Marriage

Professor Xavier

My Brazilian girlfriend's visa has expired and she is now illegally residing in Ireland. We've decided to get married in order to curtail this problem but we're unsure where our first port of call should be and what problems we're likely to encounter? We've been dating four months. Can anyone point us in the right direction?

schemingbohemia

Four months and getting married? Do you own any property? I'd be very careful of going down this route which may not even give her a right to remain.

Professor Xavier

Hi, no I don't. I'm just a student with limited finances.

Slyderx1

would you still marry her or would she marry you if she still faced being deported despite being married? Would you relocate to Brazil?

Professor Xavier

Personally, I see no value in the concept of marriage only as a means of helping my partner stay in Ireland. On the positive side, becoming a Brazilian national is an attractive proposition.

godtabh

4 months is a crazy length to be in a relationship to be getting married. Immigration is also likely to see it that way. Plenty of posts on here about this sort of thing

CIARAN_BOYLE

Professor Xavier wrote: »

Hi, no I don't. I'm just a student with limited finances.

even if you divorce with no assets you can be pursued for maintenance years later.

seb65

Professor Xavier wrote: »

My Brazilian girlfriend's visa has expired and she is now illegally residing in Ireland. We've decided to get married in order to curtail this problem but we're unsure where our first port of call should be and what problems we're likely to encounter? We've been dating four months. Can anyone point us in the right direction?

Potential Problems:

You'll have to wait three months for your marriage license.

At anytime, your girlfriend can be deported. I stand to be corrected, but I thought I read the courts upheld a decision by immigration to arrest and deport someone on his/her walk up the alter.

Your girlfriends now illegal status will complicate any attempts for her to become legally resident in the state, including, from the marriage and civil partnerships website (concerning obtaining a marriage license to wed in Ireland):

"Applications from persons where it is deemed that they are seeking such permission to simply gain entry to the State or where they seek such permission simply to continue their length of stay in the State for whatever reason, such applications will be refused and the appropriate and necessary action taken to remove the individual from the State. Any misinformation given during the application process will result in the application being refused immediately."

Chances are any marriage license application will simply notify immigration of her illegal status.

Lingua Franca

My brother lives in England and (legitimately and for love) married a woman from Argentina last July. It took 6 months for them just to get a fiances visa for her to allow them to marry, and a further 8 months after the wedding of applying to the Home Office, paying fees, and attending interviews for her to get a spouses visa to allow her to live and work in the UK. Both of their passports were in the possession of the Home Office for that 8 months. I can't imagine it's going to be any easier or cheaper in Ireland.

Getting married is no guarantee of curtailing your problem and will most likely bring a whole new raft of problems to your doorstep.

BabysCoffee

A marriage cert is not proof of a de facto relationship.

A de facto relationship is needed to gain a visa.

WayneMolloy

Professor Xavier wrote: »

Personally, I see no value in the concept of marriage only as a means of helping my partner stay in Ireland. On the positive side, becoming a Brazilian national is an attractive proposition.

You wont get brazilian citizenship unless you lived there for numerous years.

Did she tell you that you would?

Do you hold an EU passport, other than an Irish one?

Mad and all as it sounds, its easier for the spouse of an EU citizen to live and work in Ireland, than for spouses of Irish citizens (as EU rules dont apply for them).

WayneMolloy

BabysCoffee wrote: »

A marriage cert is not proof of a de facto relationship.

A de facto relationship is needed to gain a visa.

You generally need to be in a relationship for two years to qualify.

BabysCoffee

WayneMolloy wrote: »

You generally need to be in a relationship for two years to qualify.

My point is that marriage cert is not an automatic proof of a relationship for gaining a visa (particularly getting married after knowing each other for a few months).

Why rush to get married (and risk 1. Not getting a visa based on the hasty marriage and 2. Possibly face a costly divorce further down the line). Stay together and prove the relationship and apply for de facto in 2 yrs