🕵️‍♀️ How to Become a Licensed Private Investigator 🕵️‍♀️

A guide to channeling your inner Nancy Drew

Getting my private investigator license started as a joke.

Then it became a hobby.

And now, it’s…kind of a thing.

Over the last year, I’ve noticed a pattern in my inbox. Sometimes multiple times a week, someone reaches out asking some version of the same question: “Wait…How does someone actually become a licensed private investigator?”

As more people have asked, I’ve realized that it says something about where we’re at collectively, particularly those of us in film, journalism, or other media-adjacent fields in flux.

So, I wrote a guide. I didn’t overthink the title, “How to Become a Licensed Private Investigator.”

I pulled together the questions I get most often, the lessons I learned from my own licensing process, the realities of the work, and the things I wish that someone had told me earlier. I try to be practical but also honest about the weirdness and delight that come with it all.

For those who are in transition or simply PI-curious, I hope that this is useful. Not because I think everyone needs to become a private investigator, but because I think it’s worth considering alternative paths, asking questions, and appreciating the art of deep research.

Keep the questions coming. They’re what sparked all of this in the first place.