form 3299 confused..

The form is for declaration for free entry of unaccompanied articles.
I am a US citizen married to a Canadian citizen living in Canada, we have finally decided to make the move down to the states, we will be applying for my wife's immigration and her kids inland and we are leaving soon, we will be crossing the border under visiting status for my wife and kids and then applying for their immigration as soon as we can once we are in the states, however i'm unsure how to fill out the form to move our belongings across the border. I am listing myself as the importer but it asks for other family members that are traveling with me as well in the first section what confuses me is the second section. The second section is strictly about me as the importer? or is it about everyone who will be going with me as well? it asks if you are a returning US resident, non resident, immigrating or visiting, since i'm technically a returning us resident is the correct box to be checked? or since my wife and kids are coming in as visitors is this the box to check? it says I can only check one..
any help would be appreciate, these government forms make my head hurt

I don't think that's going to work for you. You should get your wife and kids' visas BEFORE you move to the US. Their things cannot be imported free of duty unless they have legal reason to move them. With your current plan, they do not.

Apply at the closest US consulate via "direct consular filing". It usually takes only a few months, then they'll have to go to Montreal for interviews and THEN you can move.

for marriage based immigration info to the US see www.visajourney.com

Reba is correct. It is highly unlikely that any border officer would allow your spouse and her kids to cross "the border under visiting status", as your US citizenship and the fact tha tyou are relocating means that they quite simply are NOT visiting -- they are immigrating; and one cannot immigrate on visitor status.


Now, they may have been able to enter in the past, but this was because it was clear to the officer that you and your family were not moving to US, and were going on vacation -- but now this is a different case.

I had thought I had all this figured out, I guess not, when I immigrated to Canada I applied from IN Canada when I was visitor, from what I looked up online I thought it was the same in the US. The immigration lawyer I spoke to a few months ago said that I had to be working in the US for 4 months before we could apply for immigration, I assume this is true? also if I just went and my wife and kids stayed in canada would I still have trouble moving my things across the border?

"The immigration lawyer I spoke to a few months ago said that I had to be working in the US for 4 months before we could apply for immigration".

You may have to be working (but I doiubt that), but that does not mean your family can come with you.

As reba said, apply for processing while in Canada, they will look at your work history in canada and your ability to suppot your family when you move.

A better site for all this marriage-based immigration is visajourney.com

Once you and your familty are ready to move there wll be no problem moving things accross.

Focus on the important thing.

Dunno where your lawyer got that 4 months working. You *do* have to be able to prove you can support your family, and you have to submit an affidavit of support and proof of income/funds, but if you've just moved back to the US then you just need to show that you have a current job, with sufficient income.

Finding a job may be tricky, depending where you're moving to.

Again, see Visa Journey for full information. You'll specifically want to check out the DCF forum, and the Canada forum.

The US immigration works quite a lot differently than Canada.

I actually already have a job, is one of the reasons we are moving i'll check out visajourney


thanks for the help

There are no forms if the stuff is being imported by you in person, say in a U-haul. Just have a packing list.

I can't see any particular reason you couldn't bring their personal effects across, I suppose technically they are not US residents yet but I assume the plan would be that they stay behind while you establish the residence so they are simply duty-free personal effects. It's entirely lawful for example for someone who has a vacation home in the US to take in personal effects without duty being applied.

I have to say CBP always seem pretty laid back about the importation of used personal effects, at least as compared to CBSA.