Arthur County Court Guide

Note: NEBRASKA PROBATE FILING FEES ARE SET BY STATUTE, STATEWIDE, AND ARE THE SAME IN ALL 93 COUNTY COURTS. Neb. Rev. Stat. § 33-125 fixes them and § 33-147 makes an officer who takes greater fees than those prescribed liable to the injured party, so no county publishes a probate fee schedule of its own and nothing here is a local figure. TWO PATHS, AND ONLY ONE OF THEM IS A SINGLE NUMBER. An INFORMAL probate commenced and closed informally carries a flat $22.00 statutory fee under § 33-125(1)(a)(i). A FORMAL probate is charged on a twenty-step graduated scale keyed to the gross value of the estate under § 33-125(1)(b)(i) through (xx). THE STATUTORY FEE IS NOT THE BILL, AND PUBLISHING $22 AS 'the Nebraska probate filing fee' UNDERSTATES IT BY HALF. Two other statutes load onto every county-court probate case: § 24-703(3)(a) adds a judges retirement charge equal to ten percent of the § 33-125 fee, and six per-case cost statutes add exactly $20.00 once per case (§ 33-107.01 legal services $6.25, § 33-107.03 court automation $8.00, § 33-154 NSC education $1.00, § 33-155 dispute resolution $0.75, § 33-156 indigent defense $3.00, § 47-633 uniform data analysis $1.00). So the amount actually collected to open an informal probate is $44.00, or $45.00 in a testate case with the § 33-126.05 certificate of probate of will. WHY petition_probate CARRIES $44.00 AND formal_administration IS ABSENT. $44.00 is a real, statewide, value-independent number: it is what a clerk collects to open the informal probate that most Nebraska estates use, and it is also the floor of the formal ladder. A bare fees.formal_administration renders verbatim as 'Formal administration: $X', and no single number can be right for a twenty-bracket scale, so that field is deliberately not stored. Read the ladder, not the floor, for any estate administered formally. THE FORMAL LADDER, from the Nebraska Judicial Branch schedule Effective 07-01-2026, printed as statutory fee + judges retirement (10%) + $20.00 costs = total collected, measured on the § 33-125(2) GROSS VALUE of the estate, meaning real and personal property in Nebraska at the time of death less liens and joint tenancy property: $1,000 or less = $22.00 + $2.00 + $20.00 = $44.00; over $1,000 to $2,000 = $30.00 + $3.00 + $20.00 = $53.00; over $2,000 to $5,000 = $50.00 + $5.00 + $20.00 = $75.00; over $5,000 to $10,000 = $70.00 + $7.00 + $20.00 = $97.00; over $10,000 to $25,000 = $80.00 + $8.00 + $20.00 = $108.00; over $25,000 to $50,000 = $100.00 + $10.00 + $20.00 = $130.00; over $50,000 to $75,000 = $120.00 + $12.00 + $20.00 = $152.00; over $75,000 to $100,000 = $160.00 + $16.00 + $20.00 = $196.00; over $100,000 to $125,000 = $220.00 + $22.00 + $20.00 = $262.00; over $125,000 to $150,000 = $250.00 + $25.00 + $20.00 = $295.00; over $150,000 to $175,000 = $270.00 + $27.00 + $20.00 = $317.00; over $175,000 to $200,000 = $300.00 + $30.00 + $20.00 = $350.00; over $200,000 to $300,000 = $350.00 + $35.00 + $20.00 = $405.00; over $300,000 to $400,000 = $400.00 + $40.00 + $20.00 = $460.00; over $400,000 to $500,000 = $500.00 + $50.00 + $20.00 = $570.00; over $500,000 to $750,000 = $600.00 + $60.00 + $20.00 = $680.00; over $750,000 to $1,000,000 = $700.00 + $70.00 + $20.00 = $790.00; over $1,000,000 to $2,500,000 = $800.00 + $80.00 + $20.00 = $900.00; over $2,500,000 to $5,000,000 = $1,000.00 + $100.00 + $20.00 = $1,120.00; over $5,000,000 = $1,500.00 + $150.00 + $20.00 = $1,670.00. OTHER PROBATE-SIDE CHARGES on the same schedule: each subsequent petition or application inside an informal proceeding $24.00; any Probate Code proceeding with no fee set elsewhere $24.00; dismissal of a petition where no appointment or order was made $11.00; deposit of a will for safekeeping $2.00; certificate involving real estate $1.00; filing and recording each report $5.00 (§ 33-126.02); an objection to the probate of a will, a petition to set aside an informal filing, or a petition to prevent informal probate $103.00 (§ 30-2429.01, $83.00 plus a $20.00 county court filing fee); notice of transfer of a claim to district court $87.00 (§ 30-2488). INHERITANCE TAX DETERMINATION IS A SEPARATE FEE AND NOT A PROBATE FEE. § 33-126.03 charges $44.00 for a determination of tax only, $24.00 for a determination inside an informal probate, and NOTHING where a formal § 33-125(1)(b) fee has already been imposed. Nebraska levies an INHERITANCE tax that the county court determines and the COUNTY collects, charged on what each beneficiary receives; it is neither a filing fee nor a probate tax. THE $22 HAS A DECOY. § 33-125(1)(a) nests a remittance schedule inside the fee ending 'beginning July 1, 2025, twelve dollars'. That $12 is the slice the clerk sends to the Nebraska Retirement Fund for Judges, and the judiciary schedule prints it as a split of the same $22 ($10.00 fee plus a $12.00 docket fee / judges retirement). It is not an extra charge. COSTS THAT ARE NOT COURT FEES. Publishing the notice to creditors is charged by the newspaper at the § 33-141(4) legal rate, fifty cents per line for the first insertion and forty-three and thirty-four hundredths cents per line for each later one at eight-point type and pica width eleven, and the notice runs once a week for three successive weeks, so the total depends on the length of the notice and the paper's type. Recording the § 30-24,129 real-property affidavit costs the § 33-109 statewide rate of $10.00 for the first page and $6.00 for each additional page. The § 30-24,125 personal-property affidavit is free because nothing is filed. Confirm any figure with the clerk of the county court before you file.