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CR1 versus IR1 and Green Card questions
Hello everyone!
Let me give you the back story to perhaps help you answer my questions better.
My husband and I met online a little over 6 years ago, he has traveled to my country multiple times and stayed with my family and me for sometimes 2-3 months, we talked every single day, often for many many hours. Then last year we finally decided to get married because the long-distance relationship was really starting to wear us down and we felt enough time had passed and we knew each other sufficiently. So summer of last year (2013) he came back again and we got married in my country, officially, with certificate and all that. He went back home to the US shortly after the marriage and submitted our petition to the USCIS (or NVC, I always get them confused). We didn't hear anything back from them at all for about 7 months (is this normal or an abberration?).
Then finally the process seemed to slowly get started. When we got to the portion with the affidavit of financial support he asked his parents to pitch in with their tax returns and help us out because at the time his job didn't pay enough to meet their requirements and he was also living back home helping to take care of his mother whose health had been ailing for the last couple of years. When something on the affidavit was submitted incorrectly, we finally decided to bite the bullet and get help from a local immigration lawyer. She resubmitted the corrected affidavit as well as some of my papers (police certificate, birth certificate and some others). This was at the beginning of December so I'd really love to know how long we're still looking at having to wait to hear something back.
Something I almost forgot to mention but feel might have bearing on the entire process. Almost 8 years ago I overstayed an F1 visa by a little over a year. I was engaged and very young at the time (we did not file any fiance paperwork) but things took a wrong turn romantically and I decided to leave. I did not know much about the way immigration rules worked at the time or I surely would not have made such a dumb mistake. I was not deported or otherwise contacted by any authority, I left back home by myself, and I did not otherwise get into any sort of trouble legally or financially during my time in the US. The lawyer we hired looked up my previous visa in their database and says that because it was an F1 visa, I do not need a pardon for overstaying, but I'd rather find out for sure from more than one source. And if I do need a pardon after all, how long and complicated is that process generally? Does it matter that it has been almost 8 years since then or is that not relevant?
My main questions are:
1. Is it normal for the process of applying for a spouse visa to take this long? (It's been almost a year and a half since we first petitioned and next summer we will have been married for 2 years).
2. Because I read that at the 2 year anniversary you can apply for IR1 visa instead of CR1 visa, is it better to wait until we pass our 2 year anniversary for me to enter the US or it doesn't ultimately matter and won't affect how long things take in the long run?
3. How long will it take to be eligible for citizenship AFTER entering the US legally on a CR1 or IR1 status and staying in legal status throughout? Is it longer if you're on CR1 status or same length as long as you follow up on change of status at the 2 year mark after entry?
4. When I do enter the US on a spouse visa, will I be eligible for work, insurance etc or am I going to be stuck at home for a while? Maybe a better question is what WON'T I be eligible for on an immigrant visa?
5. What comes after the affidavit of support is approved by the NVC? Is that when they give me my interview date and give me instructions about obtaining the medical examination records or is there another step(s) in between?
6. What is the interview process like generally for this type of visa? I know my husband very well, but sometimes I worry if they ask me something silly like what color his toothbrush is, I won't be able to answer. What types of questions do they generally ask? I don't even have an interview date yet, but I'm nervous about it anyway.
7. What type of evidence is preferred by the embassy to validate that this is not a sham marriage? We have wire transfer records from this year, years of skype logs and I'm pretty sure he can obtain phone records from Verizon showing how many days we've logged on international calls. Also we have pictures together, wedding pictures, personal emails. He has been to visit me about 6 or 7 times now, should we provide that as proof too? I'd rather be overprepared than underprepared.
Thanks for reading this long post and thanks in advance for trying to help, it is much appreciated.
Let me give you the back story to perhaps help you answer my questions better.
My husband and I met online a little over 6 years ago, he has traveled to my country multiple times and stayed with my family and me for sometimes 2-3 months, we talked every single day, often for many many hours. Then last year we finally decided to get married because the long-distance relationship was really starting to wear us down and we felt enough time had passed and we knew each other sufficiently. So summer of last year (2013) he came back again and we got married in my country, officially, with certificate and all that. He went back home to the US shortly after the marriage and submitted our petition to the USCIS (or NVC, I always get them confused). We didn't hear anything back from them at all for about 7 months (is this normal or an abberration?).
Then finally the process seemed to slowly get started. When we got to the portion with the affidavit of financial support he asked his parents to pitch in with their tax returns and help us out because at the time his job didn't pay enough to meet their requirements and he was also living back home helping to take care of his mother whose health had been ailing for the last couple of years. When something on the affidavit was submitted incorrectly, we finally decided to bite the bullet and get help from a local immigration lawyer. She resubmitted the corrected affidavit as well as some of my papers (police certificate, birth certificate and some others). This was at the beginning of December so I'd really love to know how long we're still looking at having to wait to hear something back.
Something I almost forgot to mention but feel might have bearing on the entire process. Almost 8 years ago I overstayed an F1 visa by a little over a year. I was engaged and very young at the time (we did not file any fiance paperwork) but things took a wrong turn romantically and I decided to leave. I did not know much about the way immigration rules worked at the time or I surely would not have made such a dumb mistake. I was not deported or otherwise contacted by any authority, I left back home by myself, and I did not otherwise get into any sort of trouble legally or financially during my time in the US. The lawyer we hired looked up my previous visa in their database and says that because it was an F1 visa, I do not need a pardon for overstaying, but I'd rather find out for sure from more than one source. And if I do need a pardon after all, how long and complicated is that process generally? Does it matter that it has been almost 8 years since then or is that not relevant?
My main questions are:
1. Is it normal for the process of applying for a spouse visa to take this long? (It's been almost a year and a half since we first petitioned and next summer we will have been married for 2 years).
2. Because I read that at the 2 year anniversary you can apply for IR1 visa instead of CR1 visa, is it better to wait until we pass our 2 year anniversary for me to enter the US or it doesn't ultimately matter and won't affect how long things take in the long run?
3. How long will it take to be eligible for citizenship AFTER entering the US legally on a CR1 or IR1 status and staying in legal status throughout? Is it longer if you're on CR1 status or same length as long as you follow up on change of status at the 2 year mark after entry?
4. When I do enter the US on a spouse visa, will I be eligible for work, insurance etc or am I going to be stuck at home for a while? Maybe a better question is what WON'T I be eligible for on an immigrant visa?
5. What comes after the affidavit of support is approved by the NVC? Is that when they give me my interview date and give me instructions about obtaining the medical examination records or is there another step(s) in between?
6. What is the interview process like generally for this type of visa? I know my husband very well, but sometimes I worry if they ask me something silly like what color his toothbrush is, I won't be able to answer. What types of questions do they generally ask? I don't even have an interview date yet, but I'm nervous about it anyway.
7. What type of evidence is preferred by the embassy to validate that this is not a sham marriage? We have wire transfer records from this year, years of skype logs and I'm pretty sure he can obtain phone records from Verizon showing how many days we've logged on international calls. Also we have pictures together, wedding pictures, personal emails. He has been to visit me about 6 or 7 times now, should we provide that as proof too? I'd rather be overprepared than underprepared.
Thanks for reading this long post and thanks in advance for trying to help, it is much appreciated.
