I-864 questions

[elvenshadow 19]

OK thanks, I will do that. If the cash in the US savings account has my wife's name as well as my name and my mother's name on it, is it OK to claim that full amount on my father's I-864 as being my wife's money? Would sending a scan of our Japanese checking account with her name on it showing that the funds came from there as well as the documents showing the money orders shipped and converted to US dollars help our case at all?

After all it seriously IS my wife and my money so...

[pushbrk 12,234]

Sounds good to me.

[elvenshadow 19]

Sounds good to me.

Thanks for all of your help so far. Now I have a few questions about the I-864A. My mother is filling it out as part of my joint sponsor’s (father’s) I-864. She sent me the file to check for accuracy so I want to make sure she gets everything correct.

For the tax information in part 11, she filled it in using an amount that only reflects what SHE earned personally. However, they have filed as married filing jointly and the instructions say use line for gross (total) income from the 1040 (so line 22 I would think). So, am I correct to assume that she should instead, write whatever the amount is for total income on line 22 and my father will also write that same amount on his own I-864? The instructions also specifically say “federal individual income tax return” so I just want to make sure.

This next part from the official instructions for I-864a is really confusing me. It states:

“If the sponsor you are promising to make your income

available to is sponsoring the the principal intending

immigrant (the sponsor should have “Yes” as his or her

answer to item number 8 of his or her Form I-864), you should

list the intending immigrant on line “a” of Item 13 and then

list on lines “b” through “f” any spouse and any and all

children that appear on lines 9a through 9e of the sponsor's

Form I-864. “

First of all, I don’t see an item number 8 that asks for a “yes” or “no” answer on the I-864. Second of all, it says to list the intending immigrant on line a (Part 2) which is all well and good. But then it says to list people that appear on lines 9a through 9e of the SPONSOR’S form I-864. I have no idea what section they are referring to. I only see 9a 9b and 9c from Part 6, Person 4. That seems incorrect to me. So basically what I want to know is, do we need to include anything on the I-864a for Part 2, section 13, lines b – e? Is it OK to just type N/A for all of those lines since my wife is the only intending immigrant and she is listed on line 13a?

For Part 2, section 13 and, and Part 3, section 15, for the spaces that say “(indicate number)” and “(Number from line 13)”, which number are they referring to? Do they mean I type “13a” since that is the line my wife’s information is on, or do they mean the alien number or SSN (both of which she doesn’t have and we have typed “none”)? What do we need to include on those lines?

Sorry for so many more questions. I read the I-864A instructions and that is all I could find about it.

[pushbrk 12,234]

The past tax return information for both of them should be the same and come from line 22 of the 1040. The exception, is that you would add in any non-taxed social security in addition the figure on line 22, as applicable.

I don't have time right now to sort through all the other items. If there's just one immigrant, you should be able to sort it out though. Make sure a question is not applicable before you try telling them it is.

[elvenshadow 19]

OK, I think I figured out the other things on my own.

For section 13, on line a, I just put my wife’s name and birth date. She has no A-number or SSN so I put “none”. Since she is the only immigrant, section 13, lines b – e are all just “N/A”

The parts that say (indicate Number) and (Number from line 13) in sections 13 and 15 are just asking for the number of immigrants, so in my case I just put “1” on both lines.

For section 10, current individual annual income, I told my mother to just take the most recent 6 months of pay stubs, average them together and then multiple by 2 to get an average 12 month estimated projection of what she currently makes.

For section 11, as was suggested before, the 3 values are the same as line 22 from the three years of 1040 forms.

We still need to finalize the assets section but it should be pretty straight forward once they get the documents to support it. (it turns out they have $137,000 in just cash savings and stocks alone, so I guess we don't really need to include the real-estate holdings, which they estimate to be $330,000 but have not gotten it appraised yet)

Hopefully everything is correct and her I-864a is good. Still waiting for my dad to finish his I-864 but hopefully it won’t be too hard.

Thanks for the help.

Edited May 28, 2014 by elvenshadow

[pushbrk 12,234]

Your math equation will not produce the correct current income. You don't average six months then multiply by two. You add the six months together and multiply by two, OR average the six months then multiply by twelve. I'm sure Mom can figure that out.

If she's paid every two weeks, instead of once or twice a month, the formula is different. You average a number of pay periods, then multiply by the number of pay periods in a year. For those paid every two weeks, that's 26 pay periods, not 12 or 24.

Edited May 28, 2014 by pushbrk

[elvenshadow 19]

Man, I can't believe I posted that wrong. I swear I'm not that bad at math.

[elvenshadow 19]

I told my parents that appraisals are required for declaring property as assets. They are now asking me if real-estate sales records from the same county for similar property is an acceptable substitute? I have never heard anyone else mention this before.

Since they have cash and stock assets of $237,000 without even using any real-estate assets, and their household income is already marginally above the poverty line limit, in the scenario where we declared the real-estate and sent the above mentioned supporting documents but NVC ended up considering it insufficient proof, would we get a checklist, or would they just not care since the other assets are already more than sufficient?

[NikLR 13,220]

I told my parents that appraisals are required for declaring property as assets. They are now asking me if real-estate sales records from the same county for similar property is an acceptable substitute? I have never heard anyone else mention this before.

Since they have cash and stock assets of $237,000 without even using any real-estate assets, and their household income is already marginally above the poverty line limit, in the scenario where we declared the real-estate and sent the above mentioned supporting documents but NVC ended up considering it insufficient proof, would we get a checklist, or would they just not care since the other assets are already more than sufficient?

I would not bother with the real estate. They need to have it appraised by an actual appraiser, then minus any mortgage, and that is the value of the home AND the DOS does not accept use of primary homes so unless they are using a secondary "vacation" home as the asset, don't even bother. Liquid or easily liquid assets are the best and easiest.

[pushbrk 12,234]

I would not bother with the real estate. They need to have it appraised by an actual appraiser, then minus any mortgage, and that is the value of the home AND the DOS does not accept use of primary homes so unless they are using a secondary "vacation" home as the asset, don't even bother. Liquid or easily liquid assets are the best and easiest.

Absolutely correct. No substitute for an appraisal and unless it is real estate they aren't living in, there's no need to mention it at all.

[elvenshadow 19]

Thank you for the quick reply.

They own an apartment building in the city that has 2 units. My grandmother used to live there before she passed away. Now my parents own it and they currently have tenants that live there. This is, of course, separate than their house that they live in.

OK, if you feel that the value of the liquid assets that I stated are sufficient then I will just tell them not to bother with the real-estate. (when leaving that line blank is it better to put $0, N/A, or none?)

One final question about this. I mentioned that I will be sending about $10,000 back to the US from our Japan checking account. Since my parents liquid assets are already so high, would it be more beneficial to include the joint liquid assets from me and my wife on MY I-864 or my father’s? Basically, I know that mine on its own is not good enough to be accepted because I have no current income that is able to be counted and either way my assets would be insufficient. So, it’s a matter of whether to use our liquid assets to show them that the 2 of us have some personal savings, or to pad the overall assets number on the co-sponsor I-864 which will ultimately be what is deemed acceptable to give us approval.

Edited May 29, 2014 by elvenshadow

[F & A 12]

In regards to the I-864

This may seem like a dumb question but I just want to make sure. When sending the I-864, the "Tax Return" photo copy that we send is just photo copies of the actual 1040, 2555EZ and W2s that I physically mailed to the IRS when I filed, correct? (I live abroad and all of my income is tax exempt but so I never owed but filed every year.)

My wife and I plan to move back to the states later this year if her visa is ready in time. The current one year contract for my job ends on July 31st. I will not be employed again until we return to the US and I most likely will not have a job lined up in advance that is guaranteed. So, I will most likely be unemployed for a month or more. When I calculate my current projected income, how should I go about doing that? Is it OK to just use my current monthly salary multiplied by 12? I don't know how much I will make at my next job or when I will start it exactly.

In regards to the previous question, I currently make roughly the equivalent of $3,000 a month in yen, before taxes etc. Would using my father in the US as a co-sponsor be beneficial or is it necessary given my situation? I also have about $20,000 in assets (savings, bonds etc).

Last question. In section 4 on the I-864, I should list my mailing address as my current address in Japan, right? How about for "Sponsor's Place of Residence"? Should I list the US address that we plan to move to once she gets her visa, or do I need to list where we currently, physically live in Japan? I understand that I have to prove intent to re-establish Domicile, so I was thinking the US address is good for that, but we don't actually live there at the moment so I don't want to come off as a liar.

Thank you very much for any advice or information you can provide.

Does the petitioner have to file an affidavit of support if he or she cannot meet the income requirements and there is a joint sponsor?

Yes. The petitioner is still a sponsor and must file an affidavit of support, even if he or she cannot meet the income requirements. The petitioner remains fully liable, along with the joint sponsor, for any benefits the sponsored immigrant(s) may use. The joint sponsor must file a separate affidavit of support.

[elvenshadow 19]

Can someone (Pushbrk, NLR, whoever) please verify if this statement is indeed correct or not?

"If not mistaken you don't have to have your property appraised all you have to do is go to the country office, not sure of the appropriate name and get what the property is appraised for now. They give you the papers right away I know because my father did this and we will be doing it again tomorrow. It's easy doesn't take very long at al."

http://www.visajourney.com/forums/topic/498764-nvc-filers-june-2014/?p=7053790

I was pretty much ready to just leave real-estate assets off since joint sponsor's liquid assets is actually over $300,000 already without it, so I just wanted to know if I should write "0" or "N/A" in the real-estate space, but now I am just getting more confused.

[pushbrk 12,234]

In my opinion, if the real estate equity is actually needed in order to qualify, there's no substitute for an appraisal. I had a conversation with somebody just yesterday though and told him if he had ten rental properties, and only needed two or three to qualify, he would probably get by with the tax assessments and mortgage statements for all ten, and no appraisals for any. If the liquid assets are over 300k without the real estate, this will probably work in this case too.

[elvenshadow 19]

In my opinion, if the real estate equity is actually needed in order to qualify, there's no substitute for an appraisal. I had a conversation with somebody just yesterday though and told him if he had ten rental properties, and only needed two or three to qualify, he would probably get by with the tax assessments and mortgage statements for all ten, and no appraisals for any. If the liquid assets are over 300k without the real estate, this will probably work in this case too.

So just to make sure I am understanding you properly...

Are you saying that because we have such high liquid assets that we could get away with declaring the apartment value in assets with only submitting the tax assessment and mortgage statement for it? (If this is the case, are we at any risk of getting a checklist if they decide that it is insufficient proof?)

or

Are you saying that because our liquid assets are so high, that we simply should be approved without declaring the apartment value at all?