Navigating USCIS Concerns About Living Apart After Marriage for Green Card Application

[MidpointMark 0]

Hello community,

I am a U.S. citizen (USC) and my fiancée is on an F-1 visa. We are both graduating this spring and planning to marry shortly after. Post-marriage, we will initially live in different cities due to my grad school obligations and her job offer from an internship, which is in another city. We are concerned about potential USCIS questions regarding our living arrangement when we apply for her green card.

Could anyone share insights or experiences on how to address this situation with USCIS? Specifically, we are wondering:

1. How best to explain our living situation to USCIS to avoid any doubts about the legitimacy of our marriage?
2. Are there particular types of evidence we should prepare to demonstrate the genuineness of our marriage despite the geographical separation?
3. Has anyone successfully navigated a similar situation, and what advice would you give?

We appreciate any guidance or personal experiences that could help us manage this aspect of our application process.

Thank you!

[OldUser 6,724]

You need to answer three questions and back it up with evidence:

 

1) Why are you living apart? Show the letters ans other documentation proving your grad school obligations and her internship.

2) What effort do you take to see each other and keep the marriage alive? E.g. show plane tickets, hotel and other reservations, photos together, events you attend together, vacations you take together, affidavits from friends and family. You should start comingling finances. Can you both open a joint savings account and start saving for a common goal such as deposit for lease, or downpayment? Doesn't have to be big contributions, if both of you can start saving $100 a month that's already something and better than nothing.

3) What is the long term plan? You need to be able to explain how you will build life once one of your finishes their obligations. Are you moving to her city? Is she moving to your city? What's the timeframe?

 

These cases are harder but approvable if you can document everything well and convince immigration the marriage is geniuine.

[MidpointMark 0]

Thank you!

[Boiler 45,558]

Or just wait to file until you are cohabitating.