Well it has been almost a year since my original post. After a temporary postponement due to my husband's work,my husband, children and I are finally planning to move to the UK in late June/early July 2018--only a year later than intended
. So I am just now applying for my spouse visa. Just as a refresher: I am American, my husband is British and our two sons have dual nationality.
I have a bunch of new questions. I've listed my questions below by topic. I hope it all makes sense. I've repeated some background info so no one has to go back through the old thread searching for facts
1) Financial Requirements: as I stated earlier in this thread from last year, we plan to use our savings to meet our financial requirements and we have a sufficient amount as we had been saving for a home. My husband does not have a job lined up in the UK as he intends to freelance. I have requested 6 months of our bank monthly statements as proof of sufficient savings and I have printed 6 months of my husband's pay statements as proof of the origin of the savings.
1a) is this sufficient evidence?
1b) as pay statements are no longer printed but only available to print at home, do I still need to have these pages certified? If I do have to have them certified, who does this? My understanding is that a "notary public" can only certify specific forms requesting a notary.
1c) My husband MAY continue to work for his present company (a US company) in a freelancing/contracting capacity after we move to the UK. Even though we have sufficient funds to meet the financial requirements, is there any benefit to having a letter from them stating his continuation work for them as a freelancer? (He hasn't informed his employer yet of his intentions to move thus we'd rather NOT ask for a letter unless it could affect the results of our spouse visa decision).
2) My mother-in-law and her partner have agreed to provide accommodation until we have found our own home. I have a copy of their "Land Registry Official Copy of Register of Deed" dated July 3, 2017 as we had initially intended to move last summer. However the letter they have provided expressing their willingness to house us indefinitely is dated March 13, 2018.
2a) Is that sufficient or does the "Land Registry" document need to be more recent?
2b) I have read on forums that it is really only the financial documents that need to stick to the 28 day rule, but is it beneficial to have the letter and/or the deed be newer?
2c) Their is no information on the deed that clarifies number of rooms/bedrooms or size of the home. Is the only way to acquire this evidence by hiring a surveyor (or something similar) to assess the house?
3) Similar to 1b above, who is considered sufficient for "certifying" a copy of my husband's passport?
4)Relationship evidence: my husband and I met while we were both working in California in 2006. We had our first son in 2007 and have lived together since 2006. We married in 2011 and our second son was born in 2012. We have never lived a part so this is what I have put together for relationship evidence: marriage license, 8 photos of us taken over the past 10 years printed on one sheet of paper, the first page of our past 10 years of tax returns, the first page of all of our apartment/home leases from the past 10 years.
4a) Do I need more than that? eg utility bills, etc?
4b) Is the first page of our tax returns and eases sufficient or to they require the whole document as proof (can't imagine so as that would be VERY lengthy)?
5) Photo evidence:
5a)Are you somehow penalized for providing more than 2 photos?
5b) As stated in 4) I have simply placed 6 photos one sheet of regular 8 1/2 by 11 printer paper as we don't have any photos printed on photo pater any more; is that acceptable?
5c) Our children are in a couple of the photos with us. Should I leave them out? We have SO few photos of us together alone.
I am VERY grateful for any of you who read all of this and answer
I hope I'm not breaking etiquette with the long post. I wanted to put it all in one thread as was suggested in another post but I wasn't sure if I should throw it all out there or ask in bits.
I've been lurking on this forum for a year now, thank you to you all for posting and replying!