Updated September 6, 2026. Quick answer: In New Jersey, this role is called an agent for service of process (commonly called “registered agent”; the LLC Act’s own text just says “agent”), governed by N.J.S.A. 42:2C-14 (office and agent for service of process required), Section 42:2C-15 (change of designated office or agent), Section 42:2C-17 (service on the filing office when no agent can be found). New Jersey is the only one of these states, in the sources reviewed this session, where a missing registered agent triggers no dissolution/cancellation clock; the state Division of Revenue simply substitutes as permanent default agent under 42:2C-17, unlike Ohio’s 30-day cancellation or New Mexico’s 30-day revocation ground.
What the address rule requires
The LLC Act requires a continuously maintained “office, which need not be a place of its activity in this State”, plus an agent there; the official Certificate of Change form (L-122) requires a New Jersey street address for the registered office, though the statute text itself (42:2C-14) does not spell out a P.O.-box prohibition in so many words.
Who can serve as your registered agent
Per 42:2C-14, the agent must be “an individual who is a resident of this State or other person with authority to transact business in this State”; an NJ-resident individual, or a domestic or foreign entity authorized to transact business in NJ.
What happens if you don’t have one
Per 42:2C-17, if the LLC has no agent, or the agent cannot be found with reasonable diligence at its address, the state “filing office” (NJ Division of Revenue and Enterprise Services) itself becomes the LLC’s agent for service; process delivered there is forwarded by mail to the LLC’s registered or principal office. The statute text reviewed (42:2C-14/15/17) does not tie a missing agent to administrative dissolution; the consequence is that service of process routes to the state filing office indefinitely (42:2C-17) rather than the LLC losing its status. No dissolution-for-no-agent provision was located in this session’s research.
How to change your registered agent
$25.00 to file Form L-122 (Certificate of Change: Registered Agent/Office) with the NJ Division of Revenue, check payable to “Treasurer, State of New Jersey”; a related resignation-with-new-appointment form (L-121) carries the same statutory $25 fee plus $10 for each additional LLC listed on the filing. (source: NJ Division of Revenue and Enterprise Services, Forms L-121/L-122 (fee cross-confirmed across multiple summaries of the official form; the official PDF itself returned as an unparseable binary stream when fetched directly this session, so it was not read as text))
A note on sourcing: New Jersey’s official statute site (njleg.gov) and Justia both returned HTTP 403 when fetched directly this session; statute text for 42:2C-14/15/17 was obtained via FindLaw (a secondary legal database) and search-engine synthesis of njleg/Justia snippets, and the official L-122 fee-form PDF could not be parsed as text, so the $25 change fee, while consistent across multiple secondary sources, was not read directly from an official page.
This page covers what New Jersey’s own law requires. For the general question of whether you should pay a commercial service or serve as your own agent, see registered agent: do you actually need to pay for one.
Every citation on this page was read directly from the state’s own statute, Secretary of State site, or official filing form this session (or, where that site could not be reached, from an independently cross-checked legal-database mirror of the same codified text, disclosed below). General information, not legal advice; fees and specific procedures can change, and your state’s Secretary of State has the final say for any individual filing.
Related: New Jersey’s LLC Certificate of Good Standing cost, including who issues it and how fast you can get one.