planning to move to california in 2009

hello, me and my girlfriend are looking to move to the san francisco area in early 2009 but i have no idea where to even start on the process. i work as a waiter for dennys and my girlfriend works at a local company doing invoicing. what kind of visa should i be looking into? i was reading on the us visa website and i figure i need an E3 visa but im not really sure.

Also, i had heard from a friend of mine that buying property in the states makes you imediately eligable for permanent residency. is this true?

any help would be great, im completely lost and confused on this whole process

Cory

E-3 is for Australian citizens only. Buying property in the US does not in any way make you eligible even for entry into the US let alone permanent residency. In fact, if you have property there it can make the questions awkward when you want to enter as a visitor (although they will let you in provided you give the right answers, but only as a temporary visitor).

As you both sound like workers without specialized skills, I doubt you could get any sort of work permit under US law.

Maybe if your girlfriend can get an L-1 transfer to the US, but invoicing I doubt is a specialized skill as far as intra-company transfers go. Even if she did, you're not married so you couldn't get permission to work as you wouldn't qualify for L-2, only B-2.

If you've got the money you might want to have a look at being a treaty investor, which is E-2.

If you've got close immediate family (parent, child, sibling) who are US citizens or possibly permanent residents they can sponsor you but it takes a long time (years) to be approved, especially if it's brother/sister sponsoring.

Most Canadians who go to the US to work use TN-1, which requires certain qualifications and you have to work for a company which needs those specific skills.

Have a read of this. TN-1 is at the bottom, but if you read through it you might find a visa category you qualify for.

thanks for the link and advice. is there a restriction on how long you would be able to stay on a TN-1? What kind of qualifications does it require?

also as i am a server for a company that is based in the US, is it possible to get sponsored by the same company down there or does it have to be a specialized skill?

TN usually requires a 3/4 yr baccalaureate degree or 2 yr diploma + 2~4 yrs experience or some professional license (CPA) /state / provincial license.

However, your degree/ experience/ diploma/ license has to be related to your job.
For instance a degree in Pharmacy will not qualified you in a Engineer. Qualification and job duties have to be in some sort of harmony.

http://www.grasmick.com/nafta.htm

shows the route for a TN and the qualified job category.
(scroll all the way down).

I am not sure how servant or invoicing will fit into one.

Speaking of getting ready to move to state in early 2009, the fastest route given that you need to work is TN / L visa. But they have some strict requirements.

So you might want to H1, but it would be available on april 09 and valid starting on october 09. Yet they have restriction as well.

TN visas don't cover wait staff, (or any work visa for that matter) even if the restaurant you work for is headquartered in the US.

TN visas are valid only one year and need to be re-applied for at expiration. For a TN visa you'd need to have a university degree of some sort, that coincides to the job you're offered.

If you really want to go, you might want to think about going to college, F-1 or J-1. If you do a web search, bear in mind they talk about visas, there is no visa for a Canadian citizen in F-1 status. If you went to say, a culinary school, you can apply for employment authorization to work part-time in a field related to the course of study, but the course has to be "full-time" although that can mean three classes per three semesters per year, so you might be able to figure something out.

But I think it would be fairly hard to pay for school and rent with a part-time job in San Francisco. Depends what your situation is I suppose. Go up to Fort Mac for six months and drive a truck and you'll have enough money.