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County offices

Berks County Register of Wills

If the person who died lived in Berks County, this is the office that opens the estate. Here is where it is, what it charges, and how it takes filings.

The office

Register of Wills / Clerk of Orphans’ Court

County seat: Reading

Address
Berks County Services Center, 633 Court St, 2nd Floor, Reading, PA 19601
Short certificate
$10.00
Fee schedule
Effective
Filing
Paper filings onlyWet signatures required; probate by Microsoft Teams appointment.

Worth knowing. Berks does not accept e-filing. Every document needs a wet signature, and probate itself is done as a scheduled video appointment over Microsoft Teams.

Visit the Berks County websiteOfficial fee schedule

Checked against the Berks County website and its published fee schedule on .

What you will need

Every Register of Wills office in Pennsylvania is opening the same kind of file, so the starting documents are much the same wherever you go:

  • The original will, if there is one. If you cannot find the original and only have a copy, say so when you call, before you make the trip.
  • A certified copy of the death certificate. The certified copy, not a photocopy of one.
  • An estimate of what the estate is worth. A rough figure is enough to start: what was owned, roughly what it is worth, and what is owed against it.
  • Photo identification for whoever is applying.

What differs between counties is the mechanics rather than the paperwork: whether the office wants the filing electronically or on paper, whether it wants wet signatures, and whether the appointment happens in person or by video. Those details for this office are in the panel above, and they are the county’s own. Call and ask what it wants before you travel. It costs nothing and it saves a wasted morning.

What happens once letters are granted

Letters are the point at which somebody has authority. With a will they are called letters testamentary, without one letters of administration. Until they are granted, nobody may sell or transfer estate property. After that, the sequence is set by statute:

  • The grant is advertised once a week for three successive weeks, in a newspaper of general circulation and in the county legal journal (20 Pa.C.S. § 3162).
  • Beneficiaries are notified within three months, with certification filed within ten days after (Pa. O.C. Rule 10.5).
  • The Pennsylvania inheritance tax return, form REV-1500, is filed in duplicate with this office. Paying within three months of the date of death earns a 5% discount, of the tax paid or the tax due, whichever is less. The tax is delinquent after nine months, and the 2026 interest rate is 7%.
  • The window for creditors closes one year from the first complete advertisement, not from the date of death (20 Pa.C.S. § 3532(b.1)).

Nobody can honestly tell you how long the whole thing takes. No Pennsylvania court publishes that figure. The dates above are the ones written into the statute, and they are the ones worth putting in a diary.

Checked against PA Department of Revenue and brochure REV-584 on .

The other counties we cover

If the person who died lived somewhere else, start with their county rather than this one. The estate is opened where they lived.

Start with a conversation, not a contract

Tell us who died, which county they lived in, and what is worrying you most. If the answer is that you need a probate attorney rather than us, we will say so.

Talk to someoneSee what we charge

Free, and there is no obligation afterwards.