Lawyer or not

[pasportit 7]

I'm an F-1 student, my husband and got married on November 11, 2011. I am here legally, we don't have any criminal records and so on. We are almost ready to send our forms to USCIS. But we can't decide if we should go with a lawyer or not.

Have you had any experience with lawyer? Has the process been faster?

[paojack 41]

A lawyer does not make the process go any faster, they have no influence over USCIS. If your case is pretty simple as it seems to be for what your saying I would advice you to save your money and do it yourself. Good luck!

Edit: Also VJ has A LOT of very helpful information, not to mention all the helpful people here in case you have any doubts. No need to pay anyone else!

Edited March 17, 2012 by paojack

[canadian_wife 1,791]

Lawyers can actually slow up your case. They check, double check, and then check again (when you know yourself that the info on the forms is correct)

So unless you have a particularly difficult case, no need to have a lawyer, it is certainly not faster

Good luck

[PinkMelody 1]

Your case looks pretty simple and straight forward. You're still here legally and doing AOS so I think there's nothing to worry about to send the paper works without lawyer but if you feel comfortable with lawyer it's really up to you. But as long as you follow all the guide lines to fill out paper work and didn't miss anything. I say go for it!

[Lynn&Don 0]

You can file you own papaers and probably get everything a lot faster than a lawyer would. Just type all the forms and put all the documents they ask you for in order. Make your paper work as neat as possible with everything in order, and you should be fine.

[pasportit 7]

Do I need to send supporting documents with my I-485 and I-130?

[Lynn&Don 0]

Do I need to send supporting documents with my I-485 and I-130?

Send in all the documents they ask you for. They should have a list on back of the form telling you what documents to send in.

If additional information is needed they will email you asking for it.

[Harpa Timsah 13,258]

Do I need to send supporting documents with my I-485 and I-130?

Yes, there are a lot of forms and a lot of extra documents needed. it is all outlined in the instructions, an also in the VJ guide in the "guide" section up top.

[Darnell 8,478]

Do I need to send supporting documents with my I-485 and I-130?

yes. if it seems excessive, or 'double the work', remember -

these are two seperate thingies, so two sets of all.

Good Luck !

[aosapplicant 3]

In any legal proceeding, unless you are aware of all governing statutes, codes of regulation and fully familiar with their application,

you should hire an attorney to represent you.

The true purpose of a lawyer is not what silly fantasy of ignorance has made of it. Namely, it is not a job of attorney to make guilty person

innocent or to help otherwise unqualified individual get the benefit one is not entitled to. In fact, under the governing the practice of law

code of ethics such lawyer can be punished and even deprived of a license to practice the law.

True purpose of a lawyer is to make sure that entire proceeding is fair and goes according to the letter of law while advising his or her client

to take the legal steps based on existing statutes and practical application of the same.

If you do not want to hire an attorney and would like to file all paperwork by yourself, of course you can file on your own.

Equally, if you decide to hire an attorney make sure to interview them as you would any employee and do not commit to any contract

or any payment unless you are absolutely sure that the person you are dealing with is professional, ethical and has your best interests in his

or her mind. Lawyers, just like people from all other walks of life, have wide variety of personalities and individuals mixed in their group and ,as society in general deteriorates, ethically and professionally, so do individuals in all walks of life.

So, surely there are bad lawyers who can take advantage of and ruin your case. But there are also those who will do a great job

and save you lots of headaches by making sure everything is done correct from the beginning and the entire application is filed under the rule of law.

Make your own judgement and remember - it is your future at stakes not thAt of anyone who makes you any suggestions, here or elsewhere.

Good luck.

Edited March 18, 2012 by aosapplicant

[trillium13 84]

Do I need to send supporting documents with my I-485 and I-130?

If you are considering not using a lawyer, you're going to have to do a lot of research yourself as far as what's required. I recommend you start by reading the guides here on VJ.

If you're confused about anything, or don't want to put the work into it, and you have the money, then let someone else do it. If you're going to do it yourself you need to commit to a little hard work.

[R&RM 11]

I'm an F-1 student, my husband and got married on November 11, 2011. I am here legally, we don't have any criminal records and so on. We are almost ready to send our forms to USCIS. But we can't decide if we should go with a lawyer or not.

Have you had any experience with lawyer? Has the process been faster?

I agree with others who have said that a lawyer is not necessary if the case is fairly straightforward and you are willing to put the work into it yourself. We hired a lawyer and his primary contribution was to tell us that we forgot to fill in our mothers' maiden names (very unlikely that the USCIS would have done anything other than send an RFE if they cared enough to know about that). At 2,000 dollars, it somehow didn't feel like we got much out of our money's worth. Our primary reason we even got a lawyer was because my fiance is currently not in the US. So I would skip the lawyer, dig in and do the work and spend your 20000 dollars on just about anything else more fun than legal fees. That said, it's your call, you know your situation best and what time restrictions you have that allow you to commit to going through this process on your own. Those are my $0.02

[JimVaPhuong 4,863]

In any legal proceeding, unless you are aware of all governing statutes, codes of regulation and fully familiar with their application,

you should hire an attorney to represent you.

The true purpose of a lawyer is not what silly fantasy of ignorance has made of it. Namely, it is not a job of attorney to make guilty person

innocent or to help otherwise unqualified individual get the benefit one is not entitled to. In fact, under the governing the practice of law

code of ethics such lawyer can be punished and even deprived of a license to practice the law.

True purpose of a lawyer is to make sure that entire proceeding is fair and goes according to the letter of law while advising his or her client

to take the legal steps based on existing statutes and practical application of the same.

If you do not want to hire an attorney and would like to file all paperwork by yourself, of course you can file on your own.

Equally, if you decide to hire an attorney make sure to interview them as you would any employee and do not commit to any contract

or any payment unless you are absolutely sure that the person you are dealing with is professional, ethical and has your best interests in his

or her mind. Lawyers, just like people from all other walks of life, have wide variety of personalities and individuals mixed in their group and ,as society in general deteriorates, ethically and professionally, so do individuals in all walks of life.

So, surely there are bad lawyers who can take advantage of and ruin your case. But there are also those who will do a great job

and save you lots of headaches by making sure everything is done correct from the beginning and the entire application is filed under the rule of law.

Make your own judgement and remember - it is your future at stakes not thAt of anyone who makes you any suggestions, here or elsewhere.

Good luck.

This sounds like an advertisement by the AILA.

Seriously, immigration is largely a bureaucratic rather than a legal process. There are no courts or judges involved, no rules of procedure, etc. Yes, there are a lot of laws that determine if someone is eligible for an immigration benefit. There are also a lot of laws that determine if someone is eligible for unemployment compensation or Social Security retirement benefits, but nobody recommends people hire an attorney to apply for those benefits. USCIS is no different. It's a government agency that grants benefits to people who are eligible. If you can read and follow instructions then you can handle most immigration applications and petitions yourself.

Even if you hire an attorney, if you have a routine case then the attorney isn't going to handle it personally. They're going to hand it off to a paralegal or even a legal secretary. A lawyer isn't going to waste their time filling out forms for you when they can get an admin to do that work.

It's different if you end up in immigration court or in front of the BIA. In that case you're going to need to be able to argue the law, and you're probably going to need an experienced lawyer to do this for you.

I wholeheartedly agree with your advice on HOW to hire an attorney, but I'd go even farther. Anyone can tell if an attorney appears to be professional, but knowing if they are ethical and have your best interests in mind requires that YOU understand immigration law almost as well as they do. You can't possibly know if an attorney is recommending something unethical if you don't first know what is or isn't ethical. You also won't know if they're making any procedural mistakes unless you know what the correct procedures are. In other words, whether you hire an attorney or not, your best chances of success are if you educate yourself. Many people hire an attorney precisely because they can't or won't school themselves, and they'd prefer to pay someone who already knows what to do. Many people who take the time to school themselves come to realize they don't need an attorney.

[nerito 0]

Me and my husband got married 06th January 2012 and we prepared all the documents by ourself.

I think that you guys can do it.

we had just a consultation with a lawyer..

[stefan y karen 23]

I used an attorney for the first time. SCREWED EVERYTHING UP! Guy seriously was sloppy in filling out the forms, and filled them out with erroneous information and I had to withdraw my application, and start over by myself. Now given, my situation was NOT complicated, I know I didn't need a lawyer. I wish I had never hired one. COuld have saved myself $1,100 and a HUGE headache. Seriously, VJ is a very good source of information for non-complicated problems and when a situation is complicated, you will see the VJers say "you should probably get an attorney for this." Skip the lawyer.