My parents would like to retire to Arizona. Right now they live in Canada. My dad has been retired for 7 years and my mom will retire at the end of September. My brother, who has dual citizenship, lives in Arizona with his dual citizenship wife and children. I don’t know if they can sponsor my parents or how it works.
My parents would like to purchase a house and live there full-time.
How easy/difficult is this?
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Too late I saw it!
Oddly, my dad looks Mexican but his mom was Norwegian and his dad was English. When they go on cruises the Mexicans treat him really well and tell him “you look like us”.
It’s quite difficult to become a legal resident of the United States. The methods of doing so are itemized below, and I don’t think any of the categories apply to your parents except a family based petition (unless by chance they were not born in Canada):
http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=ae853ad15c673210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=ae853ad15c673210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD
I believe a Canadian Citizen can remain 6 months in the U.S. on a tourist visa.
http://www.consular.canada.usembassy.gov/canadians.asp.
I’ve heard of retirees who buy condos in the American southwest and live there four or five months at a time, then go home for a few weeks, then come back on another tourist visa. Dunno if that’s exactly legal, though.
Immediate family of a US citizen (including parents, if the child is 21+) can be sponsored for a green card by their American family member. See here (warning - their site has been incredibly slow while I looked for this information)
I was hoping that my brother could sponsor them. I think I’ll suggest they look into this.
That’s what I’ve heard as well.
Bonus: there is no annual quota for parents of U.S. citizens:
“There is no waiting period for immediate relatives of U.S. citizens,
which include a U.S. citizen’s spouse, parent, or unmarried child
under 21 years of age.”
You still have to deal with a mountain of paperwork and waiting, though (for teh petition and eventual immigrant visa to be processed). Even without a quota, the process can run more than a year from start to finish.
Eva Luna, U.S. Immigration Paralegal
Can they apply for a tourist visa and apply for citizenship while they are already there?
That would be uncool and ill-advised (and they would be applying for permanent residence, not citizenship - you need to be a permanent resident for at least 5 years first in most cases before you can apply for citizenship). If you’re coming on a tourist visa, you are supposed to have the intent to leave the U.S. at the end of a temporary stay. If you turn around and apply for a green card once you arrive, USCIS could interpret that as a sign you had lied about your intent when you arrived in the first place.
A fraud determination, immigration-wise, is the kiss of death. If you have further questions, I recommend you speak to an experienced immigration attorney.
Ah, didn’t realize it might look less than honest. I really appreciate your expertise.
I just want to add that, once you have filed the papers, you likely won’t be able to enter the US again until they are approved, because you have just clearly demonstrated your intent to immigrate. As mentioned above, this process is rather lengthy even in the best of times. You might want to keep that in mind and schedule things accordingly.
So no applying for permanent residency and then going down to visit the grandchildren. They normally go about twice a year.
Just out of curiousity, if your parents do manage to get permission to live permanently in the US, what would they do for health care? Since they’re no longer Canadian residents, i doubt if they’d still be covered by Canadian medicare. What do seniors in the US do for their health care costs?
I believe they would have to buy private insurance. US medicare only covers seniors who have paid into the system, AFAIK.
I’m not sure what they would be doing with regards to health insurance. I wonder how long you have to be in Canada each year in order to still be covered.
Well, the rules for OHIP are that:
If that’s standard for the other provinces as well, then if a Canadian establishes permanent residence in the US, it sounds like they lose their medicare coverage.
Not that I know anything about it more than a quick google search - but it might be something your parents should look into before making a final decision.
How pricey would that private insurance be for seniors, who tend to be big users of the health care system?
I was just talking with my mom and two couples who they are friends with would also like to retire down in Arizona and have been researching it for a while. They seem to be under the impression that the whole thing is a huge deal and not really worth it.
I’d love for my parents to be able to move down there and be near the grandkids but it might not happen I guess.