What You Need to Know About Family-Based Visas 

One of the primary functions of immigration law is to unite families. If you are a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident and you are looking to use immigration to bring your family together here in the United States, the experienced immigration lawyers at the Sverdloff Law Group can help you obtain family-based visas. The type of visa that you will need to apply or petition for will depend on whether you are a U.S. citizen or a lawful permanent resident as well as your relationship to the individual you are seeking to get a visa for. We will go into more detail about that below.

Visas for Family Members of U.S. Citizens

If you are a U.S. citizen, you have the greatest ability when it comes to petitioning for visas of family members. The visa that you will need to apply for depends on your relationship to the family members. For instance, spouses require an IR-1 visa, while unmarried children under the age of 21 will require an IR-2 visa. If you are a U.S. citizen adopting a child from a foreign country, you will need to petition for an IR-3 visa if you are adopting the child abroad, or an IR-4 visa if you are adopting the child in the United States. Provided your parent is at least 21 years old, you can petition for them using an IR-5 Visa. 

Visas for Family or Lawful Permanent Residents

Lawful permanent residents are also able to use the visa process to legally bring close family members to the United States, however, their ability to do so is more limited than it is for citizens. Lawful permanent residents can petition for their minor children and spouses using an F2A visa, while unmarried sons and daughters who are not minors should use an F2B visa. Visas for family members of lawful permanent residents are known as limited family preference visas. Unlike visas for the family members of U.S. citizens, the number of family preference visas for lawful permanent residents is limited to just under 115,000 visas each year. 75% of these family preference visas go to spouses and minor children, with just 25% going to adult unmarried children of lawful permanent residents. It is important to apply early in the year to have the best chance at getting your visa petition approved. This is because the immigration visas are issued based on the date that the visa petition was filed. For this reason, it is critical to have your application complete, flawless, and filed as close to the beginning of the fiscal year as possible. 

Talk to the Sverdloff Law Group in Chicago, Illinois

If you need help securing or appealing visas for your family members, the immigration attorneys at the Sverdloff Law Group can help. Whether you need help creating a long-term plan for bringing over your family members, or a visa that you have already applied for has been denied, our attorney can help you regardless of where you are in the immigration and naturalization process. Contact the Sverdloff Law Group today to schedule a consultation.