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Filed: AOS (apr) Country: Thailand
Timeline
Posted

Hi Everyone,

This website has helped me through my AOS process and I just want to share my experience with you all and maybe I can help people who are going through what I went through to get my green card. I just received my green card today and couldn't be happier! Here is my story. I was brought to the U.S. as a child on a tourist visa that had expired 25 years ago. Been living here illegally and afraid to come out of the shadow ever since. Eight years ago I met my future wife, we started dating and we got married last year. The first 7 years our relationship, she didn't know about my illegal status as I was too embarrased to tell her. Well I finally worked up the courage to tell her about it and here is the timeline of our journey through the AOS process which was very quick and very painless:

10/12/2013: Got married in Vegas (my wife is a U.S. Citizen)

2/21/2014: Sent in my AOS packet to the Chicago lockbox, USPS certified mail (I-130, I-765, I-485)

**Tip: do not staple any of the paperwork, just use paperclips. It makes it easier for the folks at the USCIS to look through them. We got complimented on how neat and organized our packet was**

2/24/2014: Notification from the USPS that my package was delivered

3/2/2014: Received an e-mail notification from the USCIS that they have received our packet

3/8/2014: Received a letter for a biometric (fingerprints, picture) appointment for 3/26/2014

3/26/2014: Went in for my biometric at 8:00am, was out of there by 8:20am

4/11/2014: Received a notice for an interview for 5/13/2014

5/5/2014: Noticed of my I-765 (EAD) approval

5/9/2014: Received my EAD

5/13/2014: THE BIG DAY, our interview at 12:30pm (San Francisco office), was approved on the spot

5/17/2014: Received welcome letter. Status on the website changed to 'card production'

5/19/2014: Received a notice on the website that my green card has been sent out

5/20/2014: RECEIVED MY GREEN CARD!!!!!

It only took us 89 days from the packet being sent to receiving my green card which I find to be relatively fast and it was extremely painless. Everyone from the biometric place to the Immigration Officer who interviewed us were very professional, helpful, and friendly.

From my experience, as long as you have nothing to hide, your marriage is legit, and you have all your paperwork organized then you have nothing to worry about. We live in San Francisco, and in a city with so many immigrants I thought our case would take much longer but as you can see it took less than 3 months to complete the process.

I don't want to bore you with all the little details but please feel free to ask me any questions and I will try to help answer them and give you an insight of what we did, and how we did it. If you have questions about our interview experience please let me know and I'd be more than happy to answer them. Again, this site has helped me tremendously at the beginning and throughout my journey so I just want to pay it forward.

Good luck to you all :)

Posted

Hi Everyone,

This website has helped me through my AOS process and I just want to share my experience with you all and maybe I can help people who are going through what I went through to get my green card. I just received my green card today and couldn't be happier! Here is my story. I was brought to the U.S. as a child on a tourist visa that had expired 25 years ago. Been living here illegally and afraid to come out of the shadow ever since. Eight years ago I met my future wife, we started dating and we got married last year. The first 7 years our relationship, she didn't know about my illegal status as I was too embarrased to tell her. Well I finally worked up the courage to tell her about it and here is the timeline of our journey through the AOS process which was very quick and very painless:

10/12/2013: Got married in Vegas (my wife is a U.S. Citizen)

2/21/2014: Sent in my AOS packet to the Chicago lockbox, USPS certified mail (I-130, I-765, I-485)

**Tip: do not staple any of the paperwork, just use paperclips. It makes it easier for the folks at the USCIS to look through them. We got complimented on how neat and organized our packet was**

2/24/2014: Notification from the USPS that my package was delivered

3/2/2014: Received an e-mail notification from the USCIS that they have received our packet

3/8/2014: Received a letter for a biometric (fingerprints, picture) appointment for 3/26/2014

3/26/2014: Went in for my biometric at 8:00am, was out of there by 8:20am

4/11/2014: Received a notice for an interview for 5/13/2014

5/5/2014: Noticed of my I-765 (EAD) approval

5/9/2014: Received my EAD

5/13/2014: THE BIG DAY, our interview at 12:30pm (San Francisco office), was approved on the spot

5/17/2014: Received welcome letter. Status on the website changed to 'card production'

5/19/2014: Received a notice on the website that my green card has been sent out

5/20/2014: RECEIVED MY GREEN CARD!!!!!

It only took us 89 days from the packet being sent to receiving my green card which I find to be relatively fast and it was extremely painless. Everyone from the biometric place to the Immigration Officer who interviewed us were very professional, helpful, and friendly.

From my experience, as long as you have nothing to hide, your marriage is legit, and you have all your paperwork organized then you have nothing to worry about. We live in San Francisco, and in a city with so many immigrants I thought our case would take much longer but as you can see it took less than 3 months to complete the process.

I don't want to bore you with all the little details but please feel free to ask me any questions and I will try to help answer them and give you an insight of what we did, and how we did it. If you have questions about our interview experience please let me know and I'd be more than happy to answer them. Again, this site has helped me tremendously at the beginning and throughout my journey so I just want to pay it forward.

Good luck to you all :)

Congratulations on your green card approval.

Can you share what kind of questions they asked you please? Thank you

Filed: AOS (apr) Country: Thailand
Timeline
Posted

Hello,

After we got sworn in and the IO went through the list of yes/no questions from the form such as, are you planning to practice polygamy, are you a communist, etc...(I answered all NO to all of them just like I did on the form), here are the additional questions he asked us:

1. My birthday, my wife's birthday (she's my sponsor)

2. How many siblings does my wife have?

3. How we met?

**Now this is when I feel like the Officer could really see the legitimacy of our marriage since we've been together for 8 years and we do have a pretty funny story of how we met. As long as your marriage is legitimate I think you will definitely come across as being sincere and not rehearsed. My wife and I could literally finish each other's sentence during the story of how we met, how we traveled together and how we've moved to different states together for work. BE NATURAL and just tell them the truth!

I think during the story of how we met we also answered alot of questions that the Officer would have otherwise asked us. Such as, what kind of food we like, the activities we like to do together, each other's hobbies and habits.**

It took us about 15 minutes to go over how we met and pretty much told him about our whole relationship and he was very friendly and also gave us some tips on vacationing spots. I think by that point he could see that our marriage is legitimate and he didn't ask any other pressing questions.

After that he asked to see our photo album, which he had tons of pictures of us at various cities, and locations. Make sure to bring alot of pictures of you and your spouse together. We also printed out some pictures from Facebook along with comments from our friends and family. He just glanced over the pictures very briefly and handed the album back to us.

He then asked us if we brought a certified original copy of our marriage license, DO NOT FORGET to bring this with you. He told us that this was the document he needed to approve us on that day, so I'm glad we brought it. I also made a copy of the document and he kept the copy. He then asked if we have any other proof of joint assets. We brought copies of our joint insurance card, joint bank account, joint lease agreement from the last 3 apartments we've lived together. He was satisfied with everything and approved us :)

Again, be natural in your interview, be organized with all your paperwork, and bring pictures and proof to legitimize your marriage.

Filed: K-1 Visa Country: Thailand
Timeline
Posted

Congrats!!!!! I completely agreed with you about being yourself. Me and my wife has our GC interview today and was only asked how we met. Other than that we went over our paperwork, the yes / no questions, and making sure everything was correct.

Filed: K-1 Visa Country: Egypt
Timeline
Posted

Hi Everyone,

This website has helped me through my AOS process and I just want to share my experience with you all and maybe I can help people who are going through what I went through to get my green card. I just received my green card today and couldn't be happier! Here is my story. I was brought to the U.S. as a child on a tourist visa that had expired 25 years ago. Been living here illegally and afraid to come out of the shadow ever since. Eight years ago I met my future wife, we started dating and we got married last year. The first 7 years our relationship, she didn't know about my illegal status as I was too embarrased to tell her. Well I finally worked up the courage to tell her about it and here is the timeline of our journey through the AOS process which was very quick and very painless:

10/12/2013: Got married in Vegas (my wife is a U.S. Citizen)

2/21/2014: Sent in my AOS packet to the Chicago lockbox, USPS certified mail (I-130, I-765, I-485)

**Tip: do not staple any of the paperwork, just use paperclips. It makes it easier for the folks at the USCIS to look through them. We got complimented on how neat and organized our packet was**

2/24/2014: Notification from the USPS that my package was delivered

3/2/2014: Received an e-mail notification from the USCIS that they have received our packet

3/8/2014: Received a letter for a biometric (fingerprints, picture) appointment for 3/26/2014

3/26/2014: Went in for my biometric at 8:00am, was out of there by 8:20am

4/11/2014: Received a notice for an interview for 5/13/2014

5/5/2014: Noticed of my I-765 (EAD) approval

5/9/2014: Received my EAD

5/13/2014: THE BIG DAY, our interview at 12:30pm (San Francisco office), was approved on the spot

5/17/2014: Received welcome letter. Status on the website changed to 'card production'

5/19/2014: Received a notice on the website that my green card has been sent out

5/20/2014: RECEIVED MY GREEN CARD!!!!!

It only took us 89 days from the packet being sent to receiving my green card which I find to be relatively fast and it was extremely painless. Everyone from the biometric place to the Immigration Officer who interviewed us were very professional, helpful, and friendly.

From my experience, as long as you have nothing to hide, your marriage is legit, and you have all your paperwork organized then you have nothing to worry about. We live in San Francisco, and in a city with so many immigrants I thought our case would take much longer but as you can see it took less than 3 months to complete the process.

I don't want to bore you with all the little details but please feel free to ask me any questions and I will try to help answer them and give you an insight of what we did, and how we did it. If you have questions about our interview experience please let me know and I'd be more than happy to answer them. Again, this site has helped me tremendously at the beginning and throughout my journey so I just want to pay it forward.

Good luck to you all :)

Congrats to you!!! I have a question. I am seeing it costs 985 dollars to apply for this? Is that true?

Filed: Citizen (pnd) Country: Canada
Timeline
Posted

The various form instructions will be your best guide but I submitted the following:

I-130 - check for $420.00

I-485 + biometrics fee: $1070.00

First Entered US with TN Status: 04/13/2012
Engaged: 08/24/2012
Married: 08/10/2013

Adjustment of Status from TN Status to Permanent Resident:
Day 00: AOS mailed by USPS priority Post: 05/19/2014
Day 02: AOS package arrived: 05/21/2014
Day 08: Text/email notice of acceptance: 05/27/2014
Day 11: NOAs for I-130, I-485, I-765, I-131 received, 05/30/2014
Day 14: Biometrics notice received with an appointment of June 17, 2914 at 3pm. 06/02/2014
Day 15: attempted walk-in successful after a very long wait 06/03/2014
Day 38: email notice that I-485 has moved to testing & interview! 06/26/2014
Day 77: EAD/AP - card production 08/06/2014
Day 84: EAD/AP card received 08/13/2014
Day 129: Infopass appointment for an update (very helpful!) 09/24/2014
Day 136: Email received with interview date 10/01/2014
Day 138: Interview notice received! 10/03/2014
Day 170: Green Card Approved on the Spot! 11/04/2014
Day 178: Green Card Received 11/12/2014

REMOVAL OF CONDITIONS:

Day 00: ROC Package (Weighing 1.7kg -- 3lbs 13oz) mailed by USPS Priority Post: 09/13/2016

Day 03: ROC Package Received: 09/16/2016

Day 07: Check Cashed: 09/20/2016

Day Too many to count: Received Approval 02/05/2018

NATURALIZATION

Day 00: Submitted file online for N400 -- 07/31/2020

Filed: Citizen (apr) Country: Mexico
Timeline
Posted

Congrats to you!!! I have a question. I am seeing it costs 985 dollars to apply for this? Is that true?

Those adjusting from a K-1 do not need an I-130. The fee for the I-485 is $1070. Read through this page > http://www.uscis.gov/i-485

Link to K-1 instructions for Ciudad Juarez, Mexico > https://travel.state.gov/content/dam/visas/K1/CDJ_Ciudad-Juarez-2-22-2021.pdf

 
Didn't find the answer you were looking for? Ask our VJ Immigration Lawyers.

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