Public Records Lookup

There are a few reasons why people want to do a divorce records search – an upcoming marriage, tax purposes or an employer seeking to run a background check on a potential employee. All divorce records are public unless they are sealed by a judge. Be prepared to state your reasons as to why you need a copy of the record, either it’s your own record or someone else record. In any case, the requester’s details would be recorded.

Some states have centralized repositories while other states only keep records at their local county courthouses. There are still courthouses which have yet to computerize their records and getting results with a manual search might take up to two weeks. Some courts only respond only to requests by mail. So it’s best to call up the particular courthouse and ask before you embark on your search.

Before you begin your divorce records search, know specifically what you are looking for. Since different states have different looking documents, it is a good idea to actually know what the document you are searching for looks like. Also be sure exactly what type of divorce papers you need – divorce decree, divorce record, dissolution, custody or petition for divorce. A divorce record could also be record for alimony, spousal support or child support.

To initiate the search, you must know the complete details of the parties involved. A lot of people have the same name and even within the same county, there might be some with similar names. So get the full names of both parties, along with the maiden names, birth dates, date of the divorce and the city or town and county where the divorce papers were filed at. Any other additional information would help too.

You can file your request by personally going to the county court where the divorce took place. The search itself is free but you will have to pay for the copies. For a listing of the county courthouses, you can check at the national Association of Counties website.

You can also engage freelance record searches such as court house researches. Their fees are not as high as professional record searches.

Or alternatively, you can do an online search or public records lookup. But it is still best to personally verify the result by obtaining the papers from the pertaining authority. Online searches are not totally free and most sites require you to pay a subscription fee. One example is governmentresgistry.com and it’s subscription fee is forty dollars for a year. Other sites offer a one-time search fee for as low as a little less than ten dollars per search. If you are doing a lot of searches, then it is worthwhile to pay for the subscription fee. Be sure to subscribe to sites that offer a money back guarantee.

It is good to know though that a lot of public libraries do subscribe to sites like genealogy.com, so you can just visit your local library and use their services there. And of course, there are many online public records lookup databases, though most charge a fee for use. Some charge per record search, some use a subscription model where you pay a fee that allows for unlimited records lookups.

Ultimately, the cheapest, quickest and surest option to do divorce records search is to visit the county courthouse yourself.