What Renunciation Actually Costs: A Full Breakdown

Update, March 2026: The State Department just cut the renunciation fee by 80%, from $2,350 to $450, effective April 13, 2026. We’ve updated the scenarios below to reflect the new fee. Everything else in this article (the tax prep costs, legal fees, exit tax, and the cost of doing nothing) remains exactly the same.

Everyone used to fixate on the $2,350. Now the State Department fee is $450, but it’s still roughly the smallest line item in what renunciation will actually cost most people. The government fee is the cover charge. The real bill comes from the accountants, the attorneys, and (if you’re unlucky) the IRS.

I’ve watched friends go through this process expecting to spend $3,000 and ending up at $15,000. I’ve seen forum posts from people who budgeted $10,000 and hit $60,000 because nobody told them about the exit tax until they were already mid-process. The range of possible costs is enormous, and it depends almost entirely on how complicated your financial life is.

So here’s the actual math. Every line item. No surprises.

The $450 State Department Fee

As of April 13, 2026, the administrative fee for renouncing US citizenship is $450, down from $2,350. You pay it before your appointment. It’s non-refundable, even if you change your mind, even if the consular officer finds an issue with your paperwork, even if you cancel.

A brief history: this fee was $0 until 2010, then $450 from 2010-2014, then the State Department raised it to $2,350 in a single 422% jump. Their justification was “increased demand” and the cost of providing the service. After a decade of criticism, 910 public comments, and pending litigation, the fee is back to $450.

For context, here’s what other countries charge to renounce citizenship:

• Canada: CAD $100 (~$75 USD)
• United Kingdom: £372 (~$470 USD)
• Australia: AUD $400 (~$150 USD)
• Ireland: Free
• Most countries: $0–$200

The US is now roughly on par with the UK, no longer the dramatic outlier it was at $2,350.

But here’s the thing: $450 is genuinely the least important number in this entire article. The tax preparation costs are what will define your total bill.

Tax Preparation: Where the Real Money Goes

Getting your US taxes in order for renunciation is not the same as filing a normal return. You need to file a final tax return, a Form 8854 (the expatriation statement), and possibly years of back filings if you’ve fallen behind. You need a tax preparer who specializes in expat taxation — your cousin’s accountant in Ohio is not equipped for this.

Here’s what the fees look like in practice:

Simple situation — You’ve been filing US returns every year, your FBAR is current, you’re a W-2 employee or have straightforward income, and your only foreign account is a checking account. A qualified expat tax preparer will charge $2,000–$4,000 for the final year return plus Form 8854.

Moderate complexity — You have foreign self-employment income, investment accounts abroad, a foreign pension, or you need to file a few years of back returns. Maybe you need to use the IRS Streamlined Filing Compliance Procedures to get caught up without penalties. Expect $5,000–$10,000 for the full package.

High complexity — You own foreign businesses, have partnership or trust interests, hold foreign real estate with US tax implications, or you’re using Streamlined plus filing multiple amended returns. You’re looking at $10,000–$15,000+ just for the tax prep, before any legal fees.

The Streamlined Filing Procedures deserve special mention because they’re incredibly common in renunciation scenarios. Many expats discover they’ve been non-compliant — not deliberately, but because nobody told them they needed to file US taxes from abroad. The Streamlined program requires filing three years of back tax returns and six years of FBARs, and a tax preparer will typically charge $1,500–$3,000 per year for the back filings on top of the current-year work. That adds up fast.

Legal Consultation: The Fee That Pays for Itself

Not everyone hires an expatriation attorney. Some people with very simple situations handle the process with just a tax preparer and the step-by-step instructions. But for most people, a consultation with someone who specializes in expatriation law is worth the money.

What a good attorney does for you:

• Confirms whether you’ll be a covered expatriate (and what that means for you specifically)
• Reviews your exit tax exposure and identifies planning opportunities
• Catches issues your tax preparer might miss — trust interests, deferred compensation, retirement account implications
• Advises on timing (when to renounce relative to asset sales, vesting schedules, etc.)

Fee ranges:

• Initial consultation: $300–$750 for a 1–2 hour session
• Full representation through the process: $3,000–$5,000 for straightforward cases, $5,000–$15,000+ for complex ones
• Exit tax planning: $2,000–$10,000 depending on the number of assets and structures involved

Most people don’t need full representation. A one-time consultation for $500–$1,000 to sanity-check your situation and confirm your tax preparer’s approach is often enough. The people who need full representation generally know it — they have real estate in multiple countries, business interests, trusts, or they’re close to the covered expatriate thresholds.

The Exit Tax: The Line Item That Can Dwarf Everything Else

The exit tax is not a fee. It’s a full IRS tax that applies only to covered expatriates — those with net worth over $2 million, average annual tax liability over $211,000 for the prior five years, or who can’t certify five years of tax compliance.

If you’re not a covered expatriate, the exit tax is $0. Skip this section and be grateful.

If you are a covered expatriate, the IRS treats you as if you sold everything you own the day before you renounced. Your unrealized gains above the $910,000 exclusion (2026 threshold) get taxed at capital gains rates. For a detailed breakdown of how the mark-to-market calculation works, covered expatriate thresholds, and planning strategies, see Exit Tax Explained.

The numbers can be staggering. Someone with $4 million in unrealized gains faces exit tax on $3.09 million of it. At the combined 23.8% rate (20% capital gains + 3.8% NIIT), that’s roughly $735,000 in exit tax. That’s not a typo. That’s also not typical — but it happens, and people who don’t model it in advance get blindsided.

Three Scenarios: What Renunciation Actually Costs

Let me put real numbers on three common situations.

Scenario 1 — The Simple Case Sarah is a teacher in Germany. Net worth under $500,000. Has been filing US taxes every year. One foreign bank account, FBAR current. No exit tax exposure.

Item	Cost
State Department fee	$450
Final year tax prep + Form 8854	$2,500
Brief attorney consultation	$500
Total	$3,450

Scenario 2 — The Catch-Up Case James is a freelancer in the Netherlands. Net worth around $800,000. Hasn’t filed US taxes in four years. Needs Streamlined Filing. Has foreign investment accounts that require FATCA reporting. Not a covered expatriate.

Item	Cost
State Department fee	$450
Streamlined filing (3 years back returns + 6 years FBARs)	$7,500
Final year tax prep + Form 8854	$3,500
Attorney consultation	$1,000
Total	$12,450

Scenario 3 — The Covered Expatriate Maria owns a tech company and has a net worth of $4.5 million, including $2.8 million in unrealized stock gains. She’s a covered expatriate under the net worth test. She needs full legal representation and exit tax planning.

Item	Cost
State Department fee	$450
Tax preparation (complex, multi-year)	$12,000
Expatriation attorney (full representation)	$8,000
Exit tax (~$2.8M gain minus $910K exclusion = $1.89M taxable at 23.8%)	~$449,820
Total	~$470,270

Maria’s State Department fee is 0.1% of her total cost. The exit tax is 95%+ of it. (Want to estimate your own numbers? Use our Expat Cost Calculator to model your scenario.)

The Cost of Doing Nothing

Here’s the number people rarely calculate: what it costs to keep your citizenship while living abroad, year after year.

Annual compliance costs for a moderately complex expat:

• US tax preparation: $2,000–$5,000
• FBAR filing (if separate from tax prep): $200–$500
• FATCA-related costs and complications: $200–$1,000
• Lost investment returns (can’t hold non-US funds efficiently, PFIC rules penalize foreign mutual funds): $500–$5,000+ annually depending on portfolio size
• Banking hassles (accounts closed, services denied, forms demanded): unquantifiable but real

Conservative estimate: $3,000–$8,000 per year in direct costs. Over ten years, that’s $30,000–$80,000 — and it never stops. It’s a subscription you can’t cancel without renouncing.

The 10-Year Comparison

Let’s use the moderate scenario — someone who’d spend about $14,000 to renounce and is currently paying $4,000 per year in compliance costs.

Keep citizenship for 10 more years: $40,000 in compliance costs, plus ongoing banking restrictions, investment limitations, and the general overhead of being a US person in the international financial system.

Renounce now: $14,000 one-time cost. Zero US tax compliance costs going forward. Full access to local banking and investment products. No more FBAR. No more FATCA. No more explaining to your bank why they need to report your accounts to the US government.

The break-even point in this scenario is about 3.5 years. After that, every year you don’t renounce costs you money compared to the alternative. For the simple case (Sarah), break-even is under two years.

This is why framing the decision around the $2,350 fee misses the point entirely. The real question isn’t “can I afford to renounce?” It’s “can I afford not to?”

The Fee Reduction Is Here

After years of proposals, lobbying, litigation, and 910 public comments, the State Department reduced the fee from $2,350 to $450, effective April 13, 2026. That’s a $1,900 savings, meaningful for simple cases but a fraction of the total cost for most people. For the full breakdown of what changed and why, read our complete guide to the fee reduction.

The Bottom Line on Cost

The State Department fee is not the expensive part. Even at $2,350 it wasn’t the expensive part, and now at $450 it’s practically a footnote.

The expensive part is getting your tax house in order, paying professionals who know the expatriation rules, and — for a minority of renunciants — settling up with the IRS on unrealized gains you’ve accumulated as a US citizen.

Budget $3,000–$6,000 if your situation is clean and simple. Budget $10,000–$18,000 if you need to catch up on filings or have moderate complexity. And if you’re anywhere near the covered expatriate thresholds, get a professional estimate before you budget anything — because the exit tax alone can be a six-figure number.

The most useful thing you can do right now is get a clear picture of your total situation. Read the full renunciation guide, understand the exit tax, check your FBAR status, and then talk to someone who does this for a living. The consultation fee is the best money you’ll spend in the entire process.