El salvador
 

how much would the most low cost high quality professional genealogist charge me in usd to make my family tree to 1524 or earlier if i was born in el salvador? How can i get an approximate pricing for a project of this caliber? Thank you.

Welcome to the forum, Monica.

Sorry but I don't know the answer to your question. This forum is mainly for helping people trace their family trees themselves, rather than recommending professional genealogists. In general, the lower the cost, the lower the quality, I can say that! Also another general point, how to trace your family tree does not just depend on where you were born, but where your ancestors came from.

But between me and a professional genealogist, who would do a much more accurate, reliable, concise, politically correct, ect... job assuming i wanted to know who were my relatives like 5 or 6 centuries ago? Ive never made a family tree for someone else let alone much less my own! It seems like a daunting task! What should i do in my case specifically??

If you are researching ancestors from El Salvador you would need a genealogist with access to that country's records, so probably someone based in the country.

A couple of points, if you have no family tree at all right now, I'd concentrate on finding your most recent ancestors with accuracy and research their lives. It's ambitious to aim at 1524 when you haven't even started! It would also depend on what records exist for that time period in the countries where your ancestors lived and also on their status. There will be more available records for high-status people.

I'm not quite sure why you want a "politically correct" tree. People were what they were and you can't change history. Most of us have ancestors who have done things we might disapprove of but we have to accept this. Values were different in the past and we can't attribute our own values to our ancestors.

I'm not sure of your motive for wanting to draw up a family tree. It might be a lot more fun to do as much research as possible yourself, but I doubt anyone on this small forum has any experience of El Salvador research. Hiring a professional could be very expensive. I appreciate you have no experience but there are lots of forums that could offer you help and expertise. Most of us are experienced in British research and also can help with ancestors from Australia, New Zealand, the USA, Canada etc.

You might find it useful to read this:
https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en...ador_Genealogy

I hope these pointers help. You can always ask specific questions on here about your ancestors and we will do what we can to help.

Even if you believe hiring a professional is the only way forward for you, I would suggest you read plenty of information regarding the accessibility of records in El Salvador and any other country you think your ancestors may have come from, to get a handle on whether this research going back so far is even possible and/or what you might reasonably expect someone to achieve. You could begin by reading the articles here:

https://www.thefhguide.com/project-9-central-amer.html

Such a project could take a very long time. I would not trust anyone willing to place a figure on such a project at the start, as there are so may unknowns.

Many people prefer to study their ancestry themselves, as this is much more fulfilling than hiring someone else to do it for them and for most the cost of using a professional would put the project out of reach. Many on this site are at least as competent as many professionals, but I doubt there is anyone here who has experence in tracing ancestors in Central America, if that is where you ancestry lies.

A professional genealogist will charge, like any other professional, by the hour. He/she cannot know how many hours things will take. An added cost will be documentation along the way to prove findings. No one can give you a fixed cost but it will definitely be into the thousands, so it makes sense to do as much of the work yourself and to only employ a genealogist to do specific named tasks that you cannot do yourself. Good luck, it's great fun!

OC

One of the problems a lot of us have is knowing what records do not survive.

Fire, flood, war, regime change or sheer carelessness can lead to the destruction of records. Very few of us can trace all our lines back beyond a few generations.

I have several friends who are professional genealogists. Things to bear in mind:

• You need to have a precise goal
• you need to express that very clearly
• you need to provide the information you have, with sources where you have them, and indicate clearly anything that is a family story
• A professional genealogist will charge for work done, whether or not it leads to results: neither of you will be happy if they find something you knew already but omitted to tell them about.

Monica

I've been doing my family tree for nearly 30 years and haven't got back before the 1700s with most of my lines. Wanting to go back to the 1500s is highly ambitious.

In my experience, I've found it more interesting to find out about ancestors more closely related to me, as there's more documentation and in some cases I am lucky enough to have photographs.

With being so specific about tracing back to 1524 or earlier I wonder if maybe there was somebody of fame or notoriety at that time and you are just curious if you are a descendant?
Maybe you have an inkling that you could be or, perhaps, other members of your family have passed down the belief (rumour) that you may be?

It would be like someone telling me that I could be related to King Henry VIII and me setting out with a specific goal to trace back to 1547 (his death).

The Spanish conquest and colonization of El Salvador began in 1524. So possibly more like, "My ancestors arrived on The Mayflower" :)