K1 vs CR-1

[VanessaTony 3,567]

I never understood why so many people use this as an argument against getting married prior to petitioning, because I don't see much of a difference between either situation. Whether the couple is engaged or married, they're still in a long distance relationship and living separately until they've made it successfully through the visa process.

It's a shame you don't see how being married is more serious that simply dating but that is the basic argument - some of us prefer to be with our spouses after marriage and not spend the majority of the first year of marriage apart. Being engaged is TOTALLY different.. obviously though some people don't feel that way.

The average processing time for a CR1 is not that much longer than the K1.

Processing times yes. But they're not currently together, not currently married. Some peopel can't hop on a plane next week to get married, or have the marriage cert immediately to file. So it can be a decent difference in total time seeing the K1 can be filed tomorrow.

CR1 means you may wait a month or so longer during the process, but he can work, drive, and travel after entering the US with no other forms to file and no additional money to pay. He will want to work and you will want him to work. I'm not hurting for money, but trust me when I tell you that I was happy to see my husband getting paid because he felt better about himself. He was happy to have a job to help pay bills and he was tired of sitting at home bored. You will also want him to have a license. I can't wait until we knock that one out because I've had enough of driving him to work and English class on my days off when I just want to relax and be lazy. You will both want him to be independent and doing his own thing sooner rather than later, and with the CR1 that's possible.

This is a big one. Some people really struggle with the lack of independence and some people really need that otherwise the relationships can be a lot tougher. I've noticed this seems to be more with people who don't speak english well. Even myself where I of course DO speak english struggled with people not understanding my accent and that was annoying. I can only imagine what not knowing the language would be like.

K1 means he can sit around and be very dependent on you until his green card arrives, which doesn't look like it's happening in a very timely manner according to people's status updates. From what I noticed, it seemed a lot of people opted for the K1 mainly because it was supposed to be faster and/or they didn't want to be married and living separately. Since it's no longer faster and either way you're going to be living apart, I can't see how it's an advantageous choice.

Mmm no. He doesn't have to "sit around". He can volunteer. He can take driving lessons. He's permitted to drive on his foreign licence (might need an international drivers permit). He can get used to the food. He can take english classes to prepare for when he's going to get a job. He can read, watch TV, exercise, take a class like cooking or something. You don't have to "sit around" unless you want to.

The GC can take a while but the EAD/AP arrives in around 60-90 days which permits him to travel and work and all that stuff so it's really not a huge deal. Your final point about "being apart anyway" is just the whole "marriage is more serious to some people" again.

Edited July 2, 2012 by Vanessa&Tony

[BocaChicaBabe 6]

The processing times are roughly the same.

The ability to file the K1 now means the waiting time to get together again is shorter - and depending on how long it takes you to be together to get married, it could be a significant time difference.

CR-1 from start to finish is more expensive if you are not currently together because you have to pay for an extra flight to be together to get married. Flights for me cost at LEAST $1500. That is more than AOS cost me. So bear that in mind when considering costs.

The OP's fiance is from Dominican Republic and most of the responses are from people who have gone through the process in that same country. Just as each individual case is different, so are the expectations/requirements for each country. That said, extra flights when dealing with DR are necessary. DR is high in fraud and unlike Australia, we have to bend over backwards to prove our relationship. So while you and some others can get away with saving money by not visiting often or at all, unfortunately, we cannot. People with beneficiaries in DR have been denied and told they didn't visit enough. In addition to periodic visits, we are also REQUIRED to attend the interview or it's an automatic denial. So whether people with an SO in DR choose the K1 or CR1, they still have to spend money to travel. There's no way around it. Since I didn't have the luxury of saving money by not visiting, I figured I could use that same $1070 for AOS plus the cost of the civil surgeon and make the necessary trips to be with my husband and be present at the interview that I was forced to attend. I was able to make several trips using that same amount of money I would have spent on AOS and the other expenses that came with it.

The K1 means not being able to work, or leave the US until after you have filed AOS (which means MORE paperwork after you arrive) and received the work and travel permit, or GC. This takes 60-90 days from filing.

Yes, 60-90 days from filing. What if the couple isn't in a position to file right away? Unfortunately, there are some people that don't have the money to file immediately after marrying. I don't know how many posts I've read of people asking if there's any way their spouse can work prior to AOS because they need the money to pay the fees for AOS. So those people that don't have the money readily available to file right away will be waiting a lot longer than 60-90 days. And when people have responsibilities, like children they left in their country, 60-90 days (or longer if they can't file right away) can be a long time especially when money is tight. And that's 60-90 days just to get the work permit, that's not including the time it'll take the individual to secure a job after receiving the permit.

The CR-1 means being able to work/travel immediately (and get a drivers licence) BUT it is not a promise to get a job. I know people that have had some really serious problems finding work, one who has been unemployed for almost his entire 2 years here. So this is good for some, useless for others.

I obviously don't know these unemployed people's whole story, but if someone has been unemployed for too long, then perhaps it's partially the fault of the unemployed individual. There is always a job to be had. Restaurants and warehouses are always hiring. The problem is people don't want to take the jobs available because they don't pay enough or it's too much work or blah blah blah. I've heard so many people say they would never work for minimum wage. Well, the last time I checked, minimum wage was more than the $0 they're making sitting around all day claiming there are no jobs. People who have responsibility don't have the luxury of turning down jobs simply because it's not ultimately what they want. We opened my husband's bank accounts with his first check and the young lady that assisted us mentioned how many people complain there are no jobs yet my husband had one and he hadn't even been in the country that long. And I added that he doesn't even speak English. That makes his options more limited than someone that does speak English. That prompted our conversation about her being a recent college grad who wasn't happy with her job, but she's staying there until she can find something better because she has student loans to pay back. I could relate because I had to do the same thing after I graduated college. I kept the job I was miserable at until I finally got the job I was happy with because I had loans to pay back and was an adult that needed to survive. I have a friend who recently graduated college and she currently has a job that doesn't pay well. Her job is very physically demanding and she goes home in pain everyday. She tells me all the time about the people that complain about the pay and the amount of work and quit shortly after starting. She doesn't like the job and doesn't recommend it to anyone, but she stays because she keeps in mind that some money is better than no money when you are an adult with responsibilities. My husband doesn't have his dream job, but he knows we have bills to pay and so he does what he needs to do. There have been a number of males from DR that came here on a CR1 and they got jobs right away (some not knowing English). A few started working within the first week of their arrival. So I don't feed into this idea that finding work is impossible. Yes, finding work you can be completely happy with may be difficult, but finding work that provides you some sort of income is not that hard. Sometimes we have to take what we can get until we can get what we want.

K1 means being apart as fiance/fiancee. CR-1 means being apart as spouse. Marriage is important enough to me to I didn't want to have to leave my new husband and live apart for a lengthy period of time waiting for the processing.

Just because someone chose the CR1 doesn't mean their marriage is less important to them than the marriage of someone that chose the K1 is to them. I don't know why people act like being married and being apart is uniqe to people going through the visa process. People in the military get deployed and live separately from their spouses all of the time. Does that mean they don't think marriage is important? No! It just means they both knowingly entered into a situation where they accepted that at some point they'd be required to sacrifice their time together. I work with a gentleman who was deployed and separated from his wife for the first year of their marriage. Both are US citizens and therefore, never had to make their decision as part of the visa process. And I've read some posts of women who entered the US with a K1 and their husband was deployed not long after they were married. So there are couples that chose the K1 just like you and couples that never went through the visa process that still ended up separated after marriage. According to what you're saying, they don't recognize the importance of marriage because they entered into it knowing they'd be separated immediately after. Another gentleman I work with only sees his wife and child on the weekends because he accepted a better paying job that's too far away from his home for a daily commute, so he rents a room close to work during the week. He and his wife have been living apart during the week for YEARS, so I suppose neither his marriage nor his child are important to him either. What about the men that get a visa to come to this country and leave their wives and children behind until they have the opportunity to bring them here? Sometimes people find themselves in temporary, inconvenient situations and they do what's necessary to push through it. This visa process happens to be one of those situations. We're all given a few lousy visa options, each of which require us to remain apart until a visa is granted. We're all forced to choose the one that in the end is going to suck the least for us. Some make a decision based on what works best for them today and opt to concern themselves with what happens after POE much later. Others make the decision based on what will work best for them in the future and prefer the option that allows them to think/plan ahead and start making moves a lot sooner after POE. Either way, we all make the sacrifices that come along with the decision we made.

As Tony was able to financially support us without me working, as I am able to entertain myself (I'm not a child, I can find stuff to keep me busy most of the time), as i didn't want to be apart from my husband almost immediately after marriage for the better part of the first year of marriage, K1 was the route for us.

You are a woman who is lucky enough to have a man that is able to support you. A man taking care of his woman is normal and I see a number of male petitioners that have no problem with their fiancee coming here and not working. I don't, however, see too many female petitioners that are cool with the idea of their husband being unemployed for too long. In fact, I've noticed some women said they became frustrated by the fact that their husband couldn't contribute financially. The husbands were also frustrated by not being able to contribute and that led to problems between them. If you notice, with the exception of MrTee12, everyone that's encouraging the CR1 is a female petitioner with a male beneficiary. Two of those women in favor of the CR1 just recently brought their husbands here and both of their husbands have jobs already. You and Xanax are the only two people that posted in favor of the K1 and both of you are women being financially supported by men. I can't speak for other women, but I'm not in the business of making any man a house husband. Also, as a man, my husband was not at all comfortable not working and leaving me to take care of everything alone. Therefore, we chose the CR1. We decided we could handle that extra month apart in the beginning, so that we could avoid any issues with him feeling badly about not being able to help me financially after he got here. Also, I'm sure you're aware that beneficiaries of third world countries tend to send money home to their families. And since the OP is a female petitioning a male who has 5 children to support and possibly a mother that he gives money to, I'm sure the fact that he can work right away will make things a lot easier for the both of them (especially her). Otherwise while they're waiting that 60-90 days or more, the OP will be supporting her husband and any children of her own that she may have, sending money to his children, and possibly sending money to his mother if she happens to need the help. That's a lot for one person to handle in addition to the other expenses that they had prior to having to take over the beneficiary's responsibilities that they can no longer handle due to being unemployed.

The CR-1 however is not without it's advantages. Being able to have a GC quicker means you're able to feel more normal quicker - and that's not a bad thing.

You just need to decide what is important to you. It's basically:

K1: File now, be together sooner, more steps to the process, higher processing fees, unable to work/travel for 60-90 days from filing.

CR1: Get married when you can, be apart from your spouse while processing the visa, file later, be together later, less steps to the process, higher overall fees due to extra flight if not together, able to work travel/immediately

[BocaChicaBabe 6]

It's a shame you don't see how being married is more serious that simply dating but that is the basic argument - some of us prefer to be with our spouses after marriage and not spend the majority of the first year of marriage apart. Being engaged is TOTALLY different.. obviously though some people don't feel that way.

And it's an even bigger shame that people on their high horse are so quick to comment on a post prior to having a clear understanding of the point that was trying to be made. Nowhere in my post did I say that being married was less serious than simply dating. What I said was "Whether the couple is engaged or married, they're still in a long distance relationship and living separately until they've made it successfully through the visa process." Let me break that down for you. Married or engaged, you are still in a serious relationship which requires you to be selfless and think about your future together. And if you're going through the visa process, you'll be living apart regardless of your marital status. I was speaking specifically about the LIVING SITUATION being no different whether the couple is married or engaged. Bottom line is you are apart during this process and there's not much you can do about it. You have no control over the fact that you're apart, but you can control the options your SO has once they're in the US depending on which visa you choose. In no way was I saying that marriage is not serious. I have been both engaged and married while living separately. Can you say the same to be able to speak on it from experience and approach me like I have no clue? My post was to say that both were hard, but being married while separated wasn't any harder than being engaged while separated. Marriage didn't all of a sudden make the distance any more unbearable, nor did it drastically change our relationship and make it somehow completely different than it had been before. That was my point. I wasn't even close to touching on the seriousness of marriage and I surely don't need you to school me on that. So don't go quoting my words and twisting them so that you can later suggest that I don't take my marriage as seriously as you take yours simply because you and your man chose a different path.

As far as preferences go, I'm 100% positive that ALL of us prefer to be together during the first year of our marriage not just some of us as you stated. But given the limited options we're presented with during this process, not everyone has that opportunity. Just because some are choosing the CR1 route doesn't mean it isn't their preference to be together after marriage. I'm not sure where you got that impression, because not once have I read of anyone saying that they loved having to leave their spouse immediately after the wedding. Everyone would love to have a "normal" experience concerning their engagement/marriage, but there is nothing normal about any of this.

Processing times yes. But they're not currently together, not currently married. Some peopel can't hop on a plane next week to get married, or have the marriage cert immediately to file. So it can be a decent difference in total time seeing the K1 can be filed tomorrow.

This is a big one. Some people really struggle with the lack of independence and some people really need that otherwise the relationships can be a lot tougher. I've noticed this seems to be more with people who don't speak english well. Even myself where I of course DO speak english struggled with people not understanding my accent and that was annoying. I can only imagine what not knowing the language would be like.

Actually, what I said had nothing to do with speaking English well, but has everything to do with a man needing to feel like he's a man and not leaving his woman to carry the burden alone. As a female beneficiary, you will never understand where I was coming from with that one. You completely missed the point. As I stated before, I was responding to a female petitioner who will have a man to support. You are a female beneficiary being taken care of by a man. It is not the same thing when a man is the one unemployed while his woman is handling everything. Real men are never completely fine with the idea of their woman financially supporting them and he will struggle with knowing she's carrying the load alone. While he's unemployed, who's going to support his children? If she is the only one with an income, then she will be burdened with her own responsibility and his responsibility. So like I said, she will want him to work and he will want to work.

Mmm no. He doesn't have to "sit around". He can volunteer. He can take driving lessons. He's permitted to drive on his foreign licence (might need an international drivers permit). He can get used to the food. He can take english classes to prepare for when he's going to get a job. He can read, watch TV, exercise, take a class like cooking or something. You don't have to "sit around" unless you want to.

Mmm and here you go again assuming people don't have a clue. What I meant by "sit around" is that he will not be working. Neither I nor my husband are so dumb that we didn't already discuss in advance the various things he could do during the time that he didn't have a job. Volunteering to get him out of the house and around people was something I already thought about long before he got here and I already had a driver's manual for him so he could prepare to get his permit. However, volunteering, watching TV, and reading all day weren't going to pay the bills that increased after his arrival. My heating, water, and grocery bills increased. Adding him to my health insurance cost me more money. I spent more money on gas driving him to and from English class. He needs to speak with his family/friends, so that meant I had to get a landline in my house and pay for international calling, which wasn't an expense I had prior to his arrival. As I said before, it's a little different when the beneficiary is female and unemployed. I know it's 2012 and times have seriously changed, but it's not my style to go against the natural order of things concerning men and women. Some women approach men and ask them out or even propose marriage to him, I don't. Some women are cool with dealing with an able-bodied, grown man that doesn't see a problem with her working two jobs while he works only one or none, I'm not. So I certainly don't see myself getting up and going to work while my husband is spending his time taking cooking classes or going to the gym exercising. And by the way, cooking classes and gym memberships cost money. So that's an extra expense that would have been my responsibility to pay for while he was unemployed.

As far as using a foreign license is concerned, some beneficiaries didn't have a license before coming here. My husband didn't, and plenty of other Dominicans don't either. So in those cases, driving isn't an option unless you file and wait for AOS.

The GC can take a while but the EAD/AP arrives in around 60-90 days which permits him to travel and work and all that stuff so it's really not a huge deal. Your final point about "being apart anyway" is just the whole "marriage is more serious to some people" again.

Well, CONGRATULATIONS!!!! You and Tony have the most perfect situation and nobody else will ever have it all together like you two. Vanessa, you really need to get over yourself and stop acting like you're better than someone because you made the decision to enter the US before you got married. Your marriage is no more serious than anyone else's simply because you got to spend the first year of it together. I'm glad that the K1 worked best for you guys, but that's not necessarily the ideal choice for other people. Like canadian_wife said, some people choose to be more practical in their decisions and therefore, choose the CR1 route. I really don't see anything in your post that would make me change my mind, so I still stand firmly by what I said. There is no difference between the living situation, as you are separated regardless, but there is plenty of difference between what each of the visa options affords you after POE. What I said was I don't understand why people make their choice based ONLY on the living situation. You mentioned saving money as a deciding factor in addition to the living situation, but Xanax mentioned ONLY the living situation.

And since you want to touch on the subject of how serious one situation is over the other, let's talk about how you said you opted to save the $1500 that you would have spent on a flight to visit since it was more than AOS would have cost you. In my opinion, that $1500 is worth being in the arms of your SO if you miss/love them so much. But since you and Tony chose to save that $1500 rather than use it to visit and spend time together, should I assume that your relationship wasn't important enough to you? Your relationship wasn't serious enough for you guys to spend the $1500 that would allow you to be in each other's arms? People like to use the argument that they're not rich and therefore, can't afford to make trips. I'm not rich either, but I cut back on unecessary spending, stopped shopping, and stopped eating out so that I could save money to spend time with my husband. I made sacrifices because I felt it was important for our relationship to physically be together as much as possible. The things I gave up in order to save money to be with him were worth giving up. There were times that I booked a flight at the last minute just because I missed him so much. We may have been living separately during the early part of our marriage, but based on your comment about the importance of saving money by not traveling, perhaps it's safe to say that I spent way more time with my husband during the time we were separated than you spent with Tony during the time that you guys were separated. It seems it was more important to you to sacrifice seeing your SO in order to save $1500, while it was more important to me to get married and use that money I'd spend on AOS to spend time with my SO. So because I made frequent visits and spent way more time with my man than you did with yours, does that mean I took my relationship more seriously than you did? Not necessarily. Just like it doesn't mean you take your marriage more seriously than I take mine because you married after you got to the US and were able to spend the whole first year together.