders of the Seventh Judicial Circuit
• Local probate forms and checklists

One thing worth settling before you go any further. The case belongs in the county where the person was domiciled when they died, and Florida law fixes that rather than letting anyone choose it. If your mother lived in St. Johns County, her estate is a St. Johns County case, even if you live in another state and even if a different courthouse would be more convenient for everyone involved. It is the county that decides, not the town, so estates from St. Augustine, St. Augustine Beach, Ponte Vedra Beach, Nocatee, World Golf Village, Hastings, and Fruit Cove are all St. Johns County cases filed with the same clerk. Which division or section then hears the case is a separate question, and the next section answers it.

Which Judges Hear Probate Cases in St. Johns County?

Probate cases in St. Johns County are heard by the judges the chief judge assigns to the division, and the circuit publishes who they are. Knowing who has the division tells you whose procedures apply to your hearing, and how long a judge has had it tells you how settled those procedures are.

• Howard O. McGillin, Jr., Division 46, probate, guardianship and juvenile, chambers in Room 347 and courtroom 355 at the Richard O. Watson Judicial Center in St. Augustine, assigned January 20, 2026, when the current St. Johns assignment order took effect, and the circuit publishes no earlier order to date the assignment from (G-2026-044-SJ, read with the circuit division assignments in G-2026-025-SC (A)).

The circuit’s judicial directory is the source, read on September 16, 2026. Assignments rotate, usually at the start of a calendar year, so check it before a hearing.

How Busy the St. Johns County Probate Court Is

The state court system counts every petition filed in the circuit probate division, and the FY 2024-25 figures for St. Johns County are 854 probate filings, 188 guardianship filings and 7 trust filings, plus 436 Baker Act and Marchman Act cases that the same division carries. The division closed 829 probate cases in the same year. Spread across one judge, that is about 854 new probate cases per judge a year, which is the number behind how long an uncontested order takes to get signed.

Statewide the probate column was 73,282 filings against 141,166 for the whole division in FY 2024-25, so more than a third of what a Florida probate judge signs has nothing to do with an estate. The figures come from the Office of the State Courts Administrator's Statistical Reference Guide, chapter 6, and the next fiscal year's edition usually appears the following autumn.

When the St. Johns County Courthouse Is Closed

Florida sets nine paid state holidays by statute, and a circuit may close on more. The St. Johns County courthouse follows the Seventh Judicial Circuit calendar, which adds Presidents Day, Good Friday, Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur to the statutory nine. The practical point is simple. E-filing accepts a document at any hour, but nothing is reviewed, docketed or signed on a day the courthouse is dark, so a petition filed the night before a closure sits until the next business day, and a deadline counted in days runs on regardless.

There is one caution about counting. A Florida deadline stated in days does not pause for a holiday in the middle of it, and only the last day matters. When the final day of a period falls on a Saturday, a Sunday or a legal holiday, the period runs to the end of the next day that is none of those. The circuit posts the calendar on its court holidays page, read on September 17, 2026, and it publishes the following year well in advance.

How a Case Gets Filed in St. Johns County Today

Florida runs one statewide electronic filing system, the Florida Courts E-Filing Portal, and every circuit court in the state receives filings through it. Attorneys have no choice about it. The rule says attorneys must file through the portal, and no other method is permitted except in the narrow situations the rule itself lists.

A self-represented person is in a different position, and this is the part almost nobody is told. You may elect to register for the portal and file electronically, or you may hand or mail paper to the clerk, who converts it to electronic format for the official court file. Both routes are proper and both land in the same queue. One caution rides along with the choice. Once you elect to file electronically, you cannot go back to paper without the court’s permission.

Registering costs nothing and filing itself costs nothing. What you pay is the statutory filing fee for the case, plus a payment convenience fee that depends on whether you pay by card or by electronic check.

The practical consequence is that a St. Johns County estate does not require anyone to be in Florida. An out-of-state family can open, run, and close a case from a kitchen table in another state, because the filings, the notices, and the proposed orders all move electronically. The exceptions are physical documents, and there are only a few of them.

A St. Johns case is filed once and stays in Division 46, so there is no ratio, no ZIP code test, and no second courthouse to plan around. What is worth knowing is how much else that division carries. The assignment order gives the same judge juvenile delinquency and dependency, injunctions, vulnerable adult exploitation injunctions, and Adult Protective Services Act cases alongside every estate in the county, which is the calendar your uncontested order is waiting in. The friction in this county is documentary and it is about appearance, because anything longer than 30 minutes is in person unless the court says otherwise.

Are St. Johns County Probate Hearings Remote?

Probate hearings in St. Johns County can be held remotely on Zoom, and the division decides which matters must be in person. The court keeps a hybrid virtual courtroom under the remote appearance rule, and Division 46 publishes its room as Zoom meeting ID 3484746646 with password 384320 unless the notice of hearing says otherwise. Every hearing longer than 30 minutes is in person by default. A request to appear by communication technology is made by motion, unless the court authorized it when the hearing was set, and the deadline to ask is close of business two days before the hearing. Participants rename themselves on screen to their real name, and a party presenting a witness by video is expected to have rehearsed screen sharing with that witness beforehand. Hearing time comes from the judicial assistant, and labelling a motion an emergency does nothing unless the motion recites facts showing a genuine one. A court reporter appearing by video must meet the circuit’s 2023 order on reporter qualifications.

The division’s remote hearing instructions carry the current links and the dress and conduct rules, which judges enforce on camera exactly as they do in the room.

Where the Original Will Goes

Here is the rule that catches almost everyone, and it is stricter than families expect. Whoever is holding the original will has to deposit it with the clerk of the court that has venue over the estate, within 10 days of receiving information that the person has died. Read that trigger carefully. The clock does not start at the death, it starts when the custodian learns of the death, and the duty belongs to that custodian personally. It does not wait for a lawyer, it does not wait for the family to agree on anything, and it applies whether or not anybody intends to open a probate case. When the will goes in, the clerk also wants the date of death or the last four digits of the deceased person’s Social Security number.

The original itself travels on paper. Whatever a county does about an electronic copy, the physical document has to reach the clerk, and how it gets there is settled county by county rather than statewide. The original goes to the Clerk on paper within 10 days of learning of the death, with the date of death or the last four digits of the Social Security number. The St. Johns Clerk then adds a preference of its own that no statute carries and neither neighbouring clerk asks for, which is that the death certificate be filed together with the original will. One more piece of housekeeping belongs to the filer rather than to the Clerk. Where the will was deposited separately from the petition, the division expects the filer to confirm that a copy of the will was moved into the probate case, and it says so in terms.

Three things families routinely get wrong here are worth naming. Depositing the will is not probating it, so handing the original to the clerk does not open an estate, does not appoint anyone, and does not make you responsible for the debts. It is a filing, not a job. A copy is not a substitute either, because a court can admit a lost or destroyed will but proving one is a separate proceeding with a heavier burden, which is a poor trade for a document that could have been walked to a counter. And sitting on a will is a genuinely bad idea. A custodian can be compelled to produce it, and where the court finds there was no just or reasonable cause for holding it back, Florida awards costs, damages, and a reasonable attorney fee against that person personally.

Two small mercies. If the original goes in attached to the petition, Florida treats it as deposited, so it is not a second errand. And once the clerk has it, the original is kept in its original form for at least 20 years whether or not it is ever admitted to probate. Scanning a will does not replace it.

Which Forms You Actually Need

The honest answer surprises people, so here it is plainly. Florida has an official statewide form set for family law, approved by the Supreme Court and free for anyone to use. It has never built the same thing for probate. The state’s own self-help service says as much, telling visitors that it does not provide any forms related to the probate process and to ask a lawyer which form is needed.

So when you search for the St. Johns County probate forms, you are looking for something that does not exist as one official packet, which is why the results are a scatter of clerk pages, circuit pages, and companies selling you a template. What actually controls comes from three layers, and you need all three.

• The Florida Probate Rules, which prescribe contents rather than forms. The rule on the petition for administration lists eleven things the petition must state, from the decedent’s domicile to whether the proposed personal representative has been convicted of a felony. A document that satisfies the rule is legally sufficient even if it looks nothing like anyone’s template. The rules do carry a small set of forms of their own, but they are almost entirely guardianship forms, and the rules say outright that those forms are not intended to be part of the rules and are provided for convenience only. The one decedent-estate form actually written into the probate rules is the oath of the personal representative.
• The practitioner form set. Most Florida probate documents you will ever see are built from a numbered probate form set published by a private nonprofit and sold commercially. Lawyers treat it as the standard. It is not court-approved, and nothing obliges a court to accept it.
• The local layer, which is the one that rejects you. St. Johns is the county where the court, rather than the Clerk, holds the rulebook. The Clerk says outright that it publishes no probate forms and cannot help you choose one, because the probate rules expect an attorney in most of these cases. What governs instead is the Division 46 Standard Judicial Practices, and it is more detailed than anything the neighbouring counties publish. Three of its requirements decide whether a filing moves. A petition to determine homestead status filed without an administration is allowed here, and the division requires its own checklist emailed to the division mailbox at the same moment the petition is filed, which is the one hard local gate in a St. Johns estate. Proposed orders go to that same mailbox in Word or RTF, with the case number and the case name in the subject line and nothing else, and every one of them needs a cover email that either certifies that all parties agree or identifies the disagreement. In a probate matter that needs no hearing, the proposed order is submitted at the same time as the petition rather than later, and an order coming out of a hearing goes in within 10 days. One formatting rule catches drafters who have never filed here. The signature block may not sit alone on a page, because a blank signature page has been used to forge a judge’s signature, so at least one line of substantive text has to share the page with the Done and Ordered paragraph.

So start at the bottom of that list rather than the top. The circuit and the clerk publish what they want on their own forms and checklists page, and half an hour there before you draft anything is the cheapest half hour in the case.

The Administrative Orders That Govern Probate in St. Johns County

Each circuit adds its own layer on top of the Florida Probate Rules through administrative orders signed by the chief judge and the procedures each division publishes, and that layer is where a petition gets rejected. These are the orders that govern probate practice in St. Johns County as of September 16, 2026.

• G-2026-044-SJ, Assignment of Cases in Circuit Court, St. Johns County (signed December 31, 2025, effective January 20, 2026). Section C(1) sends every probate, guardianship, incapacity and trust case in the county to Division 46, along with juvenile delinquency and dependency, injunctions, vulnerable adult exploitation injunctions and Adult Protective Services Act cases, so one judge carries all of it.
• G-2026-025-SC (A), Circuit Division Assignments (signed January 7, 2026, effective January 20, 2026). Names the judge in every circuit division across the four counties, and puts Judge McGillin in Division 46.
• PB-2009-022-SC, Adversary Case Style on Probate Pleadings (May 22, 2009). A pleading that the probate rules make adversary is returned unfiled by the Clerk if its caption does not carry the adversary case style.
• PB-2022-019-SC, Motions to Compel Discovery in Probate Actions (September 30, 2022). No motion to compel discovery in a probate or guardianship case unless written notice of the deficiencies was given, 10 days were allowed to cure, and the notice is attached to the motion.
• PB-2022-018-SC, Guardianship Examining Committees (September 30, 2022). Guardianship only. The court keeps a list of qualified examining-committee members, and the petitioner confirms that each proposed member is willing before submitting the committee.
• PB-2019-006-SC, Guardianship Education Requirements (February 25, 2019). Guardianship only. Names the approved guardian-education providers for family guardians, and does not reach professional guardians.
• PB-2000-001-SC, Codification of Administrative Orders in the Probate, Guardianship, and Mental Health Division (October 4, 2000). The numbering key for the probate orders, by subject, year and number, with SC for a circuit-wide order and a county suffix for a single county, which is how you tell a Volusia-only order from one that reaches St. Johns.

The division also publishes its own procedures, last revised January 21, 2025, and the points a filer most needs are these.

• Proposed orders go to division46@circuit7.org in Word or RTF, and the subject line carries the case number and the case name and nothing else. Every proposed order needs a cover email that either certifies that all parties agree or identifies the disagreement. In a probate or guardianship matter that needs no hearing, the proposed order is submitted at the same time as the motion or petition, and an order coming out of a hearing goes in within 10 days.
• A petition to determine homestead status filed without an administration is allowed here, and the division requires its own checklist emailed to division46@circuit7.org at the same moment the petition is filed. The homestead checklist is the one hard local gate in a St. Johns estate, and it sits on the circuit site rather than with the Clerk.
• If the original will was deposited separately from the petition, the filer has to make sure the Clerk moved a copy of the will into the probate case. The division puts that job on the filer rather than on the Clerk.
• An incapacity or guardianship filing triggers an immediate email to the division carrying a proposed order appointing an attorney for the alleged incapacitated person, with the name left blank, and a proposed order appointing the examining committee, and the filer confirms that all three committee members are available first.
• The signature block may not sit alone on a page. At least one line of substantive text has to share the page with the Done and Ordered paragraph, and the division says why, because a blank signature page has been used to forge a judge’s signature.
• A continuance motion states the opposing party’s position or it is denied. A hearing is cancelled only on a complete settlement placed in the file first, and a cancellation notice filed inside 48 hours of the hearing is treated as insufficient. Case law may be submitted up to two business days before a hearing, highlighted identically for the other side and carrying no notations, and physical exhibits go to the Clerk to be pre-marked by close of business the day before.
• Every party and every lawyer attends docket sounding in person, which the court treats as the first day of trial. Witness and exhibit lists are due two business days before pretrial and the joint pretrial stipulation two business days before docket sounding, with sanctions available for either failure. The division also runs a quarterly open meeting on probate and guardianship administration in St. Johns County for attorneys, paralegals, professional guardians and examining-committee members, and you ask to be added by emailing the division.

The full procedures are on the court’s site, and they change more often than the statutes do.

The Checklist for Opening an Estate in St. Johns County

This is the sequence for a formal administration, which is the full version. A smaller estate skips most of it, and the section after this one covers that. Each step below happens in this order for a reason, because the later ones depend on the earlier ones being done.

1. Order certified death certificates. The funeral home usually orders them and will ask how many you want. Ask for more than feels sensible, often five to ten, because the court, each bank, each insurer, and the property records all want their own certified copy, and reordering later is slow.
2. Find the original will and deposit it with the clerk. The 10-day clock runs from when the custodian learns of the death, not from when anyone files anything, and it is the one deadline that can already be running while the family is still planning a funeral. Where the original goes in St. Johns County is above, and it is never just a matter of uploading it.
3. Decide which kind of administration the estate needs. Formal administration is the default. Summary administration and disposition without administration are lighter and cheaper, and they are worth ruling out before you file anything, because you cannot un-file a formal case cheaply.
4. Confirm the county. Venue follows the decedent’s domicile at death, or for someone who lived out of state, a county where they owned property. This is one of the few things in probate that is genuinely hard to fix later.
5. Prepare and e-file the petition for administration, with the local extras. The petition is verified, meaning signed under penalty of perjury, and it has to name every interested person, which is the line that most often comes back to bite an estate later. File it with whatever St. Johns County adds on top, because that is what a rejection is usually about. The filing fee is $400.
6. File the oath, the address designation, and the designation of resident agent. All three are due before letters issue. The oath is a sworn promise to faithfully administer the estate, and the appointment rests on it. The address designation puts the representative’s street and mailing address on the record. The resident agent designation, signed by the agent accepting the job, is required unless the representative is a corporate fiduciary with a Florida office or a Florida Bar member who lives and keeps an office in Florida, which in practice means nearly every family representative files one and the attorney usually is the agent. These can be folded into the petition or the oath rather than filed separately.
7. Get the order and the letters of administration. Once the petition is in and the will is admitted, the court appoints the representative, sets or waives bond, and confirms the oath and resident agent papers are on file. Letters of administration then issue, and the letters are the thing that carries weight in the outside world. Order roughly ten certified copies at once, because banks, brokerages, and title companies each keep one and many will not accept letters more than 60 to 90 days old.
8. Get an estate tax identification number and open the estate account. This comes right after the letters and before anything else useful can happen, because no bank will open an account for the estate without both.
9. Serve the notice of administration. Florida says promptly rather than naming a day count. It goes to the surviving spouse, the beneficiaries, anyone who may be entitled to exempt property, and the trustee and qualified beneficiaries of certain trusts. Service starts a 3-month clock for the person served to challenge the validity of the will, the venue, or the court’s jurisdiction, and after that those objections are barred. That deadline is close to unextendable, because Florida allows an extension only for estoppel based on a misstatement by the personal representative about the deadline itself, and expressly not for failure to disclose information or for other misconduct. The clock also runs only against people who were actually served, so leaving someone off the list does not save time, it leaves the case open. The same notice starts a 4-month window to claim exempt property and a 6-month window for a surviving spouse to elect against the estate.
10. Publish the notice to creditors, serve the ones you know about, and document the search. The notice runs in a newspaper in the county once a week for two consecutive weeks. An unknown creditor then has 3 months from the first publication, and a creditor who had to be served gets the later of that or 30 days from service. The representative has to make a diligent search for reasonably ascertainable creditors, though Florida does not demand an impracticable one, and a verified statement about that search goes in within 4 months of the first publication, with proof of publication filed within 45 days. One item gets missed constantly. If the person who died was 55 or older, a copy of the notice and a death certificate go to Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration within 3 months of the first publication. And a reasonably ascertainable creditor who was never served keeps a claim for up to two years from the death.
11. File the inventory within 60 days of the letters, then close the estate. The inventory lists each asset at its date-of-death value and is served on the residuary beneficiaries and the surviving spouse. After the creditor period runs and the claims are resolved, the estate distributes and the representative files a final accounting and a petition for discharge. Florida puts a real deadline on that too, generally within 12 months after the letters issued for an estate that files no federal estate tax return. A straightforward case runs 6 to 12 months from letters to discharge, and the creditor window is what sets the floor.

What It Costs to File in St. Johns County

These are the charges the clerk posts, not anyone’s legal fee.

Posted August 2026. Fee schedules move, so confirm the current charge with the clerk before you file. The reason the number looks the same everywhere is that it is the same number. Florida law sets the base charge for opening a formal administration and adds a small statutory service charge on top, so the entire statewide spread across the ten largest counties is one dollar. Our county-by-county filing fee study has all ten posted schedules.

And then there is the number that dwarfs every line above. Florida publishes an attorney fee schedule that is presumed reasonable and scales with the size of the estate, and it is a ceiling the estate may agree to rather than a mandate. On a $100,000 estate the schedule calls $3,000 reasonable. That, not the clerk’s $400, is what probate costs a family. You can run your own numbers in the Florida probate cost calculator.

When the Estate Does Not Need All of This

Before you open a formal administration, rule out the three lighter paths, in this order.

• No probate at all. Only assets in the deceased person’s sole name with no other instruction go through probate. Life insurance and retirement accounts with a named beneficiary, pay-on-death bank accounts, jointly held property with survivorship, property in a funded trust, and a home that passed under a lady bird deed all move without a court case. Sometimes the whole estate turns out to be in that category. Our page on whether you need probate in Florida walks the test.
• Disposition without administration. For the smallest estates, with no real property and not much more than the final bills, whoever paid those bills can ask the clerk to release what is left. It is a request rather than a case, and it costs $231 here. See how disposition without administration works.
• Summary administration. Available when the probate estate is worth $150,000 or less after exempt property, a threshold raised from $75,000 on July 1, 2026, or when the person died more than two years ago. No personal representative is appointed, and the case can close in weeks rather than months. The summary administration guide has a short qualifier.

One warning about that last figure, because it will confuse you if you go looking. Florida publishes its statutes once a year, and the edition on the official statute site still shows the old $75,000 line. The increase to $150,000 is real, it came from a 2026 session law, and the probate rule on summary administration has already been amended to match. Check the rule rather than the posted statute until the new edition appears.

If none of the three fits, the estate needs a formal administration, and the checklist above is the map.

Doing It Yourself, and Where Families Stop

Florida does not require you to hire anyone to file a document. It does require something else, and this is where most families stop. Under the Florida Probate Rules, every personal representative has to be represented by an attorney admitted to practice in Florida unless the representative remains the sole interested person in the estate, or is a Florida-admitted lawyer appearing for himself or herself in that role. Those are the only exceptions. Read it as the practical test it is. One heir, nobody else with an interest, no creditors, and you may proceed alone. A second sibling, or a creditor, and the court expects counsel regardless of how well everyone is getting along.

The smaller paths are different. Disposition without administration is designed to be done without a lawyer, and clerks routinely help with it. Summary administration sits in between, simple on its face and easy to get wrong in ways that surface years later when someone tries to sell the house.

If you do want counsel for a St. Johns County estate, our probate attorney page for St. Augustine covers what we charge and how the remote process works. And if you would rather do it yourself, nothing on this page is holding anything back. Everything above is the actual sequence.

What Changed at the St. Johns County Probate Court This Year

Court practice changes without much announcement. These are the developments in the last year that affect a St. Johns County probate filer, each with its source.

• January 20, 2026. The St. Johns case assignment order was reissued as G-2026-044-SJ, signed December 31, 2025, and probate stayed in Division 46 with Judge McGillin. Source.
• March 11, 2026. The circuit announced the retirement of Circuit Judge Randell H. Rowe, III, who held Division 02, Volusia circuit civil, so no St. Johns probate case moved. Source.
• September 21, 2026. Courthouses in all four counties of the circuit close Monday, September 21, for Yom Kippur and reopen Tuesday, September 22, and the circuit’s 2026 holiday list also carries Rosh Hashanah on September 11. Source.

Frequently Asked Questions

Common Situations

The homestead petition that went nowhere. A son filed a stand-alone petition to determine homestead on his mother’s house in St. Augustine, with no administration open, which this division allows. The petition sat. Division 46 wants its homestead checklist emailed to the division at the same moment the petition is filed, and nothing had been emailed. The petition was correct in every line, and the title company still waited two months for an order.

The docket sounding that could not be attended from New Jersey. A daughter in New Jersey ran her mother’s St. Augustine estate from her kitchen table, which the e-filing portal makes entirely possible, until a sibling objected and the case was set for trial. Every party and every lawyer attends docket sounding in this division in person, and the court treats it as the first day of trial. The uncontested half of a Florida probate travels well. The contested half buys plane tickets.

Sources of Law

Statutes and rules retrieved August 19, 2026. Court, clerk, and filing-fee data retrieved on the dates noted. Local requirements change without much announcement, so confirm the current version at the links above before you file.

• Rules cited are the Florida Probate Rules, current through the opinion issued July 16, 2026, and the Florida Rules of General Practice and Judicial Administration, effective July 1, 2026.
• Filing. Fla. R. Gen. Prac. & Jud. Admin. 2.525(b)(1) (attorneys must file through the portal; no other method permitted except as the rule provides), 2.525(b)(2) (an unrepresented party may elect to file through the portal, and once made the election may not be withdrawn without leave of court), 2.525(c)(1)(A) (a paper document may be submitted to the clerk, who converts it, where filed by an unrepresented party who has not elected). Filings move through the Florida Courts E-Filing Portal, operated by the Florida Courts E-Filing Authority, which states there is no cost to register and no fee to file electronically, apart from the statutory filing fee and a convenience fee based on the payment method.
• The original will. Fla. Stat. §732.901(1) (custodian must deposit within 10 days after receiving information that the testator is dead, with the clerk having venue, supplying the date of death or the last four digits of the social security number), (2) (custodian may be compelled; costs, damages, and a reasonable attorney fee where there was no just or reasonable cause), (3) (an original submitted with a petition is deemed deposited), (4) (clerk preserves the original in original form for at least 20 years; digitizing does not eliminate the requirement). Fla. Prob. R. 5.043 (deposit of wills and codicils; retained in original form).
• Opening the estate. Venue, Fla. Stat. §733.101. Petition, §733.202 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.200 (the eleven required contents). Preference in appointment, §733.301. Nonresident personal representatives, §733.304. Oath before letters, Fla. Prob. R. 5.320 (which also carries the only decedent-estate form written into the rules). Address designation and designation of resident agent with acceptance, both before letters, with the corporate-fiduciary and Florida-Bar-member exceptions, Fla. Prob. R. 5.110. Issuance of letters and bond, Fla. Prob. R. 5.235 and §733.213.
• Notices and claims. Notice of administration served promptly, the persons served, the 3-month objection window for the validity of the will, venue, or jurisdiction, and the estoppel-only extension, Fla. Stat. §733.212 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.240 (exempt property 4 months, elective share 6 months). Notice to creditors published once a week for 2 consecutive weeks, the diligent search for reasonably ascertainable creditors, and notice to the Agency for Health Care Administration within 3 months where the decedent was 55 or older, Fla. Stat. §733.2121 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.241 (proof of publication within 45 days; verified statement of the search within 4 months). Claim deadlines, the later of 3 months from first publication or 30 days from service, §733.702. Two-year bar after death whether or not letters ever issued, §733.710.
• Running and closing. Inventory within 60 days after issuance of letters at date-of-death value, Fla. Stat. §733.604 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.340. Final accounting and petition for discharge within 12 months after issuance of letters for an estate filing no federal estate tax return, Fla. Prob. R. 5.400(c). Attorney required for the personal representative unless the representative remains the sole interested person or is a Florida-admitted attorney appearing in that role, Fla. Prob. R. 5.030(a). Presumed-reasonable attorney compensation, §733.6171.
• Smaller estates. Summary administration, Fla. Stat. §735.201 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.530(a)(7). Reading note. The statute as officially published still shows $75,000, because Florida publishes its statutes annually and the 2026 edition is not yet posted. The $150,000 figure comes from CS/HB 1337 (2026), ch. 2026-57, Laws of Florida, section 7, effective July 1, 2026, and Rule 5.530 has been amended to match. Disposition without administration, §735.301.
• Forms. The Florida Probate Rules place their forms in Part V and state that the forms are not intended to be part of the rules and are provided for convenience only; the Part V set is essentially guardianship forms. The Florida State Courts System’s self-help service states that Florida Courts Help does not provide any forms related to the probate process, in contrast with the Supreme Court-approved family law forms. The practitioner form set commonly used in Florida probate is published and sold by a private nonprofit and is not court-approved.
• Cost. Probate filing service charges, Fla. Stat. §28.2401. Posted St. Johns County charges read from the clerk’s own schedule, retrieved 2026-08-09; all ten largest counties are documented in our probate cost by county study.
• Caseload. Florida Office of the State Courts Administrator, FY 2024-25 Statistical Reference Guide, Chapter 6, Circuit Probate, tables of filings and dispositions by circuit, county and category, retrieved September 15, 2026.
• St. Johns County local court layer, retrieved September 16, 2026, from the judicial directory · G-2026-044-SJ · G-2026-025-SC (A) · PB-2009-022-SC · PB-2022-019-SC · PB-2022-018-SC · PB-2019-006-SC · PB-2000-001-SC. Judge assignments come from the circuit’s assignment orders cited above. The parking and coffee notes are conveniences for visitors, not court information, and the research file with every source is reference/research/probate-court-pilot/st-johns-county.md.
• St. Johns County practice, retrieved 2026-08-12: clerk probate page · Seventh Judicial Circuit administrative orders · judges directory · local forms and checklists.

Updated on September 16, 2026. Reviewed by Kevin D. Klagge, Esq., Fla. Bar No. 99502. Attorney Kevin Klagge represents families, businesses, and international clients in estate and tax planning, business structuring, and international law, with a focus on Florida legal tools. He litigates estate and business issues in court. This page is general information about Florida court procedure, not legal advice, and no attorney-client relationship is created by reading it. Court addresses, local checklists, and clerk charges change; confirm them at the official links before you file. We serve St. Augustine residents wherever you are, and this is not a St. Johns County office.