I previously held permanent residency and lived for 11 years with my American wife and American-born child.
However, we had to move to England when I was made redundant and my job prospects were better in England.
We've been in London for 6 years now and the work in my industry in the USA has picked up. So we're ready to move back.
My question is, do I have to go through the whole I-130 application process?

I appreciate any help.

I suspect so, but can't give a definitive answer, the one thing you should have done, of course, was to get citizenship while there, then you would have no problems at all.

I know I should have got citizenship at the time but what with redundancy and all that it was going to be expensive.
Lesson learned.

I assume you've done nothing to protect your US PR status during the past 6 years? Sounds like you had intended to make a permanent move back to the UK.

My guess is that you've abandoned your previous PR status, and you need to do the immigrant visa process again. Your wife can file the I-130 directly to London.

Rene

If your wife starts the process today by filing the I-130 directly to London, it will still take about 5-6 months before you get an immigrant visa. You can't move/work in the US until you have the visa.

Ian

Did you ever officially abandon permanent residency? If not, I think you will have to do that now, but hopefully someone else can advise better. I had done so on my next trip to the USA after we moved back to the UK, so I put a copy of that paperwork in with the I-130 my husband filed. Essentially it's been no different than it would be if I'd never been a permanent resident, but I already have an A number and an SSN so that will be one less thing to do when we get there! Oh and if you have more than 40 quarters of social security credit (basically 10yrs working earning enough to pay SS) then you won't have to file the affidavit of support, I believe. I didn't have enough credits, boo!

He's not required to officially abandon his PR status.

Ian