US Immigration from New Zealand

Hi everyone. My wife and I are just starting the application process and very happy to have found this community. I've done a fair amount of searching through the forums, so apologise if these are answered in other places.

Background:

• I was previously working in the US on an H-1B from 2012 - 2017 as a software developer.
• My wife's a US Citizen by birth. We met in the US in 2013.
• We moved to NZ (I was a sponsor for her partner permanent resident visa) and got married in Jan 2019 (2 years, 8 months ago).
• We have one dependent who's 5 months old. Neither of us have been married previously.
• We're keen to return to the US to be near family, and about to start the Green Card application process.
• Neither of us have US income but should have sufficient assets. If not, our family in the US have offered to be a joint sponsor.

I have a few questions:

1. We were just about to buy a house in NZ before deciding to return to the US. If we went through with this (approx. March, when my wife's maternity leave ends) would it have any impact on proving intent to establish domicile? My wife's continued to vote, kept a bank account and credit card open. We both have 401k accounts in the US.
2. Are there any other gotchas around having been previously in the US on an H-1B, then leaving, then applying to return?
3. One option would be to apply for a role with a US company with a NZ office, then transfer internally. I feel like this could be a slower approach, and relies on the company to be willing to do this. It could have the advantage of them covering visa and relo costs. Is this is a common path worth pursuing, or better to go with a more solid plan of sorting out the green card ourselves?
4. Is our case sufficiently simple that we should be able to figure it out ourselves, or should we get in touch with an immigration lawyer?

Thanks for any advice you're willing to give

Our I-130 has been on the "Being actively reviewed" status for nearly 5 months now ?!? Can someone tell me if this is normal? Most comments I've seen people seem to get approved shortly after their account changes from "Received" to "Case Being Actively Reviewed" - should I be worried ? Someone ease my mind if you're dealing with the same thing.

Cheers

I've seen this topic discussed in a couple threads on here, but responses seem to vary so I thought I'd try to get some more up-to-date information.

I managed to arrange a Joint Sponsor for our case, but they haven't filed taxes for 2020 yet. She told me that her accountant is still working on them and has an extension from the IRS until October 1st. They own a business so it takes a while. Obviously this prevents us from submitting the I-864 with her most recent tax return as she won't have a copy of it yet.

I suggested that in lieu of the most recent tax return, I could send her full tax return from 2019 as well as proof that the extension was filed with the IRS (copy of form 4868) and a copy of her W-2s from 2020. Then, in October when she has a copy of her full 2020 tax return, I can either add that to the case at NVC or have my wife bring it to the visa interview. I would attach a cover letter to the initial I-864 package to NVC that explained the delayed 2020 tax return and that we would attach it as soon as possible.

Obviously I would also have the pay stubs, and this person earns well above the income requirement and has done for 2016, 17, 18, 19 and 20, so there's plenty of evidence of income.

I suppose the alternative is to wait until October and file everything with NVC then, but understandably I'd much rather get this done ASAP.

Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Hi team,

Okay so my questions is, when assessing adequate means of financial support, is current income the only factor or can you make a claim based on net savings and assets?

My husband and I currently both live in NZ (beneficiary's home country) with full time incomes (both well over the $21,677 income requirement) - we will make moves to start looking for work in the U.S. before heading over but would like to move as soon as possible regardless of job security. We have healthy savings and we've also discussed taking our time to find new employment and maybe doing a bit of traveling around the U.S. before settling back into the ole 9 to 5. We are confident we can sustain ourselves through an unemployment gap and I'm not really looking to leave my husband to go secure work in the U.S. before he can join me.. so... thoughts?? If this is our plan (to potentially go over jobless and look for work after we've arrived) will we definitely have to get a joint sponsor or is there a way to prove self sufficiency with other financial evidence outside of current income. Seems silly to have to rely on joint sponsorship with plenty to keep ourselves afloat but I'm unsure how immigration will look at it.

Note: We are still waiting for I-130 approval (lodged Feb 2021) so have not begun filling out I-864, it's just been one of my worries and I wanted to get some thoughts now.

Cheers

Hi there,

My spouse and I are currently filling out our I-864 for my CR-1 visa (she's the sponsor, I'm the immigrant). As a bit of background, we've both been living together in Canada and then New Zealand for the past few years. We realise that because her income has not been US based for this time, she cannot sponsor me and so we've found a joint sponsor - her grandma who has filled out an I-864 and provided the required tax documents etc.

We are filling out the I-864 for my wife now and upon reaching Section 6, 23.a - 24.c realised that she didn't submit her taxes for the 2019 tax year. We have her tax returns for 2020 and 2018, but in the chaos of moving countries amongst other things 2019 was forgotten about. To solve this we were going to do the obvious thing and just file for 2019, however it's proving frustratingly difficult to get all of the required tax information for both Canada and New Zealand during that year in order to report it on the US tax return.

We already know that her US based income for the 2019 tax year doesn't meet the sponsorship requirements (or 2018 or 2020) which is why we have a joint sponsor. Will it be enough to provide her 2020 tax transcript, and the total income reported for 2020 and 2018 given that we are relying on a joint sponsor anyway? Or will it be absolutely required that all three tax years are there?

Thanks for your help!