Read it.
Use it.
Focused guides for the questions that need more than a quick answer. Each includes a worksheet to prepare your next conversation.
Guides for your next decision.
Build a TN employer evidence brief before drafting the letter
Read & prepare Applicant planningKeep an L-1A new-office record from approval to extension
Read & prepare Applicant planningCompare the E-2 evidence for a startup and a business purchase
Read & prepare U.S. destination planningCanadian RN planning for New York State
Read & prepare U.S. destination planningCanadian RN planning for California
Read & prepareSeven decisions, answered before you prepare.
Assemble an Interior Designer TN file from a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury studio career with one closed employer
Hypothetical example: a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury interior designer with a college diploma and seven years across two studios is offered a position by a Colorado firm that designs resort hotels and lodges. Interior Designer is listed in Appendix 2 with a baccalaureate, or a post-secondary diploma plus three years of experience. Her diploma takes the second limb, and one of the two studios has closed. The file therefore has to prove years of experience partly from an employer that no longer exists, which is a records problem to solve before the offer letter is drafted.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Decide which years the file relies on and who can confirm them
- Match the U.S. duties to interior design rather than decoration or sales
- Confirm the employer relationship and choose the entry route
A Swiss permanent resident and a Canadian hydrologist in Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury need two different routes
Hypothetical example: a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury ski-school director is a Swiss citizen holding Canadian permanent residence, and his wife, a Canadian citizen and hydrologist, has an offer from a Montana water-resources consultancy. Her Canadian citizenship and the listed Hydrologist profession point her toward TN; his permanent-resident card gives him nothing under TN because TN requires Canadian or Mexican citizenship. His Swiss nationality, however, is a treaty nationality for E-2 purposes if the current State Department list confirms it, which opens a route for him that has nothing to do with Canada.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Record each passport before discussing any job
- Build her TN case on the Hydrologist entry
- Decide whether he accompanies as TD or arrives on his own route
Counting inventory and consignment stock when a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury outfitter buys a U.S. gear shop
Hypothetical example: a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury nordic-ski and snowshoe outfitter is buying an outdoor-gear retail and rental store in New Hampshire. The price covers fixtures, a rental fleet, the lease assignment and goodwill, but the largest asset on the shelves is inventory, some of it owned outright and some held on consignment from suppliers. E-2 counts funds that are irrevocably committed to the enterprise and at risk, so the file has to separate purchased stock from stock that still belongs to the brands, and financed inventory from paid-for inventory.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Sort the shelves into owned, financed and consigned
- Test substantiality against the real cost of the business
- Show direction and a business that outgrows the household
Opening a Vermont sales-and-installation office for a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury sauna manufacturer
Hypothetical example: a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury manufacturer of prefabricated saunas and cold-plunge units for lodges and homes sells into New England through distributors and now wants its own U.S. subsidiary, run by its sales director, who has been with the company for five years. A new-office L-1A petition is approved for one year and must show secured premises and the capacity to support a managerial role within that year. The plan has to describe a warehouse bay with a showroom, the first two hires and how the director's role becomes managerial once they arrive.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Secure premises that match the business, not a mailbox
- Plan the first year so the director manages rather than sells
- Confirm her qualifying year and the household's position
A forty-percent co-owner of a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury tour company weighs L-1A against E-2 for a Maine base
Hypothetical example: a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury guided snowmobile and ATV tour and rental company is owned forty percent by its operations partner and thirty percent each by two other Canadian partners. The company wants to open a base in Maine and the operations partner would relocate to run it. Because he owns a minority stake, L-1A through a subsidiary of the Québec company and E-2 in his own name lead to different structures, and the choice depends on who is treated as the investor and who as the employee.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Route one: the company expands and transfers its manager
- Route two: he invests personally and directs the Maine business
- Ask which entity should own the fleet and the permits
When a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury landscape architect takes a Utah TN job and her husband teaches skiing
Hypothetical example: a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury landscape architect is offered a position with a Utah resort-planning firm, a listed profession she qualifies for with her degree and Canadian citizenship. Her husband is a certified ski instructor who assumes he can teach at a nearby resort each winter; their daughter is eighteen and finishing cégep, their son is twelve. TN solves her case. TD status for the others allows study and nothing more, so the husband's winters and the daughter's plans each need a separate answer before the family commits.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- The husband cannot work in TD, so decide what he does instead
- The daughter's age makes her the most time-sensitive person in the file
- Build her TN file so that it is not carrying the family's assumptions
A Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury fuel distributor compares EB-5 capital with a Gold Card gift for a family of five
Hypothetical example: a Stoneham-et-Tewkesbury couple sold their heating-oil and propane delivery business to a regional distributor and have three children aged eight, fourteen and seventeen. They are comparing a regional-center EB-5 investment with the Gold Card as described on the official page. EB-5 places capital at risk in an enterprise that must create ten jobs and leads to conditional permanent residence for the family; the Gold Card is a gift to the U.S. government plus a processing fee for each person, not an investment and not a conventional visa. The two are different in kind, and a family of five feels the per-person structure most.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Count the family under each framework
- Understand what the money is under each framework
- Verify the terms on the day, and keep the routes separate