Maryland Corporation Revival: restore your forfeited charter.

Your Maryland corporation is showing "Forfeited" or "Not in Good Standing" on the SDAT website, and something urgent needs it fixed: a loan closing, a state contract, a bank account, a license renewal. Maryland corporation revival is what we handle every week. Back annual reports filed, Articles of Revival submitted, and confirmation of your restored charter in your inbox, with a 24-hour expedited option when the deadline is real.

What are Articles of Revival in Maryland?

Articles of Revival is the SDAT filing that restores a forfeited domestic Maryland corporation's charter. The state fee is $100, the document is filed with the State Department of Assessments and Taxation (online through Maryland Business Express or on paper), and SDAT will only accept it after every delinquent Annual Report is filed and any Comptroller tax hold is cleared. It applies to corporations only: a forfeited Maryland LLC files Articles of Reinstatement instead, and an out-of-state corporation that lost its Maryland authority re-registers rather than revives. Not sure which one you are? The free SDAT lookup shows your entity type and status in two minutes.

Why your Maryland corporation was forfeited

Maryland requires every corporation to file an Annual Report (Form 1) with the State Department of Assessments and Taxation by April 15 each year. Stock corporations pay a $300 filing fee; most nonstock and nonprofit corporations file the same report at no fee, but the filing itself is mandatory either way. Miss it and the corporation first drops to "not in good standing"; keep missing it and SDAT forfeits the charter. Forfeiture isn't a fine you can ignore: a forfeited corporation legally cannot enter contracts, bring a lawsuit, or protect its corporate name against being claimed by someone else.

The good news: forfeiture is reversible. For a domestic Maryland corporation the restoring filing is called Articles of Revival (not "Reinstatement," which is the LLC filing), and for most corporations the entire process is administrative. No court, no lawyer required. Just the right filings, in the right order.

The two-step path back to an active charter

Step 1: File every delinquent Annual Report

SDAT will not accept Articles of Revival while any Annual Report year is outstanding. We pull your corporation's exact filing history from SDAT, identify every missed year, and prepare and file all of them at once. For a stock corporation the state fee is $300 per missed year, paid directly to Maryland with a 3% card processing charge; we never mark state fees up. Most nonstock and nonprofit corporations file the same back reports at no state fee, which makes a nonprofit revival dramatically cheaper than most directors expect.

Step 2: File Articles of Revival

Once the reports clear, we file the Articles of Revival ($100 state fee) that formally restores the corporation's charter. If your resident agent has resigned or moved, we update that in the same filing at no extra service charge. When SDAT processes it, your corporation is active again (same charter, same name, same EIN) and we send you the SDAT record showing good standing.

Stock vs. nonstock: what you'll actually owe

The single biggest cost variable in a corporation revival is entity type multiplied by missed years. A stock corporation owes $300 to the state for every delinquent Annual Report, so six missed years means $1,800 in state fees before the revival filing itself. A nonstock or nonprofit corporation with the same six missed years typically owes the state nothing for those reports. The catch-up filings still have to be prepared and submitted, but the state fee for most of them is zero. Our flat service fees are the same either way: $200 to prepare and file all back reports and $575 for the revival, so a typical nonprofit case comes in at a small fraction of the stock-corporation total above.

Standard vs. 24-hour expedited

Standard SDAT processing takes roughly 7 business days once filings are submitted. When you're up against a closing date, SDAT offers expedited handling for an additional $425 state fee (plus the 3% card charge). On a clean case we file same-day and your corporation is typically back in good standing within 24 hours. Most clients don't need it; when you do, it's the difference between making the settlement table and not.

What revival actually restores

Articles of Revival don't create a new company; they restore the one you already built. Your corporation comes back with the same charter, the same corporate name, and the same EIN. That continuity is the whole point: bank accounts, contracts, and licenses tied to your EIN pick back up without re-papering everything under a new entity. The one thing revival can't guarantee is the name. If another business claimed it while your charter was forfeited, the revival has to adopt a modified name, which is one more reason to move quickly.

What Articles of Revival in Maryland must include

Articles of Revival is a short document, but SDAT rejects it over small mistakes, and every rejection restarts the clock. A filing that goes through the first time needs:

• The exact corporate name as it appears in SDAT's records, or the modified name if yours was claimed during forfeiture.
• The date of incorporation and a statement that the corporation is reviving its charter.
• A current resident agent with a Maryland street address who has consented to serve. A stale or resigned agent is one of the most common rejection reasons.
• Signatures from the last acting officers, typically the president or vice president together with the secretary. If those people are gone or unreachable, there are workable paths, but they need to be set up before filing, not after a rejection.
• The $100 state fee, plus proof that every delinquent Annual Report has been filed and any Comptroller hold cleared.

The filing can go to SDAT online through Maryland Business Express or on paper. We prepare the document, check the name and agent against the live SDAT record before submitting, and file everything in the correct order so the revival isn't bounced for a missing prerequisite.

What can complicate it (and how we handle each)

• Maryland tax debt: if tax is owed, the Comptroller's tax clearance is required before SDAT will process the revival. We coordinate the clearance; see our tax clearance & CCU service.
• CCU collections: balances referred to the Central Collection Unit must be resolved; we coordinate payoff and deliver proof to SDAT.
• Name taken while forfeited: if another entity claimed your corporate name during forfeiture, the revival includes adopting a modified name; we check name availability before filing so there are no surprises.
• No resident agent: updated as part of the revival filing, no extra service fee.

Frequently asked questions