sherbert

Who buys a house on a non-immigrant visa? I just don't get it. No offence to the OP but when your stay in the US is basically controlled by how much your boss likes you and the rug can be pulled from under your feet at any moment, why on earth would you tie yourself to a mortgage?

bluedaze

No offense taken, I currently make $500 a month after my mortgage is paid renting it out on a 2 year lease.
I could have continued to throw money away in rent but I bought a house instead. At the end of the day it wasnt just about having a house it was about having an investment.

sherbert

Well that's a good thing! How do you manage it from abroad though? I find managing my place back home to be a nightmare and my tenant is brilliant.

bluedaze

I have a property manager that takes care of it, it costs me 10% though but at least they do all the work. They also found the tenet and took care of all the paperwork etc.

kevntrace

I came out to the US in 1994 on an H1B and after 12 months my employer offered to sponsor me for a greencard. I turned down the offer! I was still in the mindset that my US adventure was temporary, and I hadn't decided to settle here at that time.

Three years later I was with another employer, got married (and brought my wife over on an H4) and this employer also offered to sponsor the greencard. This time I took up the offer and our greencards were issued in 2001. We also purchased property in 2000, while waiting on the greencard application.

There are definitely some risks in this approach, but we were fortunate that everything worked out.

Steve_

Reading your OP, I still think L-1 is your best option, it does suck being tied to the company but that's the way it works, that's why you only get so many years and then they have to sponsor you or you have to leave.

The only suggestion I can think of is that maybe L-1B would be a better method, because you surely have specialized skills and even their lawyer can't screw up that application (you would think).

Alternatively they could just file the I-140 for you and you apply for an immigrant visa and skip the L-1 step altogether. You don't have to already be in the US. You could just stay where you are, they file a petition and you wait for it to be approved and then apply for immigrant visas. That way at least you know it's going to be a one-way trip.

E-2 sounds pointless because you want to stay and you have a child who is not a US citizen, so he would eventually age out.

Another option would be to transfer to a different country where the immigration paperwork isn't quite so mind numbing. Didn't I read they were going to start up Amazon in Australia? And they certainly need some help in Mississauga.

bluedaze

My sons situation does concern me, he does have his soccer scholarship which should cover him on a student visa for at least the next 4 years and we also have the GC sponsorship from my sister in law which may come through in the 3 years before he turns 21 as its been in for 7 so far, I know that's a big if.

Funny you should mention Mississauga, when my L1a expired in the August I was given a number of options in the UK and Mississauga in Canada. I had an interview with them 3 weeks later and I was inclined for the move but the visa process could take 6-12 weeks and obviously from experience isnt guaranteed. At this point I was on leave without pay so I took the option to go back to the UK.

Your mention of Mississauga has put that option back into my head but one of the drawbacks from my previous research was the cost of living seemed to be high.

Steve, are you from this area?

christmasoompa

Just to clarify, if you're moving to Canada on an intra-company transfer Temp Work Permit and you're a UK citizen, there's no wait time at all - you simply get your TWP at the airport when you arrive.

Re: cost of living, I'd suggest a quick search of the Canada forums as you'll find loads of relevant threads.

HTH.

Steve_

No but I've been there and it's very middle-class. It's known mainly for the mall there, Square One. I wouldn't have thought the cost of living was particularly mind-blowing but it would be higher than Tennessee for sure and you'd be living in a smaller place almost certainly.

The real problem is the commute downtown - but you wouldn't need to do that.

Please, please, please move there because Amazon Canada is hopeless.

Pretty much a "no chance", if you've been paying attention to the visa bulletin you will see the priority dates have been getting gradually slower and slower due to the increasing demand for visa numbers. If you applied in 2008, you're looking at around a 20-year wait. (Unless the law changes, which is possible).

However - you could move to Canada and then later on move to the US on an immigrant visa.

bluedaze

In January they were on March 2002, today they are on August 2002 so at that pace its going to be at least 5 more years

Steve_

The bulletin for Sept. 2008 says Oct. 1997 and the current bulletin, June 2015 says Sept. 2002, so in seven years it moved five years, however it has been slowing down.

My understanding from a Congressional Research Service study is that after they put the forms on the internet in 1998, the number of applications rose pretty much exponentially, so it has been getting slower and slower and slower. The graph in the report wasn't very clear but I think you can safely assume once they hit somewhere around 2003 in the priority numbers it will slow markedly, because that's when (imx at least) internet access really became mass market and broadband took off.

Anyway, either way I don't think it makes much of a difference to your situation, your son will age out and if you live in Canada a few years or many years, you will eventually be eligible for a US immigrant visa.

In fact, it might work out better for you, because you could become a Canadian citizen prior to moving to the US.

However the only way your son is going to get in permanently based on you is if you move back to the US now on L-1.

Steve_

Actually it's clearer than I thought it was: http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/207076.pdf

Have a look at the graph on page 6, figure 5.

That spike in 2002 is absolutely gigantic, "exponential" was actually an understatement.