Dead Rel Hunting

*** 2025 End of Year Special! ***

Sign up for a Starter package (or a minimum 11 hours work on your tree),
pay your 50% deposit by 31 December 2025,
and I’ll gift YOU a 50% discount! That’s right – pay half, but get the full service.

The catch? This only applies to the first 8 next 7 people who pay,
so get in touch via the Contact form below
and put Santa2025 in the field for ‘Discount code’ before you miss out!

The sooner you pay, the sooner I can start work. 😉
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• Do you want to know more about your family history?
• How I got started and how I can help you
• How does it work?
• Starter package
• Hourly rate service
• What if I can’t trace one of your lines back to your great-grandparents?
• Other services
• Your privacy
• Why Ancestry?
• Are you ready to start?
• Reviews

Do you want to know more about your family history?

Perhaps you’ve done some research? Or you don’t know where to start? Or you’ve recently found out information that you didn’t previously know and now you want to know more?

Maybe you’ve already started building your family tree, but you don’t have the time, or perhaps the money, or maybe the knowledge, to dig deeper?

Maybe you’ve had your DNA tested, but you don’t know how to use the results to work backwards to find out more about your ancestors? Again – maybe you don’t have the time, or perhaps the technology’s doing your head in (which is understandable 😉 ).

Or perhaps you’ve been building your tree, but you have lots of duplicates, or DNA matches tied to the wrong profiles, you-name-it – and you need someone to help clean up the mess?

Here’s where I come in … I am an avid family history researcher or, as Arnold Schwarzenegger might say, ‘I am the dead rel hunter’. 😀

And boy would I love to do some dead rel hunting for you!

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How I got started and how I can help you

I first became intrigued with my family history when one of Mum’s cousins back in England sent a copy of the tree he’d created. I was about 12 at the time and it fascinated me – I loved the visual representation of my heritage and being able to see the links to the people Mum talked about.

Fast forward several decades (and many iterations in technology!) and I joined Ancestry.com in 2006 to begin my own hunt. A few years later I had my DNA tested and that really helped me begin discovering my roots. I now have over 7,500 people on my family tree, an Ancestry tree rating of 9.2 out of 10 (although it can go up and down depending on what I’m working on), and DNA matches everywhere. I also have a couple of dead ends here and there that I’m still working on, so the challenge never leaves!

I simply love the chase, the hunt, the analysis of the information and the piecing together of the puzzle. In fact, I love it so much that from 2026 I’ll be studying a Diploma of Family History with the University of Tasmania to help consolidate my knowledge and give me even more ways to help my clients other than just doing the research, such as helping write the stories of your ancestors.

I’ve assisted others with their family trees over the years and would love the chance to work with you.

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How does it work?

Reach out to me via the Contact form below and let me know that you’d like help with your family tree and what your main aims are (i.e. starting it, adding to it, cleaning it up). I’ll get back to you with some detailed instructions, and if we agree to work together, I’ll send you an invoice for a 50% deposit.

Once the deposit has been paid I’ll start work, and the balance will become payable once I’m halfway through the agreed hours. (Don’t worry – I’ll send you a reminder!) Things might be a bit slow if we have to wait for your DNA test to come back, but we can start with a few basic steps.

You have 2 options:

• my Starter package if you haven’t yet built a tree, or you’ve done a little but don’t know how to progress
• my Hourly rate service if your tree is too big to qualify under the Starter package, or if you’ve got a tree that needs work in particular areas.

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Starter package

My Dead Rel Hunting Starter package is $880. (I am not currently registered for GST, so this is ex-GST.) This covers a maximum of 3 hours for admin, onboarding and communication (questions, updates etc), and a minimum of 8 hours for researching.

The main aim will be to build your initial tree with a minimum of 15 people as follows:

• You as the core person (1 person)
• Your parents (2 people)
• Your grandparents (4 people)
• Your great-grandparents (8 people)

However, as I build I will also be adding cousins, aunts and uncles across the various generations as well, validating these with whatever official documents I can find, so you should end up with quite a few more than 15 people! These additional people will enable me to link to more of your DNA matches and verify some of the above branches.

The second aim is to secure an Ancestry minimum tree rating of 9 out of 10, so that you can be confident that the documents and links are as reliable as possible. I can’t guarantee this as I don’t know what information I will or won’t be able to validate until the time comes, but a minimum 9 out of 10 rating will be the aim.

For the Starter Package, the basic process is:

1. You will need an Ancestry account if you don’t already have one. This can be a free account – you don’t have to have a paid subscription.
2. You will need to have your DNA tested via Ancestry if you haven’t already done so. You will have access to purchase the DNA test kit once you create your Ancestry account. This is a simple ‘spit in a tube’ test which can be mailed back to Ancestry for processing. (Please note that your DNA test is a separate cost paid directly to Ancestry and is not part of the research package I am offering here. Please also be careful to only pay for your DNA test – there might be an option to sign up for access to documents, etc., but you won’t need this while I’m doing the research for you.)
3. I will send you some instructions on how to create a ‘starter tree’ so that you are the ‘owner’ of the tree rather than me, as tree ownership can’t be transferred.
4. I will also send you some instructions on how to share your DNA results with me (via our Ancestry accounts).
5. I will ask you to provide some basic details about yourself, parent(s) and/or grandparents – whatever little you may know – so that I start with the most likely ‘true’ facts available.
6. I begin building your tree by adding the facts you provide and then validating those where I can via your DNA matches and whatever documents I can find online.
7. The aim will be to validate the links back to your great-grandparents at least.
8. I will add other people along the way, such as your cousins, aunts, uncles and second cousins, and possibly some great-great grandparents, where DNA matches bring these to light. These wider links will help validate the research, too.
9. I will ask you to be open-minded about the results and accept that we don’t know what we will or won’t discover until I start digging.
10. I will also provide you with my mapping chart for your DNA matches and my tables for numerically labelling your direct ancestors.
11. Once the initial work has been done, the choice is all yours! You can:
    • rescind my access to your DNA results and your tree and take over the research yourself; or
    • rescind my access to your DNA results and your tree and leave your tree as it stands; or
    • leave me with access to your DNA results and your tree and engage me for additional blocks of time (minimum 3 hours per block at my current hourly rate) to keep researching, as and when you like.

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Hourly rate service

What if you’ve already started building your tree on Ancestry?

That’s okay – I’m happy to have a look and see what work might be required to take it further. Or perhaps you have have specific issues you’d like me to work on, such as:

• adding people to the tree and fleshing it out
• identifying duplicated people who need to be investigated and either merged or deleted
• identifying ‘unattached’ people who need to be located, investigated and either attached to a family line or deleted
• a low tree rating on Ancestry, due to issues such as the above, or a lack of facts and documentary sources attached to each person
• investigating certain lines if you’re having trouble working out where that part of the family came from.

If your tree is already too large to qualify for the Starter package, then you can book me for a minimum of three hours at a time to work on it.

• If your tree is a ‘public’ tree on Ancestry, then send me a link to your tree via the Contact form below, let me know what your aims are, and then we can discuss what options might be suitable for you. If we agree to work together, then I can send you the instructions on how to share your tree with me so that I can work on it.
• If your tree is a ‘private’ tree, then let me know that, plus what your aims are, via the Contact form below. I’ll send instructions on how to share your tree with me so that we can then discuss what options might be suitable for you. I’ll also send you instructions on how to remove me in case we decide not to work together.

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What if I can’t trace one of your lines back to your great-grandparents?

If I can’t confidently trace any of the minimum 15 people listed above for the Starter package (excluding yourself), I will refund you $25* for each one I can’t trace. By ‘can’t confidently trace’, that means I can’t find supporting documents to validate their existence in your lineage, and/or I can’t find a DNA connection to that same ancestor.
(* Please note that if you’ve received any form of discount on your Starter package, then that same percentage discount will apply to any refund.)

Having said that, it is also feasible that I may be able to add some great-great-grandparents in one line or another, depending on your DNA matches and other information available. So a dead end in one line doesn’t mean a ‘stop’ in another line – I will be validating and adding as many connections as I can over the research period. The above 15 family members listed are the minimum I will be aiming for.

As you can see here, I’m still trying to validate one of my own paternal great-grandfathers (Edward James Butler). I strongly suspect that he was left on the doorstep of a church in Ireland and raised by adoptive parents, but that hasn’t stopped me tracking down the rest of my great-grandparents, and many of my great-great grandparents (and further back) in my other lines:

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Other services

If required, I can help with writing your family history stories, or editing them if you’ve already written them, or I can help with formatting and publishing them (either for release to the public or for print on demand for your family and friends). As an editor, I am currently an Associate member of IPEd (previously a Professional member from 2008-2018), and have been helping people self publish their books since 2009.

Your privacy

I am a sole trader, so I don’t outsource your work to anyone – I do it all myself.

All communications will be between the two of us only, unless you instruct me otherwise.

Any living people added to your tree will be marked as such and so will have their details hidden from the public – only you and I will be able to see them.

If you wish, I can set your entire tree to be ‘Private’ so that other people on Ancestry will be unable to see most details. However, any photos uploaded or documents linked to, may be accessible to other people, depending on how the information is added.

I will send you instructions on how to remove my access to both your tree and your DNA results once you’re happy to move to that next step.

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Why Ancestry?

As I’ve worked on Ancestry for nearly two decades, learning another system is not worth it for me now. So with apologies in advance, if you don’t have an account with Ancestry, there’s not much I can do to help. 🙁 (I do, however, use additional external resources when searching for information, but I only build trees on Ancestry.)

Please also note that I do NOT receive any kickbacks or financial return from using Ancestry or for mentioning them on my website here.

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Are you ready to start?

Get the ball rolling by scrolling just a little further to the Contact form below!

Let me know where you’re up to with your family tree and DNA testing, and whether you’re interested in the Starter Package or my Hourly rate service. Tell me about any particular family research interest(s) you might have, or problems you’d like me to try to solve, and I’ll get back to you generally within two working days, usually sooner.

(While initial contact will be via email, I’m happy to talk on the phone at an agreed time if that helps.)

Please note that all quotes are obligation-free and I don’t pick up the phone to hassle you into signing up. The choice is always yours whether to proceed or not. But in the hope that you do proceed …

I look forward to helping you with your dead rel hunting!

Please be patient – the contact form can take a few seconds to submit your message. And please don’t forget to let me know whether you’re interested in the Starter Package, general research or cleaning up your tree.

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