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.
The licence document: what a Tyendinaga applicant brings when practice is regulated
Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga veterinarian's file turns on a piece of paper the immigration authorities do not issue. Several listed professions are regulated at state level, and for those the qualification rule and the right to practise involve different documents from different bodies. Knowing which paper proves what, and what to do when one of them is still pending, is most of the preparation for a professional whose work cannot lawfully be performed without a licence. Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga landscape architect has a qualifying degree, but the employer expects stamped site drawings before the relevant board will issue a licence. The decision is whether to defer that part of the position or change the hiring plan. A document folder cannot cure an authority the applicant does not yet hold.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Know which document satisfies which requirement
- Say clearly what is pending and what is held
- Keep the licence current with the classification
Proving citizenship: what a recently naturalized Tyendinaga applicant carries
Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga dairy technician became a Canadian citizen four months ago and has an American job offer, but has not yet applied for a passport. TN classification requires citizenship of Canada or Mexico, and citizenship has to be proved with a document an officer accepts. A permanent resident card, however long held, never does that job, and the gap between becoming a citizen and holding a passport is a practical problem worth solving before travel. Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga permanent resident who is a citizen of a treaty country is offered a U.S. role and assumes the Canadian PR card determines every option. The decision is to separate residence from nationality and from the employer's corporate facts. Each route asks a different question, and one document rarely answers all of them.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- The card proves the wrong thing
- Know what a new citizen has and what to get
- Sequence the documents behind the offer
Not marginal: building projections a Tyendinaga investor can defend
Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga maple and agri-food processor invests in a small American co-packing operation that, in its first year, will support the owner and one employee. The enterprise must not be marginal: it must have the present or future capacity to generate more than a minimal living for the investor and family, ordinarily within about five years. That is a question about evidence and reasoning, and it is answered with a plan whose numbers someone can check. Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga buyer of a U.S. commercial-laundry route must decide whether to pay for vehicles before or after the application. The decision turns on whether the contracts make the funds genuinely vulnerable while providing a coherent exit if the transaction cannot proceed. The paperwork should reflect a real commercial arrangement, not a staged appearance of risk.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Understand what marginality actually asks
- Build projections from facts, not templates
- Support the plan with what already exists
Which classification for a new office: a Tyendinaga company's first American hire
Hypothetical example: a precision-agriculture services company based in Tyendinaga is opening its first American office and can send either the manager who would run it or the specialist who knows its equipment. New-office petitions exist in both the managerial and the specialized-knowledge classifications, and they are not interchangeable. Either route requires a qualifying relationship, continued business by the foreign organization, sufficient premises, and financial capacity to pay the transferee and commence United States operations; initial approval is limited to one year. The choice determines what the first year must prove and what the extension will be measured against, so it deserves to be made deliberately. Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga modular-stage-equipment company leases a U.S. workspace and must decide whether its Canadian general manager will direct the operation or spend the year assembling inventory. That choice shapes both the hiring plan and the petition narrative. A new location needs a credible path to a managerial or specialized-knowledge role within the initial approval period.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- The managerial new-office case
- The specialized-knowledge new-office case
- Choose by what the first year will actually look like
How each route is processed: timing for a Tyendinaga applicant
Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga business owner has to be operating in the United States by a specific season and asks which route gets there sooner. The two are processed by different authorities in different ways: an intracompany transfer is a petition filed with the immigration agency by the employer, while treaty investor status is ordinarily sought through a consular application, or by a change of status filed inside the United States. Their timelines are shaped by different bottlenecks. Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga owner of a commercial-laundry route can either create a U.S. affiliate and move as its executive or invest personally in the American operation. The decision is about ownership, control, and the task to be performed after arrival, not merely processing preference. Build both options on paper and see which one matches the real business plan.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- The petition route and what controls it
- The treaty investor route and what controls it
- Decide by what has to exist first
Choosing a category by what the second adult may do: a Tyendinaga household
Hypothetical example: in a Tyendinaga household, either adult could be the principal applicant. One is a veterinarian who could pursue a professional classification; the other manages operations at a manufacturer with an American affiliate and could be transferred. The categories differ sharply in what they permit the accompanying spouse to do, and for a household that needs two incomes that difference is often the most important fact in the decision. Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga household has one adult offered a transfer, a spouse with a U.S. job prospect, and a child whose twenty-first birthday falls during the expected move. The decision is not simply who becomes principal applicant. It is whether every family member has status and work or study permission for the dates that matter.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- The three dependent positions are not alike
- Run the household arithmetic before choosing
- Weigh the other consequences, not only the income
What comes back and what does not: a Tyendinaga family's money question
Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga family that has sold farm equipment and land has a sum available and wants to know, before anything else, what happens to that money under each route. It is the right first question. An EB-5 investment is capital placed at risk in an enterprise, which can lose value and may in principle be returned; the Gold Card, under its published official framework, involves a gift to the U.S. government that is not an investment and is not returned. Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga owner selling a rail-parts business must decide whether to place proceeds into an EB-5 enterprise or make a Gold Card payment. The first route asks how the capital is invested, put at risk, and linked to jobs; the second concerns an applicant payment to the U.S. government under current official terms. They are not interchangeable uses of money.
WHAT THIS GUIDE COVERS
- Capital at risk means exactly that
- A gift does not come back at all
- Add the fees and the second filing