Public or Confidential Marriage License?!

I don't see why anyone would want a confidential ML unless they were hiding from someone, living a double life or they were famous. Other than that what other reason would someone need to do that?

Yes. I agree. 😆 I always love reading who got a marriage license in the paper.
No need for a private one, that I can think of.

Public license is $91. Confidential is $85. Saving $6 makes sense to me.

If private is cheaper and it is same in Ohio we may go that way. Yes it is only 6 bucks but as long as it says we can get married

There was another thread about this recently and it seems there are some cons to private with regards to jumping through hoops to obtain your own copies when you need them — I don’t recall the specifics but it might pop up with the search function. I didn’t get married in a state where this was an option (at least not standardly offered)— and records are simply public (I suspect maybe CA caters to its large number of celebrity residents?), so didn’t have any personal experience but I recall paying attention to that thread— I’m a private person so would’ve been inclined to do that if there wasn’t much difference , but I remember there being some actual cons & hassle mentioned

I dunno, I come from a place where there are a lot of privacy laws so the idea of public records and licenses is a bit scary to me. For that reason, I would choose private but people with different experiences may opt for public or just go with whatever is cheaper.

From what I understand you need either a court order or notarized application from one of the two of you to get a copy of your confidential marriage license, which may or may not be a hassle for you. Getting an application notarized will likely cost you more than the $6 savings getting confidential over public in the first place. Also, $85 or $91 are expensive, geez! Ours only costs $30. It’s crazy how much variance there is state to state!

Hi Kristine! Did you decide what type of marriage license to get?

Http://losangelesmarriagelicense.com/cons-public-marriage-license.html


See link above. A public wedding license in California means that you have no privacy. Anyone can access for marriage license and they will have access to information including: your full name, date of birth, place of birth, parents place of birth, address, place of marriage and previous marriages. Con artists, identity thieves, and telemarketers can, and do access marriage certificates. Once this information is submitted there's no way to remove it. I will be getting confidential marriage license to protect my personal information. It's not about living a double life or "hiding" my marriage. It's to protect my personal information. Hope this helps someone!

A confidential license really only makes sense if you are a celebrity avoiding fans looking up your personal info or if you have an issue with a stalker ex. A public license works fine for the rest and the general public doesn't normally dig that deep into the average Joe's information. It depends on what works best for you.