It is a curious question and one that begs the question.

What made you decide to move to the USA and live your lives there?

Its just part of my process before my fiance arrives......

So far I can say that her family , fairly large is there and I have no one here really apart from a brother who i have not spoken to in 10 years and a sister I have known about the same period.

She has Job that she loves and she is really good at what she does my job, I love also, but its really all I have and my fiance ....

Apart from that I have only a few friends..( No Violins please) im selective...lol and they are exsclusive.....

So thats it basically what were your thoughts before making the leap? was it a joint decision or was it left to just one of you to decide?

Since many of the folks in the USA forum arrived via employment, you might get more mixed-couple responses from the marriage-based visa forum. Let me know if you want me to move your post.

For us, DH had already left the UK and we did live overseas together for a while before deciding on the US. I owned a house here already, he had no real ties to where he was, there were no employment oppty's where we were, he likes to try new places and liked where my house was, so here we are. It was a mutual decision.

Sorry, yes if you could move it would appreciate it, still finding my way round...thanks

For us, we really had no other choice. Sadegh didn't have the type of status in Turkey to bring a wife to live there. Neither one of us wants to live in Iran. So the only choice was to bring him here to the USA if we wanted to be together. The decision was mutual.

Rene

Our then 2 year old grandson lived in Oregon.

My wife had lived in the UK for 10 years and wanted to come back to Oregon.

I was "retiring" and we would have moved out of London anyway. Oregon provided a lot better standard of living than the UK did.

Most of our joint families lived in Oregon, I only have two grown up sons in the UK.

Our 2 year old grandson lived in Oregon and my wife told me we were moving here. The most compelling reason.

For me the only negative is the US job market. I could have got a reasonable job in airport or airline security in the UK. In the US all I was offered was $8 an hour security guard jobs which was always accompanied by "We'd be glad to have you your experience would be very useful to us". To which I replied "I'm sure it would but you don't get it for $8 an hour". So I did end up retiring or becoming one of the unemployed who no longer bothers looking for a job as there isn't anything decent out there.

For professional reasons. Wanted to work here. Also, closer to family.

Only young once and figured we'd go through the ball ache whilst young as heading to the UK seemed easier.

Probably a daft idea looking back, but oh well.

I wanted to get as far away from my parents as humanly possible without resorting to suicide... or parricide.

Ian

Was the feeling mutual on their part?

Sadly, I can relate to that.

It's part of what's keeping me here.

Before I met my wife (and at the time we met) she was actually looking into teaching in the UK. When we made our decision on which side of the Atlantic to settle we pretty much swayed with the US because of her larger family and settled employment. I was working in construction and we knew the uncertainties of that. Pretty much she had stronger ties to her home, than I did to mine. I also think the Smoky Mountains are a tad prettier than some of the sights the Black Country has to offer......

I met my USC husband while studying; we were both students at a post graduate school just south of Paris. Things got serious very quickly and we knew that we wanted to live together after school, with the intention of getting married and having kids in the future.

We put together a short list of cities which we'd like to live in that, from memory, included Barcelona, London, Sydney, Hong Kong, San Francisco, Boston plus a few others.

The first person to get a good job in one of our chosen cities had 'dibs' and the other one would follow. He then proceeded to get a job in Dusseldorf (note, not on the list!) so I tactfully mentioned I'd commute to see him from a job in London. So he turned that down and got one in the Bay Area instead. I was lucky enough to get a job with an employer also in the Bay Area who sponsored my H1b so we didn't have to get married immediately. We lived together for 3 years before getting hitched and starting a family.

Now we're trying to figure out how we can actually afford to raise a family in the Bay Area. The debate is coming up as to where else we could move to which would give us the quality of life we're looking for without the price tag.

Would be interested to see how that plays out as the future unfolds. I love the Bay Area, but even without kids it's not an easy place to stay in, if you want to retire early. But then, I watch 'Househunters International' and can't believe how much a place in central London, Paris, or Rome costs! My current thought is a house in Scottsdale (for the non-summer months) and a condo in the Bay Area for quick visits and the unbearable summer months of Scottsdale (downsizing from my current big house in the Bay Area, and up-sizing from my shoe-box in Scottsdale).

We are not there yet, but as I write the packers are busy packing. OH got a job here in France so we moved here 6 years ago. France is pretty and the climate great, but it is not all we had hoped it would be, so when he got offered the chance of an inter-company transfer he (and I) jumped at it. It is only a three year contract (to start with) so only some of our stuff is being packed and the house is going to be locked up and left empty. Who knows what the future holds?

I have not worked here, partly because my French is dreadful and the only thing I could really have done is teach English and that did not appeal, especially seeing what they would be prepared to pay for this service! Our house is an old farmhouse, so I've kept myself busy growing all our fruit and veg requirements in our rather large patch of land - a real learning experience! Unemployment is also a really big problem here. I hope that I might be able to work again in the US, at least the language will not be such a barrier.