Do I need a lawyer

[WeekendPizzaiolo 47]

20 hours ago, khahlh93 said:

I just got back from my visit to meet my girlfriend In Mexico. While I was there we got engaged. So now we are going to try for the K1 visa. I got a lawyer lined up but have not paid yet. The lawyer wants 1500 for her work. Half(750) to start and the other 750 at the the time ti send in. My fiancé has been married before there in Mexico. We already have her paperwork proving she is divorced. She has no criminal charges, but I have a misdemeanor for a bad check from like 2-3 years ago. We are both in our 20’s so it’s no big age gap. I also have western union receipts of where I pay her rent food and Wi-Fi for us to talk like all day. I’m not the best with paperwork/ technology but I’m not stupid either so yeah. So With this information I was wondering do I need to get this lawyer to help. Or can I pull this off for us by using one of them help sites like boundless or any other site like that. The question is racking my brain so I would love any advice I can get before I go paying anything. 

I did the K-1 and wish I did the CR-1. It is double the work and your fiancé has an indefinite period when they can neither work (nor drive, which makes road trips more difficult) upon entry until they receive their EAD card.

 

My lawyer charged $2K in 2020 and they did barely any work. They sent me a checklist, which was accurate. The lawyer did not interact with me at all upon paying - only his paralegal. They were slow (months) to respond to notices that I could have responded to the same day. The lawyer likely added 3-4 months to the process.

 

If you do not want to pay the cost of a lawyer but you also fear that you might miss some minor detail (which is why most visa applicants probably hire a lawyer), I recommend SimpleCitizen (simplecitizen.com), which is backed by the same investors as DropBox. SimpleCitizen is like TurboTax for immigration. SimpleCitizen has you fill out all of your information in a web form and then fills out this information across multiple PDFs. For example, if you made a typo on your address, you only need to change once on a web form and the software propagates the change to all of your forms. They also do certified translations for free. The software organizes your file into a single packet for you to print with table of contents and cover letter, which you can then print, sign, and then ship to USCIS.

 

Many on VJ prefer to do it completely DIY. If you go this route, be sure to quadruple check everything. For example, there are multiple versions of the Affidavit of Support form; one that in conjunction with a CR-1 and the other which is used for the K-1 interview. As such, be careful of googling for a form by name so that you do not accidentally send the wrong version.

 

 

 

[Crazy Cat 39,589]

17 hours ago, khahlh93 said:

Also lawyer told us when she came to America on K-1 visa if she lands in jfk that they give a stamp in your passport there that lets her work here with out that wait… 

Wow!!!!   I would ditch that attorney.......He/she has no clue...

[Ontarkie 13,952]

13 hours ago, khahlh93 said:

GC? Not hip to all the lingo yet lol. But I mean I pay the stuff because it’s cheap for me to do so and where she is at the pay her very poorly and harass her. So it’s just to make her life easier. Plus WiFi is way cheaper than constantly getting  data for her phone. It was the bad lawyer that said it would help look like I’m not getting paid to marry her if I’m paying her. I’m not paying her because of that I send money to help either way. But showing it as evidence was lawyers idea. 

 

What is OP I need to learn all this lingo for this site lol 

GC = green card

OP = Original poster (in this thread that is you) 

[DaveAndAnastasia 2,079]

On 5/27/2022 at 6:11 PM, Rocio0010 said:

Because any reputable immigration attorney would be at least updated and would never tell you that the K1s are faster or that your marriage is not valid here. That’s just bs. If you’re married in Mexico, you’re married whether it be Argentina, Mexico, USA or Kuala Lumpur.

Just a minor nitpick because I doubt this actually applies in Mexico and almost definitely doesn't to the OP, but if your marriage would not be legal where you live, then it's not valid for immigration purposes. There are some cases where marriages that are legal in other countries are not valid in the US (most notably multiple spouses are legal in some countries, first cousin marriages are not legal in all states but are in some countries, and minimum age for a legal marriage varies).

 

On 5/28/2022 at 9:59 AM, WeekendPizzaiolo said:

I did the K-1 and wish I did the CR-1. It is double the work and your fiancé has an indefinite period when they can neither work (nor drive, which makes road trips more difficult) upon entry until they receive their EAD card.

FWIW, I'd still saying doing a K-1 was absolutely the right thing for us in 2018. Anastasia couldn't easily get a US tourist visa so we couldn't marry in the US, getting married in Russia takes a lot of time in-country (like over a month) or multiple visits in a short time (neither of which were practical for me), getting married in a third country would have meant choosing a meet-up location expressly for being somewhere two foreigners could marry quickly and easily (which in fact isn't true of a lot of major tourist destinations in Europe -- in quite a lot of European 'destination weddings' the couple actually legally marries beforehand in the US) which meant we wouldn't be able to start the process for another 3 months or so at minimum after when we did, at the time K-1s were taking about half as long as CR-1s from petition to POE, we wanted to have a kid soon so working immediately wasn't a huge issue, our local field office was pretty fast for AOS on average at the time, and Utah zoom weddings weren't a thing in 2018. But generally the CR-1/IR-1 path is better, especially now.

[WeekendPizzaiolo 47]

1 minute ago, DaveAndAnastasia said:

Just a minor nitpick because I doubt this actually applies in Mexico and almost definitely doesn't to the OP, but if your marriage would not be legal where you live, then it's not valid for immigration purposes. There are some cases where marriages that are legal in other countries are not valid in the US (most notably multiple spouses are legal in some countries, first cousin marriages are not legal in all states but are in some countries, and minimum age for a legal marriage varies).

 

FWIW, I'd still saying doing a K-1 was absolutely the right thing for us in 2018. Anastasia couldn't easily get a US tourist visa so we couldn't marry in the US, getting married in Russia takes a lot of time in-country (like over a month) or multiple visits in a short time (neither of which were practical for me), getting married in a third country would have meant choosing a meet-up location expressly for being somewhere two foreigners could marry quickly and easily (which in fact isn't true of a lot of major tourist destinations in Europe -- in quite a lot of European 'destination weddings' the couple actually legally marries beforehand in the US) which meant we wouldn't be able to start the process for another 3 months or so at minimum after when we did, at the time K-1s were taking about half as long as CR-1s from petition to POE, we wanted to have a kid soon so working immediately wasn't a huge issue, our local field office was pretty fast for AOS on average at the time, and Utah zoom weddings weren't a thing in 2018. But generally the CR-1/IR-1 path is better, especially now.

Indeed, K-1s are often not the preferable option, but you outline a good case. In our case, due to Canada's strict COVID measures, the K-1 was the only option. My partner was studying in Canada during COVID-19. He could not leave Canada without losing the ability to return due to academic programs temporarily operating 100% online. He could not sponsor me to visit as a significant other during COVID-19 emergency rules (only Canadian citizens and PRs) so there was no way for us to physically reunite for 18 months. If there was not a worldwide pandemic with harsh border closures, we would have gone the CR-1/IR-1 path. I am just surprised how many people have heard of the K-1 but do not evaluate other options available to them.

 

[MarJhi 925]

On 5/31/2022 at 9:12 AM, DaveAndAnastasia said:

I'd still saying doing a K-1 was absolutely the right thing for us in 2018.

I would agree about doing the K1, and also I think using an attorney for us has also been a good thing. It had been nearly a year and a half since my fiancé and I had seen each other in person because of the pandemic and there was no end in sight. I was waiting to return, hoping covid would burn itself out quickly considering how fast they said it was spreading, but before I knew it we burned up 17 months and the 2 year window of having been together was rapidly approaching. Actually the attorney I hired suggested the CR-1 route because he said they were going a little quicker, but the Philippines was completely locked down (and remained so for another 8 or 9 months) so I didn't know how I could get there to marry her there, I hadn't heard of the online marriage thing. However I have no regrets because my attorney, who is himself a Filipino, has been fantastic, communicated with both my fiancé and I about what we both need and outlined for her exactly how to get it. It was about a week and a half after hiring our attorney that our application was sent in. The only hiccup was for some reason USCIS couldn't process the credit card payment, but the attorney sent in a paper check instead. They email us regularly during the wait between NOA1 and NOA2 and let us know the date when they will do a service inquiry if it falls outside the case processing time. I can be a bit of a procrastinator and a worry wart about missing some important details, so if my attorney can save me even a week or 2 off of the back end of this process I will consider it worth the cost. I am all for the DIY thing, but I see no problem with hiring an attorney if they have a good track record and you're comfortable with the expense.

Edited June 6, 2022 by MarJhi