Question regarding hiring legal advice to support us during the K-1 Fiance Visa Process

[Pierrot le fou 0]

Hello everyone, i recently found this page, which i found extremely helpful, specially reading about other's people experiences regarding this process, as me and my Fiancee plan to go through this whole thing ourselves pretty soon.
Im from Bolivia, and my Fiancee is American and lives in the States, we wanna get married (hopefully) by June-July 2017, we initially went to the US goverment's page and read the section they have regarding the K1 Visa requirements, and i found things very poorly explained over there to be honest, im glad i found this site thou, as your guides are quite comprehensive, but the whole process is very complicated regardless. What i think i know for sure from all that reading thou is, there is barely anything i can do from my end, since im the Foreign party, my fiancee is the one who has to file all the forms and papework over there in the US (mostly).
Which brings me to my question, while looking for resources and info on this K-1, i stumbled into a lot of attorney and legal inmigration K-1 "Specialists" websites, who say "help" you trhough the whole process, as i can see that if you make a mistake in any of the forms or the filing, until you hear back of that mistake, and you correct it and send it again, you could lose months in the process, and we really don't wanna spend more time apart than we need to with my Fiancee (btw we've been together for more than 2 years and we see each other in person at least twice a year for a couple of weeks or months). Do you think it would be "efficient" to hire an attorney or legal advice+support for this whole process, could it potentially help us save time? and would the costs to pay be worth it? We have not yet looked into prices for this, but if anyone has done this with legal help, or has an opinion on this, i would really like to hear your thoughts as it will help us make a decision. Thank you!

[Cheezees 1,514]

Don't even bother with that nonsense. Unless you have a conplicated case, the K1 process is very much DIY. Good luck!

[Moslund 94]

I hired a lawyer through my k1 process... honestly it helped my stress levels I was the k1 living in the U.K. My now husband was the America citizen... the lawyers basically told us what documents we needed Gathered together what he requested and my husband dropped them off at the lawyers office since the lawyer was based where my husband lived.. the lawyer done everything for us made is almost stress free for us... any questions or concernes we contacted him and he was very clear in his answers... if you case is traight forward there is no need to get a lawyer but as I said it can help the stressful side of it... my case was straight forward but we were just worried about doing it wrong that's why we got a lawyer to make sure everything was filed correctly... I loved the fact of the lawyer doing all the paperwork and making sure everything goes smoothly so I hired a lawyer again to file my adjustment of status for me... a lawyer doesn't make the process go any faster than if you done it yourself

Edited October 8, 2016 by Moslund

[soulstriker 274]

k1 isnt hard if your case isnt complicated , and lawyers are humans as well and do make mistakes , if you have the extra time then do it on your on ,you can save that money for something more useful, lawyers dont make the process go any faster

[Ebunoluwa 6,136]

I hired a lawyer, fired him and did it myself, he was not well in tune with our embassy.

[TBoneTX 43,038]

Your question is asked quite often here. Of note, no one here can truthfully state "you do not need a lawyer!" when we don't know (and can't know) the full details of your situations as petitioner and beneficiary.

Your key to success throughout this immigration process will rely on your abilities to read carefully, interpret instructions literally, and answer/respond completely and honestly. If your petitioner lacks these capabilities -- or the time that it takes -- then consider seeking outside assistance.

Read the Guides (link is atop every page on this site), and read "Embassy Info" and "Reviews: Embassy" for possibly crucial insights into what your circumstances might be when it comes time for the actual visa interview.

It is to your advantage to become students of the entire immigration process, and that happens through reading the Guides, Embassy details, and forums.

[DavidandJen 15]

I, the beneficiary, actually put together most of our initial submission to USCIS. It's second nature to me to keep airplane stubs etc and many things we've done together that we submitted as evidence were booked by me, so I had easier access to the evidence. I assembled as much as I could, then mailed it to my fiancé who completed his parts (i.e. the biographical information, the actual I-129f, some further explanation of how we met that he thought would be useful).

That worked for us because he was working a lot more than I was and had less time to arrange these things and I'm not very good at relaxing and letting other people get on with things.

My point is that you can be involved with this initial stage. Having the two of you working out what should go in your packet means you have someone to sound ideas off of and hopefully negates the need for a lawyer. It also means that when the time comes for your interview, you don't need to "learn" your packet because you made it.

[Rosswick 4]

Personally, for us hiring a lawyer was worth it. We both tend to easily stress out sometimes, and whenever either one of us has a freak out over any part of this process our lawyer has eased our minds that everything is and will be ok. That and her overseeing all the paperwork was worth it for us but I think every couple is different.

[Scandi 3,970]

If you don't have a complicated case do not pay someone else to do it for you. It's super easy and it's much better if you keep an eye on the process yourself instead of putting your trust in a lawyer who might not even know the process very well at all. Here on VJ we see people getting the wrong info from their lawyers and receiveing RFEs very often, surprisingly often, actually. It's definitely not worth the money.

Hiring a lawyer for something like this feels very American to me, you guys have lawyers for everything apprently. In Sweden we only use lawyers if we actually NEED one - this isn't one of those cases (if your case is simple).

Besides, you do most of the work yourself anyway. You have to gather all that is needed, the lawyer only does the very small things (like filling out forms that even a child could fill out and so on). You have VJ to answer all your questions, which has proven to be a much safer place to get correct answers than asking a lawyer.

Edited October 9, 2016 by Scandi

[Neonred 3,446]

Great info so far. My suggestion is to download and print the I-129f and INSTRUCTIONS and read it over. Gather the documents you will need (you will have to do this anyway) and see if you feel comfortable filling in the blanks on the form. Ask questions here on VJ. Some folks have used a visa service company that for a small fee will look over your visa petition for errors. Generally most people are very successful doing this on their own.

[Michael and Ganna 103]

Save the money....DIY....if you have questions ask here. It looks worse than it really is.....

[Dotagirlandboy 30]

We regret hiring a lawyer everyday. He did nothing we couldn't do ourselves, and we regret wasting that money everyday. We plan on adjusting status ourselves. Like others said maybe if you had a really hard embassy or crazy circumstances maybe, otherwise I don't think so. Like I said, we regret it everyday we could have really used that money now and we basically did everything ourselves anyway good luck!

[LionessDeon 2,060]

Use the search tool and type in "should I hire a lawyer". You will see many many prior threads on this subject.

You can do this in your own. Save the $$ for AOS.

[Meg&Andrew 297]

Unfortunately I've seen more people get RFE's having a lawyer than the ones who do this process on their own. A word of advice though, have your fiance get on here and read the guides and do some research. Since your fiance is the one who will be doing all the paperwork and filing.

[ddtenor2 80]

I agree that in most cases, although the process SEEMS daunting, it is not all that bad. We did not use a lawyer at any point in our process, and never received an RFE. I would recommend you do it yourself. Three things I would recommend to ease the journey:

1. Look at sample cover letters on VJ for each of the steps in the process. I found these immensely helpful in identifying what was or wasn't needed for each step.
2. Review the examples of filled in forms provided here. They provide insight into how some of the questions should be answered. There were a few questions I was unsure how to answer, but when I saw the answer in the sample form the response became apparent.
3. If you still have questions, post them on VJ. I had a couple during the process, and I found the members to be very helpful.

Good luck on your journey!!