Residency Requirement for US Citizen in Australia

[Cdn_Ali 11]

Please note the following if you are considering filing an I-130 petition:

Unlike filing petitions in the United States, petitions submitted overseas must be submitted in person by the U.S. citizen, not by mail.

To be eligible to file a petition in Australia, the petitioner must have maintained continuous residency in Australia for a minimum of the preceding six months. In addition, he/she must be able to show permission to reside in Australia and demonstrate that he/she has been doing so for at least six months before filing the petition.

If the petitioner is a member of the U.S. military stationed outside of the U.S., a copy of his/her orders must accompany the I-130 petition.

I am a dual citizen of Australia & Canada. Due to waiting times of over a year with the backlog in Canada, my US Citizen husband and I were planning on filing DCF in Australia because it is much faster. For a long time, Australia was one of the few countries who did not require proof of 6 months residency, even as recently as last year.

However, being the cautious person I am, I thought I'd better double check that they were still allowing non-resident USC to file in person in Sydney without the 6 month residency before we booked tickets to fly over & a good thing I did. Their response is above - I guess they have come into line with all the other consulates around the world.

So there is the update! Bummer for us... If anyone has gotten around the residency requirement for the USC recently, you'll have to let me know.

Good luck to all.

[payxibka 10,044]

I am a dual citizen of Australia & Canada. Due to waiting times of over a year with the backlog in Canada, my US Citizen husband and I were planning on filing DCF in Australia because it is much faster. For a long time, Australia was one of the few countries who did not require proof of 6 months residency, even as recently as last year.

However, being the cautious person I am, I thought I'd better double check that they were still allowing non-resident USC to file in person in Sydney without the 6 month residency before we booked tickets to fly over & a good thing I did. Their response is above - I guess they have come into line with all the other consulates around the world.

So there is the update! Bummer for us... If anyone has gotten around the residency requirement for the USC recently, you'll have to let me know.

Good luck to all.

Many consulates waived the 6 mos requirement for years.... After the enactment of the Adam Walsh Child Protection act in 2006 (effective early 2007), SecState mandated all consulate districts abide by the 6 mos residency requirement.

[YuAndDan 153]

I am a dual citizen of Australia & Canada. Due to waiting times of over a year with the backlog in Canada, my US Citizen husband and I were planning on filing DCF in Australia because it is much faster. For a long time, Australia was one of the few countries who did not require proof of 6 months residency, even as recently as last year.

However, being the cautious person I am, I thought I'd better double check that they were still allowing non-resident USC to file in person in Sydney without the 6 month residency before we booked tickets to fly over & a good thing I did. Their response is above - I guess they have come into line with all the other consulates around the world.

So there is the update! Bummer for us... If anyone has gotten around the residency requirement for the USC recently, you'll have to let me know.

Good luck to all.

Many consulates waived the 6 mos requirement for years.... After the enactment of the Adam Walsh Child Protection act in 2006 (effective early 2007), SecState mandated all consulate districts abide by the 6 mos residency requirement.

Yep you can read about it here: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2007/mar/82030.htm

[larymiriam 0]

Im a USC residing w/ my Australian wife in Sydney for 13 months now. At the US immigration website it states that DCF petitioners in Australia must show proof of residence in Australia for 6 months and a valid visa for 6 months. But it also states that temporary residents such as students or tourists need not to show any proof of 6 months valid residence. Im in Australia on a 5 year temporary visa, does that qualify me as temporary? Or does temporary only mean tourists and students?

Also, I was notified by Australia immigration 7 months ago that my 5 year visa was granted and in the email it stated that i should go to get my passport stamped "as soon as possible", how long does that mean? Because I have yet to have my visa stamped since i was notified that the visa was granted. I was also given the visa number in the same correspondence so I assumed that would be enough since they did not state that having my passport stamped was mandatory and/or must be done by a specific date.

If anyone knows anything about this, please help, thanks

[Liam and Sam 2]

Please note the following if you are considering filing an I-130 petition:

Unlike filing petitions in the United States, petitions submitted overseas must be submitted in person by the U.S. citizen, not by mail.

To be eligible to file a petition in Australia, the petitioner must have maintained continuous residency in Australia for a minimum of the preceding six months. In addition, he/she must be able to show permission to reside in Australia and demonstrate that he/she has been doing so for at least six months before filing the petition.

If the petitioner is a member of the U.S. military stationed outside of the U.S., a copy of his/her orders must accompany the I-130 petition.

I am a dual citizen of Australia & Canada. Due to waiting times of over a year with the backlog in Canada, my US Citizen husband and I were planning on filing DCF in Australia because it is much faster. For a long time, Australia was one of the few countries who did not require proof of 6 months residency, even as recently as last year.

However, being the cautious person I am, I thought I'd better double check that they were still allowing non-resident USC to file in person in Sydney without the 6 month residency before we booked tickets to fly over & a good thing I did. Their response is above - I guess they have come into line with all the other consulates around the world.

So there is the update! Bummer for us... If anyone has gotten around the residency requirement for the USC recently, you'll have to let me know.

Good luck to all.

We ran into the same thing. I thought for sure we had found a loop hole to be together sooner... nope. Thank God I had emailed and asked or else we would have been filing K3 instead and waiting longer! Unfortunately the only other alternative is having the USC file the fiance visa to migrate to Australia instead of the US (it's a lot faster in some cases).