Reviewed by André Matias, Esq., Principal Attorney
Services
Altius focuses on family-based adjustment of status — bringing a spouse, a child or a parent to permanent residence from inside the United States.
If you have already lived here for years before a route opened, that history is the case.
Why the entry matters more than the forms
Adjustment of status lets you become a permanent resident without leaving the country. Whether it is available to you turns less on the current relationship than on what came before it.
The question that decides most Alexandria cases is how you entered. Someone admitted at a port of entry and someone who entered without inspection are in materially different positions, even when both are now married to U.S. citizens — and for the second, the route may not be adjustment at all.
Related facts that change what is possible: a prior overstay, a prior removal order, a denial on an earlier petition, or time spent out of status between visas. None of these necessarily ends the case. All of them are far better raised at the start than discovered at an interview, where the officer already has the file.
Where it happens
- Your interview office is assigned by ZIP code — check the USCIS Office Locator for your address.
- Virginia's immigration courts sit in Annandale and Sterling (EOIR listing).
Alexandria sits on the Metro Blue and Yellow lines, which makes it one of the easier places in the region to attend an appointment without giving up a whole day's work — a real consideration when both spouses are expected at the interview.
USCIS publishes live processing times per office and form type, and they move. Check the current figure for your own office on the USCIS processing times tool.
Government fees
Adjustment of status carries several government filing fees, and they change. Confirm current amounts on the USCIS Fee Schedule (Form G-1055) or the USCIS Fee Calculator.
These are government filing fees only. They are not Altius Law's attorney fees.
Talk to us
If your immigration history has something in it you are unsure about, that is exactly the thing worth putting in front of a lawyer first.