Reviewed by André Matias, Esq., Principal Attorney
Services
Altius focuses on family-based adjustment of status, and works in English, Portuguese, Spanish and French.
Hablamos español. If Spanish is the language you would rather have this conversation in, that is not a problem to work around.
When a route opens after years here
A child turns 21, or a spouse naturalizes, or a petition filed long ago finally reaches the front of the queue — and suddenly a route exists that did not exist last year.
Those cases are rarely simple, and the complication is usually the intervening years rather than the current relationship. Time out of status, an entry that was not an admission, an old order nobody explained properly at the time: each of these changes whether adjustment of status is available, or whether the route runs some other way.
The right first step is not filling in a form. It is establishing what your actual immigration history is — which sometimes takes a records request — and only then deciding what to file.
Where it happens
- Your interview office is assigned by ZIP code; the USCIS Office Locator gives the current answer for your address.
- Biometrics for Montgomery County applicants are usually taken at the Baltimore Application Support Center.
- Maryland's immigration courts sit in Baltimore and Hyattsville (EOIR listing).
Silver Spring is on the Metro Red Line, so Washington-side appointments are straightforward; Baltimore is a drive worth planning for.
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.