grant2

Worst timing for me, approved in Feb 2024, which means I have to wait a full year before I can apply to remove conditions. Also it looks like it takes over a year for most people to get conditions removed, standard USCIS backlog

My understanding is there's only ever 0 or 1 interviews for a I-130 + I-485. Random comments have said they're typically approved (or denied) at the same time but apparently in this era they seem to split them up, much like the I-765 + I-131 gets split up. (my I-765 approved a year ago, I-131 still 'received' status)

If you can fill out the rest of the forms, then the I-765 is no problem. if you're truly "not good" then get help. even if beneficiary has no plans to get a job, how about: a) Want a SSN for bank accounts / loans / health care / etc. etc.? Hard or impossible to get without worth authorization. b) Want a driver's license? EAD can be very helpful. c) Want to help your friend's business? Paint the house you own & rent out? technically, might need an EAD. d) Bored and want to start working part time for a hobby? Need an EAD. e) Want to be prepared in case petitioner loses their job and you have to work? EAD also needed. It's reckless to be lazy on a 15 minute form when the risk is you're locked out of so much of american life for an extra 6+ months because you realized too late you actually have a use for work auth.

Lots of peopleare getting their interviews waived. My friends nearby got green card a few months ago with no interview

Ok good to know. I thought the decision about a bona-fide marriage was made as part of the I-130, but it seems it's made as part of the I-485.

Filed in July 2022. submitted no evidence of marriage besides the marriage certificate. I-130 petition was recently approved at the local field office (Chatsworth, CA). My I-485 adjustment-of-status is now "RFE" for medical exam. Does this mean there will not be an interview? Or do I-485 sometimes still get an interview even after I-130 is approved?

A bit of a detour btw: "pre-nup" isn't all about "how do we split assets in divorce". it's also about "how do we agree to do things during marriage". My pre-nup discusses contributions to shared expenses. A friend's pre-nup says they must always live within 6 miles of a beach.

USCIS agents can think anything is or isn't fishy, that's out of your control. You can only control your actions. It's no secret that many I-485 applicants will research what USCIS agents care about, simply for performance to get approved. That doesn't change the fact that bona-fide spouses also do them for legitimate reasons. If you and your spouse plan to open a joint account, then just do it. Sooner is always better. Why wait?

How about printouts from your employment benefits / life insurance / retirement accounts listing each other as beneficiaries? Also it's better late than never to get a joint bank account and a joint credit card. I assume you don't have a prenup agreement, but if you did, I'd expect it's actually helpful to prove your entered marriage with serious intention.

What statuses are showing on the USCIS web portal for your I-130 & I-485?

There's only about half as many I-485 applications for the same cohort as I-130 applications. These are only IOE records though. I have the notion that relative petitions tend to get scanned into the IOE queue by default whereas some other forms (like I-140) seem to still be paper-only and listed under the various offices. We can see from the large blob of yellow on the right that most I-485 applications were instantly put in "Processing" status, and have been gradually approved (or rejected) going back in time. We can also see that in the past month, an extraordinary number were immediately put into "Interview Scheduled"

I'm being sponsored by a relative petitioner, as I expect most of the people on here are. Since the I-130 must be approved before the I-485 can be granted, it seems more relevant. I suspect most people's I-485 is in "processing" status, like mine, while they wait for adjudication of the related I-130. After an I-130 approval, I'd expect the I-485 approval will happen promptly & automatically shortly after.

58% of applicants in my cohort are now approved- it passed the magical 10,000 number! The "processing" queue has falling from 6,000 -> 5,400. Only 7% of applicants are still in "received" status (including me) as we continue to sit in that long, thing blue tail of very-long-processing-times.

I just passed 1 year and same for me: "Application received". My cohort (IOE-09-168) has 17,437 I-130 applications. We can see that 89% of those have advanced to at least "Processing" status which means you & I are in the ~10%-15% of applicants stuck in "Received". On the other side, almost 50% have resolved all the way to Approved / Denied / Rejected. The "Received" group shrinks by about 10/day. As you can see from the graph, all of the cohorts stretching back a full year have some tiny portion still in that blue status, so it seems like a matter of slowly-increasing-luck as to when our number is called.

Next week I expect the 168s I-130s to start getting a lot more approvals https://www.casestatusext.com/approvals/I-130/IOE-LB