Commonlaw or just get married?

[kil3ki]

I am Canadian, my girlfriend is Swedish and we met while she was in Canada on a working holiday.
We are now living in New Zealand together and both want to go back to Canada to live and work as soon as possible. Our relationship has only just been over 1 year long, but we are in it for the long haul. We lived together in Canada, but had to spend some time apart (2 months) when her visa was finished. We have now been living together again since the beginning of October 2017 but do not want to wait until next October to go back to Canada and then wait 3-4 months for an open work permit to be issued while we apply for common law.
My question is- if we got married in New Zealand, where neither of us are from, would that raise any red flags in the spousal sponsorship process? If we got married today and then applied for outbound or flew back and applied inbound, would that look bad? Neither of us have many friends here and there wouldn't be much of a ceremony.. however we would be legitimately marrying each other because we love each other and want to be together. any advice at all is much appreciated . thank you!!!

 

[KBH]

Getting married in New Zealand would not raise any red flags. You both live there right now so it makes perfect sense that you might choose to get married there. It would not "look bad". If you have a small ceremony/not many people in attendance/etc. you'll just want to make sure you include an explanation in your application as to why that was the case. They pay more attention to that kind of thing in relation to cultures where large and elaborate wedding celebrations are a cultural norm which would not be the case for a Canadian/Swedish wedding.