RFE I-485 Please help!

[xor 0]

Hello everyone,

I got a RFE today saying the sponsor's income does not meet 125% of the poverty guideline.

My sponsor (husband) annual income is $50,000 a year. There are 2 people in our household (me and him).

It requests for 6 months of paystubs but my husband has been working there for only 3 months.

We both graduated from a 4-year college in June and he did not work while attending college which is the reason why he does not have a tax return form.

We already included a letter explaining why he does not have a tax return with the form we sent in in November(was not working).

We also included a letter from his job saying that his annual income is $50k a year.

What should we do now?

[VanessaTony 3,567]

What did you write on the I-864 in the income box?

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

Hello everyone,

I got a RFE today saying the sponsor's income does not meet 125% of the poverty guideline.

My sponsor (husband) annual income is $50,000 a year. There are 2 people in our household (me and him).

It requests for 6 months of paystubs but my husband has been working there for only 3 months.

We both graduated from a 4-year college in June and he did not work while attending college which is the reason why he does not have a tax return form.

We already included a letter explaining why he does not have a tax return with the form we sent in in November(was not working).

We also included a letter from his job saying that his annual income is $50k a year.

What should we do now?

It sounds like they're not inclined to believe that he has sufficiently proven that his reasonably anticipated income for the year will be enough to meet the minimum requirements. The Adjudicators Field Manual says:

When determining the sufficiency of a Form I-864, USCIS shall first consider the sponsor’s anticipated income for the year the sponsor signed Form I-864. Thus, during the initial evidence review, USCIS shall as a general rule determine the sufficiency of a Form I-864 based on the sponsor’s reasonably anticipated household income for the year in which the sponsor signed the Form I-864.

I know that everyone says that "current income is what counts", but it appears from the above statement that it's the current YEAR'S anticipated income that counts. If he's only going to get three months of work in this year then his income for the year will be under $18K. If the IO is strictly following the AFM guidance then his income isn't sufficient for this year. They're asking for six months of pay stubs because they want to see proof that his income this year will be enough.

You can read the AFM chapter on affidavits of support here:

http://www.uscis.gov/ilink/docView/AFM/HTML/AFM/0-0-0-1/0-0-0-2872/0-0-0-3055.html#0-0-0-381

[xor 0]

What did you write on the I-864 in the income box?

We put 50,000. We don't know what to do anymore because we need to resubmit the evidence withint 87 days.

He still won't have earned 18,000 in the next 87 days. It said that if we fail to send in evidence then my applications will be denied.

[xor 0]

It sounds like they're not inclined to believe that he has sufficiently proven that his reasonably anticipated income for the year will be enough to meet the minimum requirements. The Adjudicators Field Manual says:

When determining the sufficiency of a Form I-864, USCIS shall first consider the sponsor’s anticipated income for the year the sponsor signed Form I-864. Thus, during the initial evidence review, USCIS shall as a general rule determine the sufficiency of a Form I-864 based on the sponsor’s reasonably anticipated household income for the year in which the sponsor signed the Form I-864.

I know that everyone says that "current income is what counts", but it appears from the above statement that it's the current YEAR'S anticipated income that counts. If he's only going to get three months of work in this year then his income for the year will be under $18K. If the IO is strictly following the AFM guidance then his income isn't sufficient for this year. They're asking for six months of pay stubs because they want to see proof that his income this year will be enough.

You can read the AFM chapter on affidavits of support here:

http://www.uscis.gov/ilink/docView/AFM/HTML/AFM/0-0-0-1/0-0-0-2872/0-0-0-3055.html#0-0-0-381

Thank you. Is there a way to keep my application from being denied? The letter stated that my application will be denied if we fail to prove his income in 87 days.

He will almost make 18k in the next 87 days. If the application is denied then does that mean my work permit application is also denied? I am going in for a biometric on tuesday.

When we applied we did not know he has to work for a year first. We talked to a lawyer when my husband first got the job offer and she said it is still possible to apply since he has a stable/government job. etc. I couldn't get a hold of her today tho so I will try again tomorrow. Meanwhile, all feedback are appreciated. =)

[xor 0]

Also, my parents gave me quite a bit of money as a wedding gift. Can we also include that as our assets to meet the requirement?

[ceadsearc 516]

Also, my parents gave me quite a bit of money as a wedding gift. Can we also include that as our assets to meet the requirement?

You can include assets but you need 3x the amount of the difference. So if your husband makes 1,000 less than needed this year, you need 3,000 in assets to make up for that; if he is 2,000 short you need 6,000.

Do you have anyone who could co-sponsor?

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

I had always presumed that the general wisdom on VJ was correct, and that current income was the prevailing factor that they based their decision on. However, there have been quite a few cases here on VJ where people were given an RFE after having presented what appeared to be a sufficient affidavit of support. These cases always left me scratching my head trying to figure out why their affidavit of support wasn't accepted as sufficient. In retrospect, it does seem that these RFE's seem to be more common in the second half of the year, and when the sponsor had only recently started a new job. I'd read that particular section of the AFM several times before, but it only struck me yesterday what it actually said.

Include your assets. If you can get a joint sponsor then that would clinch it.