What They Cannot Take
ORC 2329.66 — the exemptions, and the five days to claim them
Most people meet this section inside a conversation about bankruptcy and conclude it is a bankruptcy thing. It is not. The section opens by saying that every person domiciled in this state may hold property exempt from execution, garnishment, attachment, or sale to satisfy a judgment or order. A judgment does not have to be a bankruptcy for the list to apply.
Who handles this in Ohio: Ohio State Bar Association lawyer referral; and legal aid programs and the state offices, listed in the Ohio directory.
The exemption is not automatic, and the window is five business days. A judgment debtor facing a wage garnishment is sent a notice, and the notice carries a window: a written request for a hearing delivered to the clerk within five business days of receiving it. The hearing is then held no later than twelve days after that request. Nothing in the chapter applies an exemption on its own because nobody has been asked to. A person entitled to keep every dollar, who does nothing with the notice, keeps none of it.
What is on the list is set out in categories rather than as a single pot: an interest in a residence, one motor vehicle, household goods, the books and tools of a trade, and a general amount that can be put against anything at all. Each category carries its own dollar figure, and the figures move.
Reading the statute gives you the wrong number. The figures are adjusted for inflation every three years, and the adjusted table lives outside the statute. The section on the state's own site is captioned as one to see the notes on for inflation adjustments, and the dollar amounts printed in the body of it are the superseded ones. Somebody who looks up the law directly, carefully, and reads what it says, comes away with a figure that is years out of date. The current table is published by the Ohio Judicial Conference.
The figures below are the ones in force for judgments and orders from the first of April 2025 through the thirty first of March 2028. They are equity figures, not sale prices: a vehicle worth more than the exemption with a loan against it may still sit entirely inside it.
| Category | Amount in this window |
|---|---|
| CategoryAn interest in one parcel used as a residence | Amount in this window$182,625 |
| CategoryOne motor vehicle | Amount in this window$5,025 |
| CategoryHousehold goods, furnishings, appliances, clothing | Amount in this window$16,850 in total, with a separate cap of $800 on any single item |
| CategoryThe general amount, applied to anything | Amount in this window$1,675 |
Other categories carry figures this page does not print. Jewelry, cash on hand or on deposit, and the books and tools of a trade are each exempt in some amount, and the published figures for those disagreed between the sources checked for this page. Where a number could not be corroborated it is not printed here. The Judicial Conference table is the one that governs.
Exempt income and exempt property are two different lists. The same section puts categories of income outside collection entirely rather than capping them, which is the part that decides most consumer cases: social security, workers' compensation, unemployment compensation, disability payments, Ohio Works First, support received, and most pensions. Property exemptions are the dollar figures above. A person can be reachable on one list and untouchable on the other.
“Which category does this fall under, and what is the current figure.”
The figures here are the adjusted ones for the window named above and they change again after the thirty first of March 2028. Support orders, federal tax levies, federal student loan collection and state tax assessments run under their own rules rather than this section. Whether a particular item falls inside a category, how equity is worked out against a loan, and how an exemption is claimed in a particular court are questions for a licensed Ohio attorney, and legal aid offices across the state handle consumer debt as a matter of course.
Sources for this section (4)
- ORC 2329.66 — Property a debtor may hold exempt from execution, garnishment or sale, including the share of a paycheck a garnishment cannot take
- ORC 2716.06 — The notice a judgment debtor is sent, and the five business days it gives to request a hearing
- Ohio exemption amounts — Ohio Judicial Conference, the adjusted dollar figures for ORC 2329.66, reissued every three years
- ORC 2716.02 — The demand for payment that has to come before a wage garnishment
Legal information, not legal advice. Verified as of September 2026. Applying it to a particular situation is the work of a licensed Ohio attorney.