Adjustment of Status - I-485

I have been a reader during my, or rather my husband’s, green card journey but this is my first time posting. I wanted to share my timeline and experience since this forum really helped me.

AOS / Marriage Based / USC
I am a USC and my husband’s country of origin is Macedonia
Field office: Pittsburgh, PA

PD: June 215, 2018
Biometrics for I-485: July 12, 2017
Interview notice: August 24, 2017
Interview Date: September 26, 2017
Notification that green card is in production: September 26, 2017
GC received----
Total time: about 3.5 months

We arrived 30 minutes before our interview and ended up waiting for about an hour. We didn’t use a lawyer and we were totally fine. We got called into an office together and after the officer swore us in he reviewed our ID’s and our case file. Our case was a little strange because we currently live in different states and have never lived together (we are young and have only been out of school for about a year). Long story short we are saving up to buy a house in the next year and with our jobs it is easier to do while living apart. The officer asked us why we could not just move in together but we told him it was what we have discussed and decided. After that he asked us to state each other’s full names and birthdays. He never asked us how we met but we explained it when we showed him our pictures. He asked to see some pictures and I showed him a photo album of our recent trip to Macedonia to visit my husband’s family which he seemed to like. We also showed him some other random photos of our relationship, we’ve been together for four years so we had a lot. Then he asked if we had any other evidence of our relationship, specifically paperwork that had both of our names on it.

Evidence of Relationship:
-Joint bank account statements
-Joint credit card statements
-Notices of spouse as life insurance and 401k beneficiary
-Receipts for our tickets Macedonia
-Receipts for flights to visit spouse
-College diplomas (We met in college and graduated together)
-Letters from our families confirming out relationship
-Receipt for my engagement ring
-Receipts for charity donations that we have made together
-Cards we have given to each other for various holidays.

The officer was really only interested in the joint statements, travel receipts, diplomas, and photos. I tried to give him more papers but he didn’t want them.
After we gave him that information he gave my husband a book that said “Welcome to America” and explained how he will have to remove the conditions on his green card since we haven’t been married for two years. Then that was it… We were still nervous because the officer didn’t officially say we were approved but later in the evening (about 5pm) I received a notification that our case status had changed to “New Card in Production”. We are so happy!!

Tips:
-Bring everything: The interview notice tells you everything you need to bring so use that as a checklist. Our officer didn’t need any more paperwork for our file but it’s better to be prepared rather than risk delaying the approval process any more.
-Be organized: I bought an accordion binder and separated all of our paperwork into separate sections. I had one for copies of our previously submitted paperwork and supporting evidence, one for immigration related information, and one for evidence of relationship. I also had a separate folder for all of our original documents (Birth certificates, citizenship documents, tax info etc). I was able to access everything really easily during the interview. We didn’t end up needing to leave anything with the officer besides our relationship evidence but this gave me piece of mind.
-Be yourself: The officers do this all day every day and they can tell whether a relationship is real or not. They aren’t out to try and catch you in a lie. If your relationship is real then you have nothing to worry about
-Be prepared: Go over practice questions so you get comfortable with the answers. You don’t have to know everything exactly. Ex: The officer asked my husband what my current address is and he said “I am not sure about the house number exactly because I just drive there from memory but it is on xxxx Street in the suburbs of xxxx city. No big deal.

Surprisingly our officer didn’t ask us too many questions about each other, I think he was ready to go to lunch at the time of our interview…, but I think we had a good amount of evidence. We didn’t have a lot of joint statements (cars, utility bills, property etc.) but we did bring a lot of personal mementos of our relationship. He told us that not living together will be a red flag when my husband applies to remove the conditions on his green card but we told him that we will be living together by the end of next year.

All in all I think I was more nervous than my husband but everything went smoothly. Good luck to everyone on your green card journey!