Employment history issues and concerns

[maxtennis 0]

Hello everyone.

I have a few worries about the employment history part of the application and how it affects the chances of me and my fiances chances of not getting the k1 visa.

First, briefly about us. I'm a US citizen and she's from Russia. I was originally born in Russia but my family moved to the US when I was 5. Currently I'm 27. She's 31. I met her over a year ago traveling to Tunisia to play a tennis tournament and she was on vacation there. We've met in person 4 times since then in Turkey, Czech Republic, Serbia, and Greece. I should have no problem proving our relationship is genuine.

I'm pretty much about two weeks away from putting together all the documents to submit but I'm worried about the employment part because I have a fairly unique situation there.

I was basically unemployed for the past few years officially. I have a job (tennis player) that I can put on the form and it's legit but I never made money from it.

I will be starting a job in the next few days that will be official and I'll be making the necessary amount of income for the 125% of poverty line requirement(which if I'm not mistaken is 20,300? I'll be getting slightly above that). I also have another prospective job in next couple of months that I can put on the affidavit of support form that I'll need to send my fiance when it's time for her interview.

I have no assets, real estate, etc. that I can declare. I can potentially also try to find a co sponsor.

My worries and questions are this : can I file the petition in let's say two weeks from now after officially being on a current paying job for only few weeks? Or do I need to wait a while?

The thing is we'd like to get this process started as soon as possible because we're very much in love and ready to start our life together. It's hard being apart as I'm sure as everyone here knows. But we'd like to not take any risks.

Any help and suggestions is appreciated. If you have any questions about my situation to make it easier to answer, please just ask. Thank you

[kris&me 572]

you will need a cosponsor with ability to show last 3 year's tax returns

also for K1 it is only 100% 

125% will be needed for AOS after marriage

[maxtennis 0]

16 minutes ago, kris&me said:

you will need a cosponsor with ability to show last 3 year's tax returns

also for K1 it is only 100% 

125% will be needed for AOS after marriage

I see. Well that does complicate things for me but assuming I do find a cosponsor, I can file the petition whenever I have it ready then? 

Edited December 20, 2017 by maxtennis

[geowrian 22,339]

You can file anytime. The I-134 is needed for the interview, which will likely be in 7-9 months at the soonest. You can delay it for almost a year from that in most cases as well. So you have plenty of time to establish your current income, and/or get a second job OR joint sponsor if needed.

 

You only need the most recent year's tax return for the I-134. This will be the 2017 return by the time you interview.

 

For the I-864 for AOS (after entering on the K-1 visa and marrying), you must provide the most recent tax year's tax return as well have filed the 2 years prior to that. You can optionally provide the actual returns for the other 2 years as well. If you didn't file for a year because you weren't required to file, then you can provide a signed letter stating as such.

[maxtennis 0]

Also, I just realized that the job that I had for past few years, even though legit but since I wasn't making money from it, I wasn't filing tax returns and don't have any for past few years. Is it better to just leave it off the form entirely and just have the job I'll be starting in a few days? 

[geowrian 22,339]

2 hours ago, maxtennis said:

Also, I just realized that the job that I had for past few years, even though legit but since I wasn't making money from it, I wasn't filing tax returns and don't have any for past few years. Is it better to just leave it off the form entirely and just have the job I'll be starting in a few days? 

Normally I would suggest listing all employment, but I really don't think it matters either way here as there is a valid argument, IMHO, either way. There's no harm in disclosing it, so I would tend to err on the the side of including it personally.

[maxtennis 0]

Quick question, when filling out the I-129f form and the employment part, for a job that I'm currently working at do I leave the end date blank or put N/A, current, etc? I'd have to fill it in ink then because Adobe only allows me to put a date there when filling it in my pic. Thanks

[geowrian 22,339]

"N/A" or "Present" is fine.

[maxtennis 0]

On 12/19/2017 at 7:44 PM, geowrian said:

You only need the most recent year's tax return for the I-134. This will be the 2017 return by the time you interview.

 

For the I-864 for AOS (after entering on the K-1 visa and marrying), you must provide the most recent tax year's tax return as well have filed the 2 years prior to that. You can optionally provide the actual returns for the other 2 years as well. If you didn't file for a year because you weren't required to file, then you can provide a signed letter stating as such.

 

I will not have a 2017 return as I'm not required to file for it this year and it would be pointless for me to do so as I technically did not have income this year. For the interview part, can I not include a tax return with my I-134? Just letter from employer, pay stubs, bank statements? The I-134 instructions doesn't state that you have to include tax returns. Will it be alright if just my sponsor that I will find will include his tax returns with the I-134? Or should I also provide a signed letter explaining why I don't have tax returns for 2017 like you said for the i-864 AOS part? 

 

The AOS and i-864 will most likely be in 2018, so I shouldn't have a problem having the tax returns then for it. 

 

I'll hopefully sending the petition to get everything started by the end of the week. 

 

Happy new year everyone. 

 

I and my fiance greatly appreciate the help. 

[maxtennis 0]

So I filed mid January, does anyone have any suggestions for what I posted above? Thank you

[OutOfThisWorld 87]

Consider filing, even though you do not have to. It may be easier to bring transcript that shows zero (or a little bit of tip income, or something), than keep explaining why you did not file.