K-1 in college

[celugelda 0]

Hello everyone,

 

Extremely new to this site and saw a bunch of helpful information. I'm also very new to this whole process and hope you'll allow me to rely on you all on this site, as I don't know who to turn to offline!

I'm currently a college student (age 20) who met my boyfriend/intended fiancee (age 24) online about 4 years ago. We've met several times with him visiting me here in the states, and me visiting him as well in Chile, and we'd like for him to immigrate here to the USA so that we don't need to travel across the world to see each other. 

 

He will be graduating from college this year, and would like to start his career here. However, I am still in college and do not have a career started yet. I know the visa requires that I have a minimum amount of salary per year, however I am an independent student, and thus am studying full time. I have different part time jobs during the year (one while I'm at school, one during the summer), and am not sure if that will count as a steady income. However, I come from a family that has a decent amount of money, and also have a trust fund in my name from deceased family that I am currently in access to in order to pay for my tuition. I'm not worried about being able to support myself and my fiancee due to both my account, my savings, and my family support (my family knows and support him), and I already have living arrangements for him all planned out, but I'm worried about how these things will look on paper. Would I need a cosponsor? Will the government take into account my assets (trust funds, etc.) in comparison to my actual salary? And does it look bad that I'm trying to get married while still in school/ at this age? 

 

I apologize if this has already been discussed. Any help/advice is super appreciated, as well as any general advice about when I should begin filing (I haven't yet, but I may want to soon since I'd like for him to be able to move here mid-2018). Thank you!

[A'n'L 735]

You can file whenever you want, as long as you have proof of being in each other's presence sometime within the last two years. Your age and still being in school is not a problem to USCIS. You've also established a pattern of visiting each other, which is good.

 

If you want to use assets, they need to amount to 3x the income limit. You can also use a co-sponsor. That's no problem.

[pantonia 39]

Hey! Cool to see more people doing this whole thing from Chile too! My situation was similar to yours. I (the chilean) was graduated already, but my now-husband was (still is) a student. While you may have enough to meet the income requirements between your jobs and trust funds, I suggest, if possible, to make as simple as possible and use a co sponsor. 

 

Assets (your trust fund probably counts as such) need to amount to 3x or 5x (I always get confused about this number) the shortage of your income... For example, if after you count your salary, you are $1,000 short of the minimum, your assets should be worth $3,000 or $5,000 to compensate. This, plus part time jobs, seems like too unreliable for USCIS.

 

Provide all your info, include assets if you want too, but I suggest making sure to include a co-sponsor with a straightforward situation, especially for the later AOS process. 

 

I say all this as a cautionary tale, because of what happened to me. When I had my interview at the consulate, my co-sponsor was a special case all around but the clerk didn't seem to care or notice. He just saw money he made was ok and approved it with no problem....Chile is an easy embassy and as long as you meet the poverty guidelines, you'll be fine. However, once we had to deal with the AOS process, it all became a nightmare and we ended up having to scramble to find a different joint sponsor than the one used for the k-1 process (for the record, it was USCIS fault, not ours, but what do they care...). Because it was a personal situation, you don't HAVE to do it this way... but after what we went through, I just feel like dumbing down everything to the simplest case possible is the best option.

[celugelda 0]

On 5/5/2017 at 10:25 AM, pantonia said:

Hey! Cool to see more people doing this whole thing from Chile too! My situation was similar to yours. I (the chilean) was graduated already, but my now-husband was (still is) a student. While you may have enough to meet the income requirements between your jobs and trust funds, I suggest, if possible, to make as simple as possible and use a co sponsor. 

 

Assets (your trust fund probably counts as such) need to amount to 3x or 5x (I always get confused about this number) the shortage of your income... For example, if after you count your salary, you are $1,000 short of the minimum, your assets should be worth $3,000 or $5,000 to compensate. This, plus part time jobs, seems like too unreliable for USCIS.

 

Provide all your info, include assets if you want too, but I suggest making sure to include a co-sponsor with a straightforward situation, especially for the later AOS process. 

 

I say all this as a cautionary tale, because of what happened to me. When I had my interview at the consulate, my co-sponsor was a special case all around but the clerk didn't seem to care or notice. He just saw money he made was ok and approved it with no problem....Chile is an easy embassy and as long as you meet the poverty guidelines, you'll be fine. However, once we had to deal with the AOS process, it all became a nightmare and we ended up having to scramble to find a different joint sponsor than the one used for the k-1 process (for the record, it was USCIS fault, not ours, but what do they care...). Because it was a personal situation, you don't HAVE to do it this way... but after what we went through, I just feel like dumbing down everything to the simplest case possible is the best option.

Hey! Thank you so much for replying, and it is super cool seeing someone with a similar situation, as most people I talk to that are similar are from Europe :). I'd love to hear your story sometime haha!

 

Thanks for your suggestion, I'd like to know more about cosponsors? Do you know if they have any responsibilities, exactly. Like, I'd be fine asking my mother to cosponsor, as long as I know I wouldn't have to actually rely on her for anything and it was just in name. I don't wanna put any unnecessary legal pressure on people, but if its just in name saying she's a backup to us financially I'd be okay with it. 

 

I'm glad to hear the Chilean embassy isn't too awful... This whole thing has me very stressed! Thanks again!

[pantonia 39]

10 hours ago, celugelda said:

Hey! Thank you so much for replying, and it is super cool seeing someone with a similar situation, as most people I talk to that are similar are from Europe :). I'd love to hear your story sometime haha!

 

Thanks for your suggestion, I'd like to know more about cosponsors? Do you know if they have any responsibilities, exactly. Like, I'd be fine asking my mother to cosponsor, as long as I know I wouldn't have to actually rely on her for anything and it was just in name. I don't wanna put any unnecessary legal pressure on people, but if its just in name saying she's a backup to us financially I'd be okay with it. 

 

I'm glad to hear the Chilean embassy isn't too awful... This whole thing has me very stressed! Thanks again!

 

So, to clear out future confusions, I'll explain some things.

1. Usually, a co sponsor is the term used during the K-1 stage. You, as being the petitioner will be the primary sponsor, even if you don't meet the requirements. That means that you'll have to provide all pertinent forms and evidence of a sponsor, even if you get someone else to help you, who will provide all that stuff too. A joint sponsor is the same, but that terms is used later for the AOS process. Maybe it's not 100% technically right, but whenever you see those two terms, you'll know that they are the same, just used at different stages.
2. The legal duties of a co sponsor is to sign the affidavit, which will make them legally liable if the beneficiary (the immigrant) ever becomes dependent on government welfare. So, if for example he ever needed food stamps or something similar, the government would have the right to sue the sponsor to get the money back. Keep in mind that it's unlikely this would happen, since your bf would be ineligible for most of those benefits in the first place. But I'm sure it's happened before.... hence the affidavit.
3. I've heard rumors of immigrants suing the co sponsor for money and stuff, but honestly, I've never really seen a real thread about it or it actually working. If you needed to assure a co sponsor, I'm sure you can look up online cases of it and seeing if it really IS a thing.
4. The sponsorship lasts until the immigrant either, becomes a citizen, dies, abandons the green card, or after about 10 years of him working and earning his own money (I forgot the terms for this... but it's like he has to accrue a certain amount of time working which usually is 10 years or so...). It doesn't end if you and him cut ties and divorce... it doesn't end if he starts making tons of money himself... or if you later on make enough to maintain him yourself... etc.
5. After this whole process is done, paperwork is given and your husband gets his greencard... The only actual duty the sponsor and joint sponsor have, is to notify USCIS of any address change they have from then on.

In the end, it's a trust thing. You can promise all you want that you won't take advantage of the person, that you'll find a job as soon as you are allowed to work, etc, etc.... but in the end, the sponsor has to trust you that you mean it and that things won't change in the future. In my case, the co sponsor we had for the K-1 process was my husband's dad, and for the AoS it was my husband's best friend. I felt terrible the entire time, because it's super invasive: you have to ask them for their tax returns, their bank statements, etc... and even though I starter working literally as soon as I got my EAD, and I actually make more than what our co sponsor makes... I still feel bad about it lol. I know I'd rather go back to Chile than ask for welfare or our sponsor's help, but he can only trust that I would.

 

If you have any more questions or wanna know about our story feel free to message me