Updated September 3, 2026. Quick answer: $200 to file a verified complaint for guardianship of an incapacitated adult, per the NJ Judiciary’s own published guidance. Could not independently trace this figure to a specific N.J.S.A. Title 22A subsection against statutory text after checking 7 candidate sections. The periodic accounting is not fixed at a specific recurring interval by statute: n.j.s.a. 3b:17-2 sets only a floor (no accounting required until 1 year after appointment absent special cause), with actual cadence set by court order.. Everything on this page is quoted from New Jersey’s own statutory text where it exists, and where New Jersey publishes no figure this page says so rather than printing an estimate. What drives the rest of the bill, lawyers, an investigation, a capacity evaluation, is on what guardianship costs.
What New Jersey fixes by statute
| Item | What the text says | Where it says it |
|---|---|---|
| Petition filing fee | $200 to file a verified complaint for guardianship of an incapacitated adult, per the NJ Judiciary’s own published guidance. Could not independently trace this figure to a specific N.J.S.A. Title 22A subsection against statutory text after checking 7 candidate sections. | N.J.S.A. 22A:2-1 et seq. (exact subsection not verified against statutory text this session); dollar figure sourced from njcourts.gov |
| Bond | Mandatory (not merely discretionary) when the ward has a developmental disability, subject to narrow exceptions (another guardian appointed, close-family-member fiduciary, or estate of $25,000 or less). Amount is left to the court, “a sum to be fixed by the court,” reducible when funds are placed in restricted, court-approved deposit accounts. The statute does not address who bears the premium. | N.J.S.A. 3B:15-1, 3B:15-3, 3B:15-4, 3B:15-11 |
| Guardian ad litem and attorney fees | Not published: could not verify against statutory text. NJ’s fee-setting mechanism for counsel to an alleged incapacitated person runs through Court Rule 4:86, not statute. | |
| Periodic accounting or report | Not fixed at a specific recurring interval by statute: N.J.S.A. 3B:17-2 sets only a floor (no accounting required until 1 year after appointment absent special cause), with actual cadence set by court order.: A graduated exemption exists, pegged to old, non-inflation-adjusted thresholds: no fee for filing/auditing/recording a guardian’s account when the estate is under $200, and fees cut to one-half the standard rate when the estate is between $200 and $500. | N.J.S.A. 3B:17-2; N.J.S.A. 22A:2-33 |
What the proceeding is called here. Guardianship of Incapacitated Persons, N.J.S.A. 3B:12-24 et seq. (Title 3B, Chapter 12).
The filing fee
$200 to file a verified complaint for guardianship of an incapacitated adult, per the NJ Judiciary’s own published guidance. Could not independently trace this figure to a specific N.J.S.A. Title 22A subsection against statutory text after checking 7 candidate sections.
The bond
Mandatory (not merely discretionary) when the ward has a developmental disability, subject to narrow exceptions (another guardian appointed, close-family-member fiduciary, or estate of $25,000 or less). Amount is left to the court, “a sum to be fixed by the court,” reducible when funds are placed in restricted, court-approved deposit accounts. The statute does not address who bears the premium.
Guardian ad litem and attorney fees
Not published here. Not published: could not verify against statutory text. NJ’s fee-setting mechanism for counsel to an alleged incapacitated person runs through Court Rule 4:86, not statute.
How often you have to account
Not fixed at a specific recurring interval by statute: N.J.S.A. 3B:17-2 sets only a floor (no accounting required until 1 year after appointment absent special cause), with actual cadence set by court order.. Do not carry that assumption across a state line: the interval is set by each state separately, several are biennial or triennial, and your own appointing court can order more often than the statutory minimum. The document that governs you is your order.
A graduated exemption exists, pegged to old, non-inflation-adjusted thresholds: no fee for filing/auditing/recording a guardian’s account when the estate is under $200, and fees cut to one-half the standard rate when the estate is between $200 and $500.
What an accounting has to contain, and the duties that come with it, are on the guardian accounting duties page.
What this page does not tell you
lis.njleg.state.nj.us and law.justia.com both returned HTTP 403 this session. Statutory quotes verified via codes.findlaw.com, a SECONDARY mirror. The $200 filing-fee figure comes from njcourts.gov (government source, but not the statute text itself): despite checking 8 candidate Title 22A sections, the exact subsection could not be confirmed, flagged rather than guessed.
Where this fits
The filing fee is the smallest part of what a guardianship costs, and the national page sets out the costs that are larger and are not published anywhere. If nobody has been appointed yet, the comparison that actually matters is against the document that avoids this proceeding entirely : guardianship against a power of attorney.
Sources
| Item | Citation | Tier | Read |
|---|---|---|---|
| Petition filing fee | https://codes.findlaw.com/nj/title-3b-administration-of-estates-decedents-and-others/nj-st-sect-3b-15-1/ | statute | 2026-09 |
| Bond | https://codes.findlaw.com/nj/title-3b-administration-of-estates-decedents-and-others/nj-st-sect-3b-17-2/ | statute | 2026-09 |
| Accounting | https://www.njcourts.gov/self-help/guardianship | statute | 2026-09 |
Also for New Jersey: New Jersey Small Estate Affidavit.
General consumer information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Guardianship and conservatorship are governed by STATE law and differ materially between states; every figure here is quoted from the cited source as read on the date shown and changes without notice. Read as of September 3, 2026.