Residency after marriage

[syngirl]

ElQueso, perhaps that was your experience, but for me it was 3 weeks to receive the DNI once we submitted in September 2010, and then it was delivered to my door, and I was never categorized as temporary resident, my DNI arrived and it states permanent. Once you marry an Argentine citizen you immediately get permanent residency. Since your spouse was only resident your situation was different to that of the Swedish person.

 

[syngirl]

The question is if the residency demands that one actually have to be in the country or visit for some determined time each year? The swedish residency e.g however permanent it is will be cancelled if you stay abroad for more than a year. The only thing permanent about it is that once you have it - if you stay in the country - you dont have to renew it every two years. Is that the case with the argentine residency?? Or can you get it and then so to speak never go back to Argentina without it expiring?

If you look through my posts on this subject you'll see a couple of thing:

1) You can't get married again here. You're already married. You can do a tramite to have your marriage registered here, but it's just silly to do so if your marriage is recognised by Argentina. This is the one thing you have to check, is whether Argentina recognises marriages performed in Sweden. If they do, then that's that. You're married. You can't do it again, you can only do another religious ceremony, but you cannot be married at the registro civil (look back through the thread and somewhere there I post our story of this)

2) When we did our residency application the guy at Migraciones told me that technically you need to step foot on Argentine soil 1 day every 3 years to keep your residency, but he said the reality is that as spouse of an Argentine citizen they will not take it away, at the most they may tell you it has expired and make you pay some fees to update it.

But for instance my DNI was issued Sept 2010 and the expiry date on it is Sept 2025, so unless there is a radical change in things here I don't foresee having any problems entering Argentina with the card up until then. However, as everryone who lives here knows, things can change, and maybe you get stuck with someone at customs & immigration that is having a bad day and they refuse to accept your residency status one day when you come through.

Yes other countries tend to be more strict about these things -- for instance Canada needs total 2 years of every 5 in Canada in order to not lose residency status. However every day spent living with a Canadian citizen that is a spouse or parent OUTSIDE of Canada is considered towards residency days. But to go to the next level and get citizenship you need to live 3 years out of 4 within Canada.

 

[domthegreat]

Assuming you are doing the paperwork here, you can't use a state background check. You need an FBI check and yes, it needs to be apostilled. It takes anywhere from 12-15 weeks so best to start early.

Some people haven't needed the passport translated (as the US passport already has the info in Spanish on it). Really up to the person that day although it may be easier just to do it to err on the side of safety.

Do you need to have the background check to get married, or jsut to apply for residency? I talked with a friend who said that after he got married here, he just overstayed his visa for a period of 10 years...he would just pay the fine whenever he had to leave the country. Now I am not saying I want to do that...but we have so many things going on with our wedding(s) planning, that I am thinking it might be better to just wait on the residency thing until after we are married.

Any thoughts on that?

 

[domthegreat]

Furthermore, I am trying to figure out what is the best way to go with the whole thing...I am American, but my wife-to-be and I plan on living here for a few years after we get married...with the possibility of going back to the US in the future.

Based on what I read about US policy, if we were to get married in the US we would have to stay in the US after we get married there for her to apply for permanent residency...If we get married in Argentina, and then I apply for her to come as my foreign bride, she can get all of the paper work done while we are in Argentina, and then once she gets her visa we can go to the US and she will get her passport stamped saying she is a permanent resident.

But with all of the legal mumbo-jumbo you need here...would it just be easier if we got married in the US and then left to come back here, since it would be recognized here...?

 

[citygirl]

Do you need to have the background check to get married, or jsut to apply for residency? I talked with a friend who said that after he got married here, he just overstayed his visa for a period of 10 years...he would just pay the fine whenever he had to leave the country. Now I am not saying I want to do that...but we have so many things going on with our wedding(s) planning, that I am thinking it might be better to just wait on the residency thing until after we are married.

Any thoughts on that?

You don't need the background check to get married - the only thing you need is a current stamp in your passport.

Once you get married, you can immediately apply for perm residency.

Why not just fill out the form (FBI if you are from the US), get your fingerprints taken here and send it in? It will take 12 weeks on average for FBI (only one I can speak to, don't know how long it takes if you are from other parts of the world). Then you need to send it for the apostille. Once it comes back, you can start your paperwork for residency. *If you go back to the US/wherever AFTER you have your apostilled criminal report in hand but before submitting it, it invalidates it. Just an FYI.

 

[Jaredberryman]

All the above stuff is good, however, a quick bit of advice. I married an Argentine, and went through all this, and one of the first things they rejected me for was my passport, becasue my middle name was an initial and not written out (pretty stupid huh!). Check your passport, and if your middle name is written out, you're fine. If not, you must go to the embassy and get a special letter, or get a new passport with the middle name written out. I opted for the second.

 

[ElQueso]

All the above stuff is good, however, a quick bit of advice. I married an Argentine, and went through all this, and one of the first things they rejected me for was my passport, becasue my middle name was an initial and not written out (pretty stupid huh!). Check your passport, and if your middle name is written out, you're fine. If not, you must go to the embassy and get a special letter, or get a new passport with the middle name written out. I opted for the second.

Those are the kinds of technicalities that a lawyer, or a gestor even, can usually help with. I had a bunch of those little things that the lawyer handled efficiently (all paperwork reviewed before I even went to immigrations and he took care of it before we applied) and I didn't much problem personally except for the delays that would have happened either way.

The first time my wife went to get her precaria, she was rejected three times by immigrations for tiny little discrepancies like you mentioned. At the time, the immigration process wasn't nearly as streamlined as it is now and took her more than three months to get accepted for the precaria with the rejections that happened.

 

[ElQueso]

Furthermore, I am trying to figure out what is the best way to go with the whole thing...I am American, but my wife-to-be and I plan on living here for a few years after we get married...with the possibility of going back to the US in the future.

Based on what I read about US policy, if we were to get married in the US we would have to stay in the US after we get married there for her to apply for permanent residency...If we get married in Argentina, and then I apply for her to come as my foreign bride, she can get all of the paper work done while we are in Argentina, and then once she gets her visa we can go to the US and she will get her passport stamped saying she is a permanent resident.

But with all of the legal mumbo-jumbo you need here...would it just be easier if we got married in the US and then left to come back here, since it would be recognized here...?

I know a US citizen who married an Argentina here and then took his wife to the States to get residency there. They fly back and forth now, spending six months there every year (two months at a time) to maintain her residency until she gets permanent residency.

So, if you do something like that, you'll have to make sure you are going back to the States anyway to maintain her residency and spend 6 months there to ensure it.

If you're going to do that, I see no reason why you would need residency here during that process. You would be living here legally for six months at a time if you are a tourist, if you live there six months as well and you wouldn't need residency to stay here legally in that case.

As far as you having to stay in the US to get her visa after you're married there, I don't believe you have to do that, or lose the ability to do it later. As I understand it, you can marry in the US then move here and when you plan to move back to the US, go through the process at that time. It depends on whether or not you can continue to go back and forth between the US and Argentina and maintain her residency there (in either time or money) as to whether or not it makes sense.

If you are not going to get her residency in the US off the bat and fly back and forth, just put that off and get your residency here first. Things are much more simple that way.

I can't get a tourist visa for my wife to visit the US (freaking idiots). We've been married for 4 years. It doesn't matter that my father's got cancer, my mother had a stroke a few years ago, etc - they've never met their new daughter-in-law. I've considered going through the process of getting her a spouse visa but we haven't for the simple reason that it's relatively expensive and time consuming to do so, and on top of that I would have to do like my friend and spend 6 months out of the year there to maintain it - I can't afford the travel costs

I have bigger problems getting my wife a visa to the US because she's Paraguayan. She was told when they rejected her application that her biggest problem was that she was an immigrant here in Argentina and to give her a tourist visa to the US would be too tempting for her to immigrate there illegally. It made no sense to me whatsoever - why would she immigrate there illegally when she could do it legally through her marriage to me?

Also, she only has a bank account here. Until recently she didn't work and therefore has no record of tax payments, doesn't own a car, doesn't own property, etc.

They also told me that applications for tourist visas could not take anything into account other than the person who is applying for the visa - so the fact that she was married to an American whose parents were aging didn't carry any weight whatsoever.

I really despise the US' immigration policies, but that's another subject.

However, if you all are planning to get married there, I assume you've already gotten a visa (or are reasonably confident you can do so) for her. Being Argentina, with roots in her own country, etc, she probably wouldn't have much of a problem anyway.

 

[Crema Americana]

Sorry to hear ElQueso... it's really unfair and ridiculous that honestly married couples can't get a tourist visas for their spouse. Marriage or other family ties should definitely matter.

Is she in the process of applying for Argentine citizenship? That may help.

 

[Ceviche]

Basis El Queso's report, I can say with experience, that an Argentine girl would find it easier to get a US tourist visa as compared to a Paraguata in Argentina.

Also, if the Argentine girl is a student, its easier to get a tourist visa than being married to a American or in a low paying job.