Need Some Good Advice

[theresaL 408]

1 hour ago, birch2013 said:

Thanks for all the good input everyone. I really do appreciate the information.

 

The sad thing is that the US government has weaponized US citizenship. They'll use it against you, though having it will benefit you too.

 

For us, the green card is the best fit. I'm an owner of multiple businesses, so my financial IQ is pretty high. It's mainly financial reasons that push me in this direction.

In what way(s) can you explain what you mean by this? 

[kiwibean 44]

I'd be interested too!  I know that I'll have to file US tax returns even if I happen to move out of the country.  What else should I worry about?

[Villanelle 4,121]

1 hour ago, happiness268 said:

Thank you for this information. It is was truly very helpful. do you know when they started interviewing all K-1 AOS applicant?

 

I applied for ROC in May 2018. I received in a RFE in May 2019. I sent additional information in Aug 2019. I received a notice of transfer to NBC for interview in Sept 2019. I was a little frustrated because applicants in my timeframe with RFE were getting approved for their 10 year green card. 
My 18 month extension is up in Nov 2019. Therefore, i will probably had to schedule an Infopass appointment for a i-551 stamp. 

 

I am a NYC filer. According to @Villanelle great advice. I will probably look for some action late Dec - early Jan at the earliest. 

Your situation is different from the OP. Also you are doing ROC not K1 AOS and ROC is still possible to have interview waived.  But I think it was within the last year or so they decided to interview all K1 AOS... Anyway, you got a notice that your case is going to be interviewed (unless someone at the local office decides to waive it, which can happen but is unlikely. Sometimes they do end up waiving it if they have a heavy caseload) So you need to look at your local office wait times for interviews. Unfortunately the USCIS webpage for processing times does not display est times for the 751 at local offices (it only shows the service centers times) but you can look at the 485 processing times for an idea on how long your local office takes to schedule appts. It can be up to 1.5 years wait in some parts of NYC! Your best bet would when you go to an infopass for the stamp to ask how long apx for you to be given an interview. They probably will tell you that you just have to wait for a slot to open but often after inquiring one opens up magically or Ive even heard of them on occasion being able to get you entered into a slot manually. You can also use the various tracking stuff on VJ to find people in your local office and see how long they waited for 751 interviews. 

[birch2013 4]

Here's 2 negatives to being a US citizen. If you are never going to live outside of the US, then these will probably never affect you.

 

1. Many banks now refuse service to US citizens. This is because of the onerous reporting requirements the IRS puts on a bank with US customers, even if the bank has no presence in the US at all. So the banks, including even some major European banks, simply refuse service to Americans period. It used to be that being American opened every door to you. Now it can close many doors also.

 

2. The US government is one of only 2 in the whole world who believe you owe it taxes on your worldwide income regardless of where you lived and where you worked. If you own a coffee shop in Paris, and haven't stepped foot in the US in 10 years, the IRS believes you owe it taxes every year on the money you make from your Paris coffee shop. As well as French taxes, I might add. Granted there are some loopholes and exceptions, but the rule remains that you owe US taxes on your worldwide income regardless of where you live or where the money was earned.

 

There are other disadvantages, these are the principal two that weighed on our mind.

 

There are indeed many, many advantages of being a US citizen, so weigh the pros and cons for yourself...

 

[SalishSea 17,505]

23 minutes ago, birch2013 said:

Here's 2 negatives to being a US citizen. If you are never going to live outside of the US, then these will probably never affect you.

 

1. Many banks now refuse service to US citizens. This is because of the onerous reporting requirements the IRS puts on a bank with US customers, even if the bank has no presence in the US at all. So the banks, including even some major European banks, simply refuse service to Americans period. It used to be that being American opened every door to you. Now it can close many doors also.

 

2. The US government is one of only 2 in the whole world who believe you owe it taxes on your worldwide income regardless of where you lived and where you worked. If you own a coffee shop in Paris, and haven't stepped foot in the US in 10 years, the IRS believes you owe it taxes every year on the money you make from your Paris coffee shop. As well as French taxes, I might add. Granted there are some loopholes and exceptions, but the rule remains that you owe US taxes on your worldwide income regardless of where you live or where the money was earned.

 

There are other disadvantages, these are the principal two that weighed on our mind.

 

There are indeed many, many advantages of being a US citizen, so weigh the pros and cons for yourself...

 

So how is it beneficial to you financially if your spouse doesn't become a citizen?  Overseas investments or earnings would be considered joint income, and you would still be taxed on it, right?  

[birch2013 4]

18 minutes ago, Jorgedig said:

So how is it beneficial to you financially if your spouse doesn't become a citizen?  Overseas investments or earnings would be considered joint income, and you would still be taxed on it, right?

Well for one, it might allow us to get a bank account in a place where otherwise we might not be able to. In her name at least, not mine...

 

If my wife wants to not pay US taxes on foreign income, she would have to surrender her green card. This would only happen if we retired outside the US. But that is a real possibility for us as this point, retiring outside of the US. 

 

Again, if you never intend to live out of the US, you probably don't need to think about all these complicated things, just become a US citizen and forget about it.

 

For us, it's a difficult decision sometimes. My thinking is that if she doesn't NEED citizenship, then we won't get it for her. It's much easier to turn in her green card than to renounce US citizenship.

[SalishSea 17,505]

13 minutes ago, birch2013 said:

If my wife wants to not pay US taxes on foreign income, she would have to surrender her green card. This would only happen if we retired outside the US. But that is a real possibility for us as this point, retiring outside of the US. 

Yes, but your income would still be taxable.

[birch2013 4]

Yes, @Jorgedig. 

[theresaL 408]

I think you are forgetting that some countries have tax treaties that prevent double taxation on income. France is one of them. We are planning to live in France when we retire and I have looked into this. We also maintain a bank account in France. Also, the exemptions on foreign earned income for 2018 was $104,100 double that if both are US citizens filing jointly.

 

Since our future income will be a combination of US and French retirement accounts we will not have any US tax liability since it is considered after tax (US) and exempt as Foreign Income (French) on our US taxes. Now my French husband will be required to pay income taxes to the French gov. on his French retirement income, but I won't on my US retirement because of the tax treaty. It depends on which country you decide to live in and of course the amount of money you're expecting to have. LOL for us it won't come close to being an issue.

 

One thing you might want to look into is eligibility of a non-US citizen spouse to receive Social Security Survivor benefits if he/she is living outside of the US. Most countries are restricted, but here again France is an exception. This was one of the reasons why we were considering him obtaining dual citizenship.

 

All of this is predicated on laws/treaties remaining unchanged. They may, they may not, so we remain flexible with our decision.

[birch2013 4]

That's a good point @theresaL. I just checked on that issue with social security. It appears that if you (the US citizen) were married for 5 years to your foreign spouse and your foreign spouse lived in the US for 5 total years, they qualify fully as your spouse for social security purposes, both for the survivor benefit and the spousal benefit. Even if the foreign spouse no longer has a green card or US citizenship.

 

https://secure.ssa.gov/apps10/poms.nsf/lnx/0302610030!opendocument

 

About taxes, I don't even want to know how much I am going to have to pay to get my taxes done if I live in another country. It already costs me thousands a year for myself and my US based businesses.

 

Luckily there are tax treaties with some countries, as you mention, but certainly not all of them! And even if you avoid the double taxation, correct me if I'm wrong, but that still means you're taxed at the higher of the two rates between the two countries.

[theresaL 408]

For your last question, that I'm not certain about that. I suppose it depends on the amount of taxable income and which country has jurisdiction. Maybe someone on VJ that has more tax knowledge than I do can weigh in. this likely wont be an issue for us.

 

It's good you are thinking about this now and are in a position to plan for the future. All of our situations are different and so many people fail to or it never occurs to them to ask questions. Fortunately there are good expat services available who can advise you once you decide where you might want to live later.

[theresaL 408]

I just looked at your SS link. This is only 1/2 of the equation. You also need to look at eligibility for payments if the surviving no-citizen spouse is living outside of the US.

[birch2013 4]

14 minutes ago, theresaL said:

This is only 1/2 of the equation. You also need to look at eligibility for payments if the surviving no-citizen spouse is living outside of the US.

Oh you're right. Once they're out of the country for 6 months, they're no longer eligible. Thanks.

[theresaL 408]

This might help.  https://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10137.pdf

 

[birch2013 4]

Actually @theresaL, this is a very complicated question. I read that PDF and it's pretty confusing to me. The actual parts of the Social Security handbook that cover this are numbers 1845 and 1846. They too were confusing but I finally understood them.

 

If you are married to a US spouse living in the US for 5 years, it is a true exception, even if you move out of the country for more than 6 months, and benefits can continue. However, that does not apply to citizens of countries specified in #1846. Rule after rule.

 

The easiest thing for anyone to do is use this tool, it's very helpful and walks you through the process:

 

https://www.ssa.gov/international/payments_outsideUS.html

 

 

 

Edited October 23, 2019 by birch2013