Updated August 14, 2026. Quick answer: Pennsylvania’s petition filing fee could not be established from primary text, and the periodic accounting is first within 12 months, then at least annually. Everything on this page is quoted from Pennsylvania’s own statutory text where it exists, and where Pennsylvania 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 Pennsylvania fixes by statute
| Item | What the text says | Where it says it |
|---|---|---|
| Petition filing fee | Not published here. Petition filing fee is not stated on this page because it could not be verified against statutory text; no value was established. This page will not print an estimate in its place. The route tried was https://www.palegis.us/statutes/consolidated/view-statute?17&iFrame=true&txtType=HTM&ttl=20&div=0&chpt=55&sctn=11&subsctn=0. | — |
| Bond | Bond for a guardian of an incapacitated person is not set out in chapter 55 directly; §5515 imports the personal-representative and minor-guardian bond provisions of the same title. Under the imported §5121, the bond runs to the Commonwealth with sufficient surety ‘in such amount as the court considers necessary, having regard to the value of the personal estate which will come into the control of the guardian’. | 20 Pa.C.S. §5515; §5121 |
| Guardian ad litem and attorney fees | Not published here. Guardian ad litem and attorney fees is not stated on this page because it could not be verified against statutory text; no value was established. This page will not print an estimate in its place. The route tried was https://www.palegis.us/statutes/consolidated/view-statute?17&iFrame=true&txtType=HTM&ttl=20&div=0&chpt=55&sctn=11&subsctn=0. | — |
| Periodic accounting or report | A report is required at least once within the first 12 months of appointment and at least annually thereafter. Guardian of the estate reports current principal and how invested, current income, expenditures of principal and income since the last report, and the needs of the incapacitated person. No filing fee is stated in the reporting section. | 20 Pa.C.S. §5521(c)(1) |
What the proceeding is called here. Guardian of an incapacitated person (20 Pa.C.S. ch. 55), Orphans’ Court Division.
The filing fee
Not published here. The petition filing fee is not stated on this page because it could not be verified against statutory text; no value was established. This page will not print an estimate in its place. The route tried was https://www.palegis.us/statutes/consolidated/view-statute?17&iFrame=true&txtType=HTM&ttl=20&div=0&chpt=55&sctn=11&subsctn=0.
The bond
Bond for a guardian of an incapacitated person is not set out in chapter 55 directly; §5515 imports the personal-representative and minor-guardian bond provisions of the same title. Under the imported §5121, the bond runs to the Commonwealth with sufficient surety ‘in such amount as the court considers necessary, having regard to the value of the personal estate which will come into the control of the guardian’.
The provisions relating to a guardian of an incapacitated person and his surety shall be the same as are set forth in the following provisions of this title relating to a personal representative or a guardian of a minor and their sureties
Read at statute source on 2026-08-11: 20 Pa.C.S. §5515; §5121.
Who pays the premium is not answered. A surety bond carries a recurring premium and it is usually the largest ongoing cost of a guardianship of the estate. Pennsylvania states no express rule on who bears it in the chapter read for this page, and no figure for what one costs is published anywhere this project could verify. That is a gap in the law and in the published record, not a gap we have filled with a guess.
Guardian ad litem and attorney fees
Not published here. The guardian ad litem and attorney-fee provisions is not stated on this page because it could not be verified against statutory text; no value was established. This page will not print an estimate in its place. The route tried was https://www.palegis.us/statutes/consolidated/view-statute?17&iFrame=true&txtType=HTM&ttl=20&div=0&chpt=55&sctn=11&subsctn=0.
How often you have to account
First within 12 months, then at least annually. 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 report is required at least once within the first 12 months of appointment and at least annually thereafter. Guardian of the estate reports current principal and how invested, current income, expenditures of principal and income since the last report, and the needs of the incapacitated person. No filing fee is stated in the reporting section.
Each guardian of an incapacitated person shall file with the court appointing him a report, at least once within the first 12 months of his appointment and at least annually thereafter
Read at statute source on 2026-08-11: 20 Pa.C.S. §5521(c)(1).
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
Of the four things this page set out to establish from primary text, 2 could not be: petition filing fee, guardian ad litem and attorney fees. Each is marked above with the route that was tried. What is missing everywhere, in every state, is a price: what an attorney charges to bring an uncontested petition, what a court-ordered capacity evaluation or investigation costs, and what a surety charges for the bond. None of it is published by any authority, and this page does not estimate it.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bond | 20 Pa.C.S. §5515; §5121 | statute | 2026-08-11 |
| Periodic accounting or report | 20 Pa.C.S. §5521(c)(1) | statute | 2026-08-11 |
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 August 14, 2026.