Filing I-130 from abroad (Netherlands)

[rvd-ank 0]

Hi!

Hope someone can help me with this:

I am a US citizen (and Dutch as my parents are Dutch but I was born in the US) and I've lived in the Netherlands my whole life. I will marry my girlfriend shortly, and we want to live in California as soon as possible for around two years. We currently live together in the Netherlands. I have my own company and will be working for our US office there; my wife will try to find a job. Now I have a few questions:

- On I-130, should we use our Dutch address for both of us? (field 2). The reason I ask: it seems that for I-864 (affidavit of support) I should be a resident of the US, but I don't think this is the case for I-130?

- On I-130, what should we fill in for "Your relative's address abroad. (Include street, city, province and country)" ? Is it a problem that I don't live in the US? If so, should I rent a place in the US, or use a friend's address here? If not, should I attached an explanation detailing that we currently live in the Netherlands and we would like to move to the US together?

- I'm expecting it would take around 8 months for my wife to get a visa and be able to work in the US. As we would like to go there as soon as possible, would it be possible for her to go there a few months earlier on a tourist visa or a K3 visa?

Thank you so much!!!

[speedwell 224]

You don't have to be a resident to file the I-130. In many countries you can do what is called "Direct Consular Filing" which is processed locally for the most part and is faster. See whether this is applicable to you. It is OK for you to use your Dutch address on the I-130. For the I-130 it is not a problem that you live abroad. The I-130 is just to establish that you have a bona fide relationship not entered into for immigration fraud reasons.

When you get around to filing your affidavit of support, you will need to prove that you will "domicile" in the US. By the time you are ready to file the AOS (after the I-130 is approved), you should have caught up on your last three years of US tax returns (assuming you have not been filing them as every US citizen is obliged to do). You should have in hand firm evidence that you have a job offer in the US, You should already have made firm arrangements to buy a house or rent an apartment in the US. You should have evidence that you will be buying a car in the US if you need one. You should have made arrangements to enroll your children in school if you have any. Things like that.

Your wife will be unable to enter the US with the intention of staying permanently unless she has an immigrant visa. Tourist visas are not immigrant visas. If your wife intends to go a few months early, she must have and be able to prove she has firm plans to return to the Netherlands. This is possible for her, but risky. She will be unable to work while on this visit. She will only be able to work when she has a specific work visa, or when she gets her green card. When the two of you enter on your permanent resident visas, you, as the USC, must precede or accompany her (that's the law).

The K3 visa is not a faster visa for you and it will just be a waste of money.

(caveat: I am in a ####### mood today, so sorry if this sounded a bit flat; I'm trying to cheer myself up by helping out lol)

Edited April 23, 2013 by speedwell

[speedwell 224]

Urgh, this was supposed to be an edit. See more information about the AOS.

When you get around to filing your affidavit of support, you will need to prove that you will "domicile" in the US. By the time you are ready to file the AOS (after the I-130 is approved), you should have caught up on your last three years of US tax returns (assuming you have not been filing them as every US citizen is obliged to do). You should have in hand firm evidence that you have a job offer in the US, You should already have made firm arrangements to buy a house or rent an apartment in the US. You should have evidence that you will be buying a car in the US if you need one. You should have made arrangements to enroll your children in school if you have any. Things like that. You must also be able to provide evidence that you have, or a joint sponsor who is a USC or permanent resident has, enough US-based income or assets to satisfy the financial requirement. Non-US income and assets, or a primary residence, are not usable for this purpose.

Edited April 23, 2013 by speedwell

[speedwell 224]

I was reviewing my posts (bored at the office, heh) and wanted to clarify two things:

1) Only your wife will be entering on a permanent resident visa. You are, of course, a USC.

2) Even though you intend to stay only two years, this is not really "temporary" for immigration purposes.

3) At the end of the process, your wife will get a conditional green card good for two years. Unless she intends to abandon her permanent residency status, she should be in the US to remove conditions and get her ten-year green card. If she intends to be a citizen, she should not be absent from the US long enough to jeopardize her green card.

Cheers

[pluis 2]

Hi rvd,

There is no such thing as Direct Consular Filing anymore for us Dutchies.

I'm going through the same process as you, except I'm in the position of your wife, and this is what I would do in your situation:

- We put our Dutch address on the I-130. You'll file the I-864 at a later time and you can then declare that you intend to establish domicile in the US. Be prepared to show proof for this (and so maybe get started on gathering this proof now)

- Wat number is the question on the I-130 that you refer to? This form is supposed to be filled out by the UCS for a foreign spouse, so they're likely asking for your Dutch address. Yes, add an explanatory note / cover letter explaining that you're a USC who resides in The Netherlands who wishes to move to the US with his wife.

- It seems a waste to have your wife go to the US on a VWP before you're finished with the visa process. She won't be allowed to work yet and she'll need to be in The Netherlands anyway for her medical and interview. It's better to wait a few months and then just move permanently.

Otherwise, spoeedwell says many valuable things about how to establish domicile and about filing taxes. Making sure you've filed US taxes correctly is a _big_ deal and you can forget about her getting a visa of you don;t file.

[Ryan H 3,865]

In many countries you can do what is called "Direct Consular Filing" which is processed locally for the most part and is faster.

The use of the phrase that I put in bold above is inaccurate when referencing Direct Consular Filing. Such filing is only available if there is a USCIS field office in the country and only a handful of countries have USCIS field offices. The list can be seen here: http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=1ac900c262197210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=1ac900c262197210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD

[speedwell 224]

The use of the phrase that I put in bold above is inaccurate when referencing Direct Consular Filing. Such filing is only available if there is a USCIS field office in the country and only a handful of countries have USCIS field offices. The list can be seen here: http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=1ac900c262197210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=1ac900c262197210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD

That looks like "many" countries to me. What's your problem with it?

[rvd-ank 0]

Thank you all!

@ Speedwell & Ryan

DCF is unfortunately not available anymore in the Netherlands indeed. Would have saved me a lot of time :-(

@Pluisje

- That is question 19: "Your relative's address abroad. (Include street, city, province and country)". I read it from the perspective of me, but I guess it should be from the perspective of the United States indeed, hence they are probably referring to my wife's address in the Netherlands. Thanks for clarifying!

- It doesn't seem that your case has been expedited, any idea why? (visajourney.com/forums/topic/357465-usc-petitioner-living-abroad/)

I've a few other questions; maybe you can help with these as well?

- The form doesn't ask to send any proof for marriage. Do you need to bring this to the interview instead?

- We are not yet married but planning to do so in about six weeks. I'm assuming that we have to wait for the marriage before filing the I-130? (instead of already filing and bringing the evidence/marriage documents to the interview)

- We are planning to live in the US for around two years. The I-130 form gets my wife an immigrant visa though. Should we indicate that we are looking to immigrate to the US for an indefinite period, or for two years? Or doesn't it matter?

- I-130 seems to be the best way for my wife to get to the US and be able to work. An alternative however seems to be the L1 visa (I need to work in the US for my own company, which has offices in the UK, NL and US), as it seems to be processed quicker (around one month, egov.uscis.gov/cris/processingTimesDisplay.do)? In that case I wouldn't 'use' my US citizenship though and hence it would be awkward if it would be the better route?

[chaine1 116]

Speedwell mentioned it, but I wanted to make sure you saw it - make sure you've filed your last three years of taxes!! Even though you live abroad, the US government expects you to have done this, and will ask for proof at the NVC stage. As you are residing abroad, you may make it through the USCIS stage fairly quickly (use your address abroad), and if you haven't filed your taxes, this could slow you down considerably.

There is a thread with information from people who filed abroad, and while the trend has changed a bit from when the thread started, there is still plenty of good information here:

http://www.visajourn...-living-abroad/

Good luck!

ETA: I see you've already found it!

Edited April 24, 2013 by chaine1

[chaine1 116]

- The form doesn't ask to send any proof for marriage. Do you need to bring this to the interview instead?

The I-130 does ask for proof - a marriage certificate and proof of bone fide relationship. Are you looking at the instructions, or just the form itself?

- We are not yet married but planning to do so in about six weeks. I'm assuming that we have to wait for the marriage before filing the I-130? (instead of already filing and bringing the evidence/marriage documents to the interview)

Yes. Can't file until officially married.

- We are planning to live in the US for around two years. The I-130 form gets my wife an immigrant visa though. Should we indicate that we are looking to immigrate to the US for an indefinite period, or for two years? Or doesn't it matter?

Doesn't matter.

- I-130 seems to be the best way for my wife to get to the US and be able to work. An alternative however seems to be the L1 visa (I need to work in the US for my own company, which has offices in the UK, NL and US), as it seems to be processed quicker (around one month, egov.uscis.gov/cris/processingTimesDisplay.do)? In that case I wouldn't 'use' my US citizenship though and hence it would be awkward if it would be the better route?

Sorry, can't comment here. Hopefully someone else can.

[pluis 2]

The time lapsed between my NOA 1 and NOA 2 was 55 days, which is considerably faster than almost any petition filed by a petitioner inside the US. These people routinely wait for five to seven months, just to get to the first part (the I-130) approved. So, as far as there is an expedite, I sure benefited from it. For the record, we filed in early November, expect an interview in June and could have easily won a month of time (or so) at the NVC stage had we ourselves been faster.

The form doesn't ask to send any proof for marriage. Do you need to bring this to the interview instead?

The form itself doesn't, but the instructions with the form do. It's certainly advised to send in a nice package of evidence, including your marriage certificate (this last item is mandatory). f you want to see what we sent, I made a list of it on my personal blog (link). A good general guide for things to include is found on VJ itself, namely here.

- We are not yet married but planning to do so in about six weeks. I'm assuming that we have to wait for the marriage before filing the I-130? (instead of already filing and bringing the evidence/marriage documents to the interview)

Yes, you can only file after you've gotten married, because the marriage certificate needs to be included. However, you can have the package ready to send out the moment you have the certifcate in hand if you start compiling evidence now.

- We are planning to live in the US for around two years. The I-130 form gets my wife an immigrant visa though. Should we indicate that we are looking to immigrate to the US for an indefinite period, or for two years? Or doesn't it matter?- I-130 seems to be the best way for my wife to get to the US and be able to work. An alternative however seems to be the L1 visa (I need to work in the US for my own company, which has offices in the UK, NL and US), as it seems to be processed quicker (around one month, egov.uscis.gov/cris/processingTimesDisplay.do)? In that case I wouldn't 'use' my US citizenship though and hence it would be awkward if it would be the better route?

I suppose you could go for an L1 if your company qualifies and have a partner visum for your spouse and while it may perhaps give you a short term benefit (maybe!) of a quicker filing time, it gives you less certainty. Perhaps you and your wife decide that you'll want to stay for more than two years, for instance, or maybe something unexpected will happen with your company. With a green card for your wife, you'll be the safest and the most flexible to respond to what may happen in the future. I would personally counsel to deal with the somewhat longer wait now, but to have the certainty of an unlimited stay later.

[chaine1 116]

An alternative however seems to be the L1 visa (I need to work in the US for my own company, which has offices in the UK, NL and US), as it seems to be processed quicker (around one month, egov.uscis.gov/cris/processingTimesDisplay.do)? In that case I wouldn't 'use' my US citizenship though and hence it would be awkward if it would be the better route?

I'm pretty sure an L-1 is for the individual working for the international company. As a US citizen, you could not qualify. The only way your wife would qualify for an L-1 is if she got a job with an international company. Not something I'm too familiar with, so I hope someone with more experience with an L-1 can comment.