Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with residence

How long for UK residency after marriage

tavegyl — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 08:09:07 -0800

He's British, I'm not. I plan to travel to London on a fiancee visa so we can get married. How long does it take after the wedding for the visa extention/ work permit to arrive? Once we get our wedding registered and the applications sent off, I'd like to have a sense of just how long before I can start looking for work/ stop mooching off the poor guy/ watch my savings dwindle in the face of a 1:140 exchange rate. This is, of course, in the UK.

Bonus questions:

- How invasive/ irritating is the process? Applying for the fiancee visa was an enterprise in itself.

- For anyone else from the dark side of the world: does travelling get easier afterwards? Can't say I'd miss the suspicious looks and disbelieving interrogations that come with the ghetto (non-EU/US etc) line at Immigration, while my young man breezes through.

What made your college RA great?

Clandestine Outlawry — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 15:39:51 -0800

What made your college RA great? I'll be an RA this upcoming September at a large Canadian university. Tending to a co-ed 'house' of about 44 undergrads, my role will include community building as well as rule enforcement and support for individual students with whatever they need during the year. I did this job last year and was OK - things went fine, but I doubt anything I did was very memorable for the residents.

This year, I want to be more than OK - I want to be a great RA. So I'd like to hear the things that your college RA did that you look back on as especially helpful, that made your time in the residence more pleasant, or otherwise earned your appreciation.

Cautionary tales or general advice are also most welcome. On the residence programming front, I've already noted this Ask thread from a few years ago.

What happens (legally) when an American and a Japanese person marry?

Vorteks — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 15:00:53 -0800

International Marriage filter: When a US Citizen marries a foreigner, what process is involved in bringing the new spouse to the US and getting permanent resident status? I'd like to know how difficult it is for a US Citizen to marry a foreigner (specifically, a Japanese person), and bring them here to the US to stay. What are the legal procedures? How long does it take? What, if any, is the chance of "failure"?

I know a lot of people are going to tell me to talk to an immigration lawyer. Believe me, I will... if/when the situation comes up. You see, right now I'm not yet dating. I'm just considering a potential relationship, and if I decide to pursue it I'd like to know up front what I'm getting into. So YANAL, or at least YANML, I understand. But what can you tell me about the process? I'd like to get a "birds eye view" at least.

Bonus points: What would be involved in a US Citizen marrying a Japanese person and getting permanent residence in JAPAN? This seems less likely in my case. But hey, it could happen.

Thank you MeFites!

Are lawyers just vampire money-pit evil people?

Brockles — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 09:30:18 -0800

Wanted: Most expedient and financially prudent way to apply for permanent residence in Canada. I can't find any specific questions or direct help in the various government websites for my particular circumstances, so am looking for anecdotal evidence or a person in the know:

I have a work visa in Canada, and I have been here since October 2006. I am English and I have a very specific and technical job here that I am extremely well/over qualified for, with 15 years employment in the field. I'd like to apply for permanent residence, and have had quotes in the region of $2.5 to 5K for the process from immigration lawyers. At the moment, that is quite a lot of money to me, although I could save that without major hardship if I had to.

So questions are as follows:

1: Is there any advantage in turn-around time going with a lawyer? (please quantify answers). How long does either take?

2: I can't decide how likely I am to screw up the process if I don't use a lawyer (my work permit took two goes to go through when we tried to do it ourselves) so am weighing cost/arse-factor of just getting it done over not paying $3K or so. Any experience?

3: After having got a work visa, and having had lawyers offer to take my case on (expressing, as they would, high chances of it being successful), are lawyer supported applications a reasonable certainty?

4: I've heard rumours that there may be difficulty extending my 2 year work permit - which seems nonsensical to me. Is there any truth in this? The difficulty revolved around needing a few months gap between visa expiry and additional applications, which seems stupid.

5: Does it make it any easier that I am already employed and living here?

So. I am essentially looking to take the right decision for reliability of application. I also want to get this over and done with.

Can anybody help with this?

What should a homeowner know about electricity in the home?

Brandon Blatcher — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 12:09:18 -0800

What should a homeowner know about electricity in the home? Just looking for a general guide to electricity and an explanation of how it works and its use in homes. Basic stuff like why the outlet for the 'frig is different from a regular outlet (beside the obvious "it needs more power"), how much electricity should you plug into an outlet, the difference between volts and amps and their impact on the various circuits in the house, 15 vs 20 amp circuits, things to check for, things not to do and especially anything I'm too ignorant to even be aware of.

Yeah, I know to map the circuits if they aren't already mapped.

Note: this is not about doing any electrical work, but just a general guide for someone who knows nothing about electricity.

How to make first year living easier

Phire — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 12:13:45 -0800

Are there any faux-pas to watch out for when looking for accomodations for University? Snag: I'm going into first year Undergrad, the year most people either spend at home or in University provided residence. I'm going out of town for University, but residence is rather more than I can afford. I've been keeping an eye out on craigslist for potential apartments and shared-rooms situations, and I've found a few that involve renting one room in a bigger house that seem quite nice.

Besides asking about location, amenities, utilities, and house rules, is there anything that would make my first year a living hell? Rules like "don't live with people who're all in the same major", say?

For example, the one I like the most has five other girls going into their last year of Teacher's college, whereas I'm going into first year Undergrad. Would the age gap make that big of a difference? Other potentially 'hidden' issues?

UK tax: How long do you have to live somewhere to call it your residence?

handee — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 00:31:24 -0800

UK Tax question: How long do you have to be resident in a house for it to be your residence, for the purposes of capital gains tax? If you have not lived in a house for 3 years, you get taxed on the profit of the sale.

My question concerns what happens if you've not lived in it for 2 years then move back in for N months then sell it? Obviously, if N is very small it looks like tax avoidance. And presumably there's an issue with property developers owning 4 houses and moving from house to house. So there has to be a fact about this: I'm looking for a statement of the form 2.5 years out, 2 months in=bad, 2.5 years out 3 months in=good. I've tried to check the revenue website for this information but it's not easy to find stuff on there.

How do I go about finding proof of residence from 1940's

ellke — Thu, 28 Dec 2006 20:59:21 -0800

My mother is 94. I recently found out that she has unclaimed assets from a long time ago. The state says that in order to claim the money, she has to prove that she lived at the residence listed on the claim. We think she lived there in the 1940's. How do I go about finding records from so long ago?

Words for where you're from

poweredbybeard — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 10:17:26 -0800

LanguageFilter: Cypriot. Cairene. Dubliner. These are beautiful, and I'd like more. Name some favourite or exotic words denoting city of origin or residence. And what is the word for this type of word? Used as noun or adjective, doesn't matter. I'm having trouble with a Google search for what these words might be called, so if anyone knows, do share.

Does a rule exist to determine how a placename is changed when speaking of something native to that place?

geckoinpdx — Wed, 13 Apr 2005 18:25:12 -0800

How is the term is determined for a native, thing or resident of a place? For example, an American from America or Italian from Italy seems simple enough, but Glaswegian from Glasgow? Shouldn't it be Moswegian and not Muscovite? I have been wanting to ask this for a long time but was recently pushed to ask when a friend of mine from Galway referred to her neighbours as Galwegian. I've googled everything I could think of, checked Languagehat's site but didn't find anything in the way of standard rules. All I really found were a number of sites commenting on the strangeness of some of these terms ("Utahn", "Filipino").

How can I get French citizenship as a current US citizen?

Livewire Confusion — Sat, 05 Feb 2005 14:34:35 -0800

French Citizenship or Residence

I am a United States citizen who is looking to move to France. I am currently living in the Republic of Ireland but I am finding it harder and harder to maintain legal residence (even though, my mother is remarried to an Irishman and my ancestry is Irish) It seems you either have to be offered a contract for employment or be a student to stay here. I HEARD that requirements for French citizenship or permanent residence were more lenient. Does anyone have any information on this. I am NOT "highly skilled" in the slightest, unless you consider fixing PCs and Macs a skill.