What has everyone's experience with legal name changes? I know there are various ways to go about it. Let's hear 'em!
Hi there,
Mine was fairly straight forward, it took about 8 weeks to become official, and it cost me $135.00 Cdn. Of course I live in Ontario, Canada, so as you live in the U.S. yours will be different. After I got the certificate with my new legal name on it, it was just a matter of going to all the agencies that I deal with, DMV, Medical, banking etc... to get the name change on all my other documents, and that was free of charge.
Chat later,
Steph.
I live in Southern California. Here it costs $350 to file with the court, $60 to put an ad in the newspaper for 6 weeks, then you go to court before the judge and when approved they suggest you get 8 to 10 copies of the change at $15 per copy. You can get copies of the forms you need from the court house for around $15. Or....
Pay high costs for lawyer.
So it gets fairly expensive here, I know in some states it is less than $50.
Sarah
Quote from: Sarah Louise on September 25, 2005, 05:22:31 PM
I live in Southern California. Here it costs $350 to file with the court, $60 to put an ad in the newspaper for 6 weeks, then you go to court before the judge and when approved they suggest you get 8 to 10 copies of the change at $15 per copy. You can get copies of the forms you need from the court house for around $15.
Sarah
Same here in Texas.
I made the mistake of first going to an "online lawyer service" which pretty much meant I paid $200 for them to send me copies of the form I could have gotten for free from the local government website.
devi-
Same as Steph. Fill in the form, pay a fee, get back the certificate and set about the task of changing everything bit by bit.
Dennis
I live in a VERY conservative county. Y'know a place where the current Bush is considered a stinkin' liberal. LOL. So I have had to hire a lawyer to get the paperwork done even though they are not supposed to be able to interfere with the process.
Technically in the US you can use any name you like as long as you don't use it to defraud anyone. Also you can't use it to get legal identification like passports drivers license and such. Also you have to sign legal documents with your legal name. Some states allow you to sign you legal name and then write aka whatever name your using. As security issues grow this will probably change.
In Georgia you file the name change $80 was $60. Post a legal notice for 4 weeks in an approved legal notice publication (this varies usually $80 also) and in thirty days you stand before the judge and swear your not doing this to defraud someone and voila you are who you say you are.
Cassie