Did I make a mistake?

[malka 0]

Yep exactly. My husband goes through bouts of depression whenever I have to pay anything for him I'm not sure he would survive 30-90 days of waiting before he gets to work in the US. The CR-1 visa was the visa we were going to get anyway when we were planning on doin DCF in Finland. It's a lot easier, you don't have to Adjust your status (though we'll have to remove the conditional thing since we've been married less than 2 years), and you don't have to wait for permission to work or anything.

Neither one of us are very fond of having the government breath down our necks and pester us, so this route seems to be the one that involves LESS of that. Then he'll get his citizenship once he's been here three years and we should be in the clear to be left alone to live our lives.

So let me get this straight....if by some chance DCF comes back, I would be filing for a CR-1, if I went the DCF route correct? And if DCF doesn't come back, I am planning to file in Rome....would that be CR-1 also? Not K3? How long does the CR-1 take if filed in the US? I am just trying to minimize the time apart. We are currently living together, but come May I need to head back to the states!

Thanks for all the help!

You and I are pretty much in the same boat. If you can file your I-130 petition outside of the USA through DCF or Rome, your husband should get a CR-1 visa pretty quickly. Way faster than through a USA USCIS office, anyway. I don't think that K-3 ever even gets adjucated outside the USA, so only consider it if you have to first file your I-130 in the USA, too.

Edited February 23, 2007 by malka

[Geist 0]

Gah. No more using the term DCF, because filing at a USCIS center that's located abroad is NOT the same! Everytime I read someone saying "I'm doing DCF," it makes me go, "WHERE? HOW!?" And then I realize what they mean is filing at a USCIS center abroad I'd do that, but I have to be a resident of Finland and that paper work takes 3 months to get through, plus I wouldn't be able to work in Finland So that stinks

[malka 0]

Gah. No more using the term DCF, because filing at a USCIS center that's located abroad is NOT the same! Everytime I read someone saying "I'm doing DCF," it makes me go, "WHERE? HOW!?" And then I realize what they mean is filing at a USCIS center abroad I'd do that, but I have to be a resident of Finland and that paper work takes 3 months to get through, plus I wouldn't be able to work in Finland So that stinks

Sorry! Didn't mean to make you sad. You're right - the two do get terribly confused, but after a hasty re-read of this thread I don't think anyone here is confusing them; when we say DCF, we really do mean DCF --- vs., for instance, Rome USCIS. We're holding out the hope that DCF will come back soon and calculating that into our various-scenario time-games.

[babybunny 2]

Oh yeah, don't bother with the I-129F if you'd rather go for the CR-1. And as a side note, I'm quite glad you've decided to go that route. The way it's currently looking, if you can stand the extra two months or so, it's so much better.

this may be a dumb question but why is CR-1 a much better visa than the K3?

Well, I haven't actually experienced it, but from what I've read, even though K-3 technically lets you work, etc., you still need to apply for temporary work cards, go through adjustment of status (money and forms and LOTS of time) and people seem to have a long wait to get their final Greencard. With IR1/CR1, you've already done most of that work while abroad, which, depending on the country, probably makes it go a lot faster. When you arrive in the US, a IR1/CR1 visa in your passport allows you to work immediately and IF things go smoothly, your Social Security card and Greencard arrive in the mail within a month. Makes setting up jobs, drivers licenses, bank accounts, etc., a lot easier. Someone please tell me if I have this really wrong. I know some CR1/IR-1 arrivals have had their share of snafus, but it seems to generally go a lot faster than the arrival/setting-up a life in the USA experiences of K-3's.

Yep, that's basically it. The K3 visa is a nonimmigrant visa and its real purpose was for when immigrant visas used to take a lot longer than they do now so that with a K3 the couple could be together faster.

The CR1/IR1 allows you to work immediately (temp stamp in passport and then green card arrives in a couple weeks) and there's no adjustment of status. So that saves a ton of money. With the K3, you have to apply for work authorisation when you enter (takes 3 months and costs $180 I think, something close to that), and you have to file Adjustment of Status (which currently costs around $300 and may go up to $905 by October), and then you receive the two year green card if you've been married less than two years and then you still have to apply for removal of conditions before the green card expires. There's also the extra fee of $170 for the petition itself.

With the CR1, you only pay to file the I-130, for the visa at the interview, the medical, and for removal of conditions (currently $200 something) once the two-year green card is 90 days or less from expiring. The IR1 is for couples married longer than two years and that cuts out the removal of conditions. With K3 visa, you pay all those fees plus the fee to file I-129F, work authorisation and adjustment of stauts on top of it, plus losing three months of potential work after arrival.

It's my understanding that in some countries, the K3 is still coming through a lot faster, but that a lot of people are experincing the K3 coming through only a couple months sooner and sometimes not even sooner. Of course there are always individual circumstances and I wouldn't presume to know what's best for everyone. I just think it's good to keep the extra fees and hassle in mind when deciding what route to take.

K-3 is a waste of time. depending on the country that the visa is supposed to be processed in. took us 10 months of AP. ultimately the embassy cancelled the visa on us. mean while our case has since been converted to IR1 < 10 year visa >