Where Beneficiary Intends to Live: Petitioner in Military?

[Isabel&Will 112]

Hey guys,

So I was hoping this wouldn't end up being an issue because I thought the timing would line up better but basically, my fiance (the petitioner) is in the US military and is still currently living in the dorms. There is a chance he may get moved out of them before my interview but it's not looking too promising. Once we are married (which we plan to do as soon as possible after I enter the US), we will be able to get a housing allowance to go and find a place, but what should I be using as my address until then? We used the dorm address on our I-129F with the intent of updating it for the interview, but now it's looking like he probably won't have his own place yet, and I feel like leaving it as the dorms is going to cause some issues. It is likely that I will have to get a hotel or arrange some other sort of temporary living situation until we're married and approved for the allowance. Has anyone here gone through something like this and can offer some advice? I'm worried they will deny me if there is no permanent address for me to live stateside. Is it possible to just explain the situation, show evidence of lining up a temporary place to stay as well as research into apartments, and then paperwork that explains the housing allowance, or is that not sufficient?

Note: My fiance has a PO box for mail so we do thankfully have a steady mailing address

[Cyberfx1024 7,978]

6 minutes ago, Isabel&Will said:

Hey guys,

So I was hoping this wouldn't end up being an issue because I thought the timing would line up better but basically, my fiance (the petitioner) is in the US military and is still currently living in the dorms. There is a chance he may get moved out of them before my interview but it's not looking too promising. Once we are married (which we plan to do as soon as possible after I enter the US), we will be able to get a housing allowance to go and find a place, but what should I be using as my address until then? We used the dorm address on our I-129F with the intent of updating it for the interview, but now it's looking like he probably won't have his own place yet, and I feel like leaving it as the dorms is going to cause some issues. It is likely that I will have to get a hotel or arrange some other sort of temporary living situation until we're married and approved for the allowance. Has anyone here gone through something like this and can offer some advice? I'm worried they will deny me if there is no permanent address for me to live stateside. Is it possible to just explain the situation, show evidence of lining up a temporary place to stay as well as research into apartments, and then paperwork that explains the housing allowance, or is that not sufficient?

Note: My fiance has a PO box for mail so we do thankfully have a steady mailing address

Use the PO box until you find a house and then use that address once you get here. They will not deny you for not having a permanent address here in the USA so please don't think like that. If they ask then simple tell them that your fiancé is in the US Military stationed at XXX Base and we do not have a house yet due to him still living in the barracks. I would use that PO Box for EVERY type of mail in the future coming from the USCIS. Do you know if the PO Box is on base given to him by the military?

 

I wish he did not use his unit's address for mail because that is notoriously inaccurate as a single military member stateside. I mean inaccurate by the mail may get there super late for example. Once you 2 get married then go ahead and go straight to the base to be added as his dependent so you two can rate BAH right away. 

[Isabel&Will 112]

12 minutes ago, Cyberfx1024 said:

Use the PO box until you find a house and then use that address once you get here. They will not deny you for not having a permanent address here in the USA so please don't think like that. If they ask then simple tell them that your fiancé is in the US Military stationed at XXX Base and we do not have a house yet due to him still living in the barracks. I would use that PO Box for EVERY type of mail in the future coming from the USCIS. Do you know if the PO Box is on base given to him by the military?

 

I wish he did not use his unit's address for mail because that is notoriously inaccurate as a single military member stateside. I mean inaccurate by the mail may get there super late for example. Once you 2 get married then go ahead and go straight to the base to be added as his dependent so you two can rate BAH right away. 

Thank you, this helps a lot. To clarify, we used the PO box as his mailing address and it is a separate one that he went and got off base by himself (for the exact reason you mentioned). We used his dorm as the address for where I "intend to live" because at the time we had been under the impression that we couldn't leave it blank, which I now realize was a mistake that will have to be rectified 

Edited October 26, 2018 by Isabel&Will

[Cyberfx1024 7,978]

1 minute ago, Isabel&Will said:

Thank you, this helps a lot. To clarify, we used the PO box as his mailing address and it is a separate one that he went and got off base by himself (for the exact reason you mentioned). We used his dorm as the address for where I "intend to live" because at the time we had been under the impression that we couldn't leave it blank, which I now realize was a mistake that will have to be rectified 

Not an issue at all really. I used my parent's address as the "I intend to live at xxxx" because I was working overseas at the time. But when my then fiancé now wife came to the USA we moved from NC to CA and did stay in that address more than 10 days at most. When you do the AOS you can use your more permanent address with no issues with that past address. 

[Isabel&Will 112]

14 minutes ago, Cyberfx1024 said:

Not an issue at all really. I used my parent's address as the "I intend to live at xxxx" because I was working overseas at the time. But when my then fiancé now wife came to the USA we moved from NC to CA and did stay in that address more than 10 days at most. When you do the AOS you can use your more permanent address with no issues with that past address. 

That's reassuring to hear, thank you!

[Cyberfx1024 7,978]

2 minutes ago, Isabel&Will said:

That's reassuring to hear, thank you!

I completely understand that this is overwhelming at best so just take a deep breath and you will be ok. 

[Roel 7,191]

2 hours ago, Cyberfx1024 said:

Use the PO box until you find a house and then use that address once you get here. They will not deny you for not having a permanent address here in the USA so please don't think like that. If they ask then simple tell them that your fiancé is in the US Military stationed at XXX Base and we do not have a house yet due to him still living in the barracks.

Damn, is this really that simple?

My husband actually rented an apartment off post, just so we could have an address to put in on our paperwork. His command actually let him live off post (as a single soldier then) in that apartment.

[Cyberfx1024 7,978]

3 minutes ago, Roel said:

Damn, is this really that simple?

My husband actually rented an apartment off post, just so we could have an address to put in on our paperwork. His command actually let him live off post (as a single soldier then) in that apartment.

The PO box is still a address. So that works out great for them and that means her fiance is ahead of the curve. 

 

At least this post we aren't being called rude..... 😂

[Isabel&Will 112]

2 hours ago, Cyberfx1024 said:

I completely understand that this is overwhelming at best so just take a deep breath and you will be ok. 

Thank you haha, I'm trying not to worry too much but we've already been hit with a lot of roadblocks so I'm trying to make sure that I at least have all my bases covered as best as I can, since everything is so uncertain
 

1 hour ago, Roel said:

Damn, is this really that simple?

My husband actually rented an apartment off post, just so we could have an address to put in on our paperwork. His command actually let him live off post (as a single soldier then) in that apartment.

I hope it ends up being that simple. Originally it was looking like they would let him get a place a couple months before my arrival, then there was talk that it was going to be time for him to move out of the dorms "soon". Now it's more of a "probably not gonna happen" situation, so everything is pretty much up in the air at this point. There's a chance everything will just work itself out but I've been heading into "worst case scenario" territory
 

57 minutes ago, Cyberfx1024 said:

The PO box is still a address. So that works out great for them and that means her fiance is ahead of the curve. 

 

At least this post we aren't being called rude..... 😂

We've already had enough postal issues without the addition of on-base mail service so, I'm definitely glad for the PO box haha.
Who's calling you guys rude? You've been a great help 😯

[Cyberfx1024 7,978]

1 hour ago, Isabel&Will said:

Thank you haha, I'm trying not to worry too much but we've already been hit with a lot of roadblocks so I'm trying to make sure that I at least have all my bases covered as best as I can, since everything is so uncertain
 

I hope it ends up being that simple. Originally it was looking like they would let him get a place a couple months before my arrival, then there was talk that it was going to be time for him to move out of the dorms "soon". Now it's more of a "probably not gonna happen" situation, so everything is pretty much up in the air at this point. There's a chance everything will just work itself out but I've been heading into "worst case scenario" territory
 

We've already had enough postal issues without the addition of on-base mail service so, I'm definitely glad for the PO box haha.
Who's calling you guys rude? You've been a great help 😯

I am not going to delve into that in this thread but we were being factual and what could happen, someone wanted us to sugarcoat stuff. 

What service is your fiance in? I was a Marine myself.

Edited October 26, 2018 by Cyberfx1024

[lierre 224]

On 10/26/2018 at 9:45 AM, Isabel&Will said:

Hey guys,

So I was hoping this wouldn't end up being an issue because I thought the timing would line up better but basically, my fiance (the petitioner) is in the US military and is still currently living in the dorms. There is a chance he may get moved out of them before my interview but it's not looking too promising. Once we are married (which we plan to do as soon as possible after I enter the US), we will be able to get a housing allowance to go and find a place, but what should I be using as my address until then? We used the dorm address on our I-129F with the intent of updating it for the interview, but now it's looking like he probably won't have his own place yet, and I feel like leaving it as the dorms is going to cause some issues. It is likely that I will have to get a hotel or arrange some other sort of temporary living situation until we're married and approved for the allowance. Has anyone here gone through something like this and can offer some advice? I'm worried they will deny me if there is no permanent address for me to live stateside. Is it possible to just explain the situation, show evidence of lining up a temporary place to stay as well as research into apartments, and then paperwork that explains the housing allowance, or is that not sufficient?

Note: My fiance has a PO box for mail so we do thankfully have a steady mailing address

 

We have a PO box address when we lived overseas. And used that to get our mail for the CR-1 process. When we left overseas, all mail addressed to either of us was automatically forwarded by the USPS PO for a certain number of time.

 

When we moved back to the US, we used his sister's TX home address as the place to receive mail. Then, we changed it to a new mailing address when we bought a house in the new US location. The key is to not use a mailing address that will not be able to forward your mail as quickly as you need it to be. So, if for instance the best address to use would be a parent's house, that's fine, too.

[ZKT 118]

On 10/26/2018 at 11:45 PM, Isabel&Will said:

Hey guys,

So I was hoping this wouldn't end up being an issue because I thought the timing would line up better but basically, my fiance (the petitioner) is in the US military and is still currently living in the dorms. There is a chance he may get moved out of them before my interview but it's not looking too promising. Once we are married (which we plan to do as soon as possible after I enter the US), we will be able to get a housing allowance to go and find a place, but what should I be using as my address until then? We used the dorm address on our I-129F with the intent of updating it for the interview, but now it's looking like he probably won't have his own place yet, and I feel like leaving it as the dorms is going to cause some issues. It is likely that I will have to get a hotel or arrange some other sort of temporary living situation until we're married and approved for the allowance. Has anyone here gone through something like this and can offer some advice? I'm worried they will deny me if there is no permanent address for me to live stateside. Is it possible to just explain the situation, show evidence of lining up a temporary place to stay as well as research into apartments, and then paperwork that explains the housing allowance, or is that not sufficient?

Note: My fiance has a PO box for mail so we do thankfully have a steady mailing address

my then fiance/now husband used to live on base. he got promoted to ao2 in may, so he could move out of base and get bah. but then that doesn't kick in or hasn't even kicked in yet in his salary before i arrived. so we had to go for option 2 which is get an apartment w/o bah. apartment rental is cheaper than going for an airbnb for x number of days (depending when the bah will kick in).

so my then fiance went apartment shopping a month before i arrived/when i was doing my medical and k1 interview/waiting for my k1 visa. he found an apartment we both liked. i gave my approval. then he got the key to our apartment on sept 4. i arrived in the us on sept 5 but we arrived at the apartment like really sept 6 cause i arrived late at night and the drive was long to go to that area.

we got married sept 16, and then got our marriage certificate sept 21. as soon as we got our marriage certificate, we applied for military dependent right away, dod id for me, then i got added to page 2, then we applied for bah all this before sept ended.

so for the month of sept my husband paid for everything from his pocket and also for month of oct. since bah has not kicked in. but on the oct les, there was a note on a bah change. so possibly for the next les/nov les we will get bah already. my husband said they might also refund the oct and sept rent and pay the bills.

if you stay in a hotel, they might not pay your bah. but if you stayed in a place you'll be staying then they can refund you. and it makes it easier for you too since you could stay there for the rest of his assignment in that location.

for your question about what address to put. in my k1 visa interview i used his us navy base physical address, anytime they ask me or any form i had to do even in poe like for the customs declaration form i used the us navy base address. but for applying for marriage license, marriage certificate, ssn, dod id etc i used our current apartment's address. 

hope that info helps you.

p.s. having the lease with both our names, was easy for me to also have our electric bill in both our names which helped in getting 2 joint accounts for chase and navy federal. and they also serve as proof of marriage and then he applied for my health and dental insurance under the tricare for the navy. after all that evidence we submitted our aos packet. 

[ZKT 118]

p.s. i forgot to say, my husband officially left the barracks end of sept. he emptied the whole barracks before i arrived but he kept that room until end of sept. he moved in with me in our apartment when i arrived. on some days, i stayed in his barracks room and did laundry while he went to work since i'm not allowed to loiter around the base without him and without my dod id. so i'm not sure if we will be given bah for september but the officer said we might get a refund even for that month.

[Londonergirl 133]

On 11/4/2018 at 5:28 AM, ZKT said:

p.s. i forgot to say, my husband officially left the barracks end of sept. he emptied the whole barracks before i arrived but he kept that room until end of sept. he moved in with me in our apartment when i arrived. on some days, i stayed in his barracks room and did laundry while he went to work since i'm not allowed to loiter around the base without him and without my dod id. so i'm not sure if we will be given bah for september but the officer said we might get a refund even for that month.

You will get back pay from the date you got married. 

[ZKT 118]

On 11/24/2018 at 10:47 AM, Londonergirl said:

You will get back pay from the date you got married. 

 

cool! that's great to know! i appreciate it londonergirl!!! i hope we get it soon so we can buy more stuff for our home. hehehe!