POE--Pearson International, right?

[TayL 0]

My fiancé moved into a new apartment complex with some friends from work at the end of January. He thought to ask about the rules for adding me to the lease when he was signing forms. However, since his housemates had already asked and were planning on bringing along a couple animals and since ALL the documentation said "pet friendly" he didn't think to ask what the deal was with the pet deposit. Well, last night he was looking at getting a pet and doing all the research into what it was going to cost him to keep it, if it was even legal (we're talking about a 6 foot long boa constrictor that needs a new home because the breeder has too many males). We come to find out that the pet deposit at that complex is 600 dollars. Of which only 300 are refundable, no matter the condition of the apartment. Ugh. Our options come down to getting rid of my cat or paying 600 dollars for his presence in our lives.

So of course, this is one of those "unexpected" expenses that forces us to rebudget the whole process. The only way that we can POSSIBLY afford this is to cut EVERY extra expense from the process. We have a little money, but we need that for things like the fact that his share of the rent goes up when I move in, his share of the utilities goes up when I move in, his share of the grocery bill goes WAAAY up when I move in, we need a new mattress (he's sleeping on a single right now and doesn't even have a couch for me) and we've known all along that I would need new clothes as I don't actually OWN any real summer clothes (I spend most of my summer right on the water off Georgian Bay, which tends to be a tad cool).

This all adds up to one conclusion. I'm doing the move on my own. By airplane. One way ticket and I get to move as much stuff as I can move within my baggage allowance (not much, but an extra bag is 200 dollars, so my parents will have to fed-ex it when we have some money to send them). Well, I'd planned for this contingency--Delta Airlines will let me keep Leo (my cat) in the cabin with me if his crate is small enough. So I'll be flying down by Delta Airlines by myself. All this for a cat...

Here's the problem: I've heard that Pearson International at least USED TO do POE for K-1 visas, but the only actual report on VJ of this happening was 2005 and a lot can change in 4 years.

Does anyone know if they still do this, or do I have to plan to make sure that I have a stop-over in, for example, Kennedy? I understand that Dallas processes visas too, right? I see reports there from 2008?

Thanks for any help. I like to plan things in advance and I hadn't taken this contingency very seriously--he was supposed to drive up to get me according to our plans.

The things we do for our pets.

[Reba 2]

EVERY Canadian aiport that has US preclearance can process K1 visas. That includes Pearson.

[TayL 0]

Awesome. Thank you. I'm REALLY mad at his housemates for not telling him the details when he said "Bringing my fiancé's cat is gonna be okay, right?" We could have been budgeting for this since before he moved in.

[July09Bride 1]

I have two dogs and the things I do for them and I'm a total planner. Wow, so I totally understand. Good luck with your move!!!

[TheATeam 0]

I completely understand where you're coming from. I gave away all of my stuff, packed my suitcase, put my dog in her kennel and flew down on a one way ticket. I have to say, it was kind of liberating to get rid of the stuff. I didn't really need most of it and the things I really did want to keep are sitting in a box in my mother's garage.

All Canadian airports do preclearance. Keep in mind though, that they may not know exactly what they are doing so you should budget some extra time. I was glad that I had gotten there super early because it took a long time. The BO read through the manual first before even looking at my packet etc. It was fairly painless other than the fact that if I hadn't budgeted enough time then I would have been really worried about missing my plane!

[TayL 0]

I'm not very acquisitive so everything I own has some kind of serious value to me. Some of it is completely irreplacable. I'm NOT happy about this at all, but it's my only option for not losing Leo. We'd allotted about 200-300 bucks for the pet deposit. Not 600 added to our first-month expenses, which are already ridiculous.

[Kathryn41 3,205]

Good for you for having your priorities right, though, and keeping your cat. Perhaps it won't be long before you will be able to afford your own place without the roommates and without an exorbitant pet deposit. (I brought my 6 cats with me so know what it is like). Good luck.

Edited March 15, 2009 by Kathryn41

[TayL 0]

Well, we are planning to move on our own as soon as I can find employment. We even found an apartment we could afford. Well, we had, until we found out about this pet deposit. Kori LOVES the complex he's in right now, and we'd discovered that they generally have 1 bedroom apartments in our price range, but that's out the blessed window now. I'm not paying 600 bucks for the privilege of moving to another apartment in their complex.

I'm just so mad right now! These housemates of his go out partying every weekend, yet they never have the money for groceries, even though he pays them 50 bucks a week for food. He ends up buying extra groceries because he's hungry and now they throw this out at us? This is TOTALLY unfair.

[TheATeam 0]

That's totally wrong! In my opinion, you should do your own grocery shopping. Then you can spend however much money you want and get what you actually want! The real trick though is to keep other people from eating your food. It sounds like his roommates are pretty disrespectful. Hopefully you won't have to be there very long!

[TayL 0]

Well, Kori's angry enough about this that, even though he works with one of his flatmates and therefore will have to see this guy every day, he's thinking about going to the super/landlord, explaining the situation and seeing if he can give notice to get out without having to pay exorbitant fees for breaking lease. He's got another buddy that he could get a place with and, while they would have to get a smaller, less expensive place for Kori to afford his portion of the rent, it might be a better situation for us, at least. It's just one thing after another with these flatmates of Kori's.

Another thing making me mad? There are three adults and one child living in this apartment. They split the rent three ways since all three adults are capable of earning money and the child is not. This seems PERFECTLY reasonable to me. By that logic, until I get my EAD, he should continue to pay 1/3 of the rent and, when I get my EAD, we should have to pay 1/2 of the rent. This seems PERFECTLY reasonable to me. However, they want more money from him so, the day I move in, they're changing how everything's set up--he'll pay 2/5 of the rent and they'll pay 3/5. They agreed to this arrangement only after he explained to them that their demand that we pay 1/2 of the rent while I'm waiting on my EAD was unfair because I should count the same as the child as I have no earning power. They GRUDGINGLY agreed to give him the 2/5-3/5 arrangement.

It's just a toxic situation, which sucks, because they seemed like amazing people in the beginning.

[TheATeam 0]

Oh man TayL. I really hope that you find a good solution to this problem. That situation does seem toxic for sure and you don't want to be moving into that!

[TayL 0]

We've decided that he's moving out on the next strike, provided he can get his name off of the lease agreement. One more screwup and, well, we've found a few other apartments that, while more expensive for him (they've only got one-bedroom apartments available right now), wouldn't have those people in them and he wouldn't be worrying about coming back from visiting me to discover he has to pay to stop eviction proceedings because they didn't bother to pay the rent, even though he gave his share.

[Saddle Bronc 124]

Pearson is still a visa-activation PFI (subtle difference from POE, but we won't go there for now).

[Carlawarla 1]

Hope things work out for you! I must say when I read this thread I could see diaster all over it....

I don't know about your story, but why are you going to be living in this kind of situation?

[missmissy 38]

Hope things work out for you! I must say when I read this thread I could see diaster all over it....

I don't know about your story, but why are you going to be living in this kind of situation?

I totally agree. Sorry - wish I knew more.