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DV 2016 OC Selectees

Hershal said:
Waiting is the hardest bit. You don't know what to do with your life. If your pretty certain that you will get accepted then you can start to slowly make small plans. For us we were 50/50. So we couldn't really plan the next few years of our lives until we had he interview. Luckily we were accepted so now we are off to sunny texas at the end of the year
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Congratulations! Lucky you. :)

It's hard to properly get excited until you hear the words 'your visa is approved.' While my application is clean, my paranoid brain keeps thinking about all the things that could possibly go wrong. :p It's just a matter of being able to put it in the back of my head for now, although that seems a little impossible and staying off this forum certainly isn't an option lol. I'm very ready to move to the US as I had been planning since last year to go on the J1 visa at the end of this year, so now I'm itching to get there!
 
Hey guys! So happy to have this source of info. I am a selectee – 1xx, from Melbourne AUS – and currently trawling through every piece of info I can get. My husband is trying to remember every place he's lived since 16 (it's a LOT!). While he was at university, he lived with some friends and can't remember the address. There are a few places he can't remember – can you enter 'can't recall', or should we try to track down the people he lived with and hope that they remember? Thanks in advance, you guys are the best.
 
I think it's a bit of both: try to remember as much as you can, track down people who might be able to help (we used my mother-in-law's old address book at one stage as she had each of my husband's addresses while he was at university written in it), google maps (I had to do that with one of my former addresses because I knew how to get there, but couldn't remember the address). If you can't remember, give it your best guess.

For those of us who are a little older, we've lived a few places and it can get hard to remember. My husband's former addresses took up three pages on the DS260 and traversed two countries and four Australian states!

Welcome to the forum!
 
EmilyW said:
I think it's a bit of both: try to remember as much as you can, track down people who might be able to help (we used my mother-in-law's old address book at one stage as she had each of my husband's addresses while he was at university written in it), google maps (I had to do that with one of my former addresses because I knew how to get there, but couldn't remember the address). If you can't remember, give it your best guess.

For those of us who are a little older, we've lived a few places and it can get hard to remember. My husband's former addresses took up three pages on the DS260 and traversed two countries and four Australian states!

Welcome to the forum!
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Thanks heaps. I figured as much! Google Maps it is :) P.S. Just checked out your Dropbox – so helpful. We'd been advised to use a lawyer but were quoted $5000 for the process, which is a bit much when you're planning a move. All of the info here is invaluable.
 
gemka said:
Hey guys! So happy to have this source of info. I am a selectee – 1xx, from Melbourne AUS – and currently trawling through every piece of info I can get. My husband is trying to remember every place he's lived since 16 (it's a LOT!). While he was at university, he lived with some friends and can't remember the address. There are a few places he can't remember – can you enter 'can't recall', or should we try to track down the people he lived with and hope that they remember? Thanks in advance, you guys are the best.
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That's a great number! Welcome. :) I'll add you to our list! Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe one of the main purposes of past addresses is to determine where you need to obtain police checks from (typically from stays in countries 6 months and over). So, if they were very temporary addresses and you can't really remember the precise apartment number or whatever, I wouldn't worry too much.

And $5000?! That lawyer must be joking! What a laugh!
 
That's pretty much it, @violetion. In the end, I did my best. Although I know I wasn't spot on, I don't think it mattered much.

When you interview in Sydney, the checklist they ask you to use to organise your documents also has a section at the bottom where you have to list where you have lived. I think that part of the checklist is definitely designed to make it easier for the CO to determine how many police checks you need.
 
violetion said:
That's a great number! Welcome. :) I'll add you to our list! Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe one of the main purposes of past addresses is to determine where you need to obtain police checks from (typically from stays in countries 6 months and over). So, if they were very temporary addresses and you can't really remember the precise apartment number or whatever, I wouldn't worry too much.

And $5000?! That lawyer must be joking! What a laugh!
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Oh cool, thanks. He hasn't lived O/S for more than a year, but has in a couple of states, so we'll get police checks from those. All we can do is our best and be honest, right? RIGHT! Go team!
 
In the Class of OC2015, we haven't had a single denial (that we know of). We've all been over-prepared, knowledgeable about the process, and compulsively organised and that seems to have worked in our favour.

Even where some of our members have had tricky cases (we've had three get their GCs via the work experience route, and one (@reeko) who completed the ultimate triple salchow of DV in cross charging their eligibility to their parents), we've made it through.

You guys will be the same in DV2016. When in doubt, ask the forum. :)
 
@eskimokisses
We were kind of in the same boat. We were looking at moving away from Perth, but if we didn't get the green card we were going to move over east Australia. So we could half plan, but not really, as international move is bigger than domestic. Anyways we have our answer now.

When it comes to Texas, we are looking at the greater Houston area. Very hard to make a decision when you have never been there. Our main reason for Texas is because of my work in Oil and Gas. We are going to hopefully rent an apartment in the city for about 6 months to get our feet wet and bearings before we decided on an actual location!
 
@Hershal yes we have just started looking at Texas as well around Houston, Dallas, Austin......woke up this morning to see the shooting in Texas eeek !

Agree it is hard to make a decision without visiting first. We have school age children so we are thinking we might have to try and rent in the area that we wish to eventually buy so we don't have to move schools several times but I guess we wait and see.
 
Interesting to see a lot of folks here (and in the 2015 thread) shooting for the Lone Star State. I was expecting more prospective New Yorkers or Angelinos...
 
eskimokisses said:
@Hershal yes we have just started looking at Texas as well around Houston, Dallas, Austin......woke up this morning to see the shooting in Texas eeek !

Agree it is hard to make a decision without visiting first. We have school age children so we are thinking we might have to try and rent in the area that we wish to eventually buy so we don't have to move schools several times but I guess we wait and see.
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Apparently, the Plano ISD is one of the better schooling districts in the country. Convenient if you're looking to live / work in the DFW area.
 
connectedspace said:
Interesting to see a lot of folks here (and in the 2015 thread) shooting for the Lone Star State. I was expecting more prospective New Yorkers or Angelinos...
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For me, a work transfer means CA, TX or NY. CA is studiply expensive, NY is do-able for us, whereas TX would grant us quite a comfortable life (theoretically). A work transfer is very desirable for me, as I'd prefer to have a job to go to, as opposed to having to spend the first month or so looking for work.

Now I just have to win DV-2017.
 
MattWatt said:
For me, a work transfer means CA, TX or NY. CA is studiply expensive, NY is do-able for us, whereas TX would grant us quite a comfortable life (theoretically). A work transfer is very desirable for me, as I'd prefer to have a job to go to, as opposed to having to spend the first month or so looking for work.

Now I just have to win DV-2017.
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I will have a look at Plano. Thanks MattWatt !
Yes would be easier if you are able to transfer within your current organisation a lot easier!
 
eskimokisses said:
I will have a look at Plano. Thanks MattWatt !
Yes would be easier if you are able to transfer within your current organisation a lot easier!
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Hey, If I had won this lottery 2016, my ideal place would have been north of Houston (Spring) or east Houston (Kingwood, Humble). very nice, low crime rate and house prices are fab.
 
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