Timeline help for spouse of US citizen living abroad: We're very confused!

[ElliotInTheUK 0]

My husband and I live in London. I am an American citizen with an American passport and my husband is not, he is from Azerbaijan.

 

USCIS received our I-130 petition in December 2023 and we are awaiting next steps.

 

We are very confused as to how long it will take *after* we move to the NVC stage, which will hopefully be soon. How long should we expect the NVC/embassy stage to take? I can't find a clear answer anywhere, anything from 6 weeks to another 12 months, and we have plans to re-locate to the United States in June. Any help is greatly appreciated.

[wildbug100420 156]

9 minutes ago, ElliotInTheUK said:

My husband and I live in London. I am an American citizen with an American passport and my husband is not, he is from Azerbaijan.

 

USCIS received our I-130 petition in December 2023 and we are awaiting next steps.

 

We are very confused as to how long it will take *after* we move to the NVC stage, which will hopefully be soon. How long should we expect the NVC/embassy stage to take? I can't find a clear answer anywhere, anything from 6 weeks to another 12 months, and we have plans to re-locate to the United States in June. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Depends on the embassy. I wouldn't plan for this summer 

[appleblossom 3,052]

23 minutes ago, ElliotInTheUK said:

My husband and I live in London. I am an American citizen with an American passport and my husband is not, he is from Azerbaijan.

 

USCIS received our I-130 petition in December 2023 and we are awaiting next steps.

 

We are very confused as to how long it will take *after* we move to the NVC stage, which will hopefully be soon. How long should we expect the NVC/embassy stage to take? I can't find a clear answer anywhere, anything from 6 weeks to another 12 months, and we have plans to re-locate to the United States in June. Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

June might just be ok, luckily London is one of the the quickest consulates. 

 

So once the I-130 is approved, the case will be sent to NVC, and you’ll wait for the Welcome Letter to start that stage. That’s pretty quick (only 10 days at the moment), timelines are updated here weekly - https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/us-visas/immigrate/nvc-timeframes.html

 

Once you’ve paid the fees, completed the DS-260 and submitted the docs (that timescale is really down to you, it could be as quick as a few days, or much longer if you take longer to do it all), then it’s only currently a couple of weeks to get (hopefully) Documentarily Qualified. The timeline for that is also updated weekly on the link above. You can start by gathering your documents now so that you’re ready to sort all of that asap.

 

Once you’re DQ’ed, you should get an interview letter in the next month or two for a date about 4-6 weeks in advance, so maybe 2-3 months from when you were DQ’ed overall. 

 

What I would say though, is don’t count on the above! Hopefully it will all go smoothly but don’t book any non-refundable travel just in case. You never know what may happen, particularly if your husband is from Azerbaijan so has a higher chance of being put in to extended AP. 

 

Best of luck.