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Just to give you an idea, I spent $13,000 so far in trips, wedding and immigration related expenses and she is not even here yet.
I refused to deal with agencies and payed no fees of any kind for correspondence or for addresses. I paid one time to place my own ad. So that figure is NOT including any "searching for her" items.
If your wallet is thin beware and take it slow and carefully planned.
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I am in no way wealthy, but I feel that I will manage quite well in this endeavor.
I definately went overboard on my first relationship and spent way more than I should have done, one way or another...
But now I feel closer to my final goal (a lot closer) and I am sure that things will work out without ruinging me!
Plus, I have learned to control myself a bit better (long distance on my mobile for example...)...It all helps.
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I jumped on another member about asking the other members to "fess up" and tell him how much the process of meeting a FSU woman costs. I see it is a valid question. My question is, does one have to be somewhat wealthy to be able to afford the complete process? I see that many FSU women are not wealthy and rely on AM to help and support them all the way to the US. Since many of you are professional people (lawyers, veterinarians, accountants, doctors etc) does it really help to be fairly well off financially? What I am trying to say: Have any men with average incomes been able to affort the process? I can tell you this much my salary is nowhere close to that of a lawyer or accountant. My trips to FSU cost about $2,000 but at present it does not include supporting a Russian bride. Thank you.
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I am not supporting anyone and I don't travel as far. For my two penn'orth, if you are dating at the moment in the US, then you spend money, but drip by drip. If you go on holidays that require a passport, or go out of state, or two resort destinations, then you are paying for leisure travel.
If you give up dating in the US and instead of going to the DR, or Florida you go to Russia etc, then I reckon the costs are not so hugely different.
Next thing is, do you want to give those things up whilst you search for a wife in a foreign country? (transferring the dating and holiday money to Russia)
If you don't want to give those things up, then you will need plenty of disposable income. If you don't mind giving them up, just stay in a little, buy a few groceries and don't eat out so much and you'll be fine.
If you currently do not do those things anyway, for whatever reason and you think you need to ask the question, then I suggest two things:
1) You can't afford it.
2) You should be dating American women before going to Russia, if only to get your hand in.
I pay for my time in the FSU by doing less here. I guess many guys do the same in one way or another.
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the operative words being, "disposible income".
You don't have to be wealthy to do this, but if you arn't it will take some disicipline with your budget to get to the finish line. As far as the annual income requirements are concerned you will have to make 125% above the national poverty level, which isn't a huge amount, IIRC. For a family of two that amounts to about $15,000. If you don't earn at least that much, don't bother with writing the 1st letter, the U.S. State Department will not approve a visa application to anyone if their sponser doesn't make the minimums. And they do check for sufficient income by asking for income tax returns at the time of the interview.
You can check it out yourself at:
http://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty/03poverty.htm
If you are considering a woman with kids you will have to earn more, but it's still 125% of the numbers listed there, just scroll down to the number of family members (including yourself) you will wind up with and use that number.
The killer for you may be the actual cost of the courtship, round trips to visit with her @ about $2,000 a pop, paying for visa filing fees, her medical exam, visa cost, airfares, additional BCIS paperwork once she gets here, etc., I will tell you this much, it gets expensive, so go into it with your eyes wide open, don't let yourself get snookered by a pretty face. Two or more years of this and you will find you have spent the better part of the price of a nice new car and she won't even be here yet.
IMHO, the worst possible thing you could do is go into debt doing this, imagine the strain it would put on a new relationship to bring a girl over to an already shaky financial situation and also be burdened with a truck load of debt to boot. That would be a formula for disaster.
However, if you make in the neighborhood of,,,, say, $25,000+ per annum, don't have a sh!thouse load of debt already, you should be able to pull it off if you watch your expenses as Andrew pointed out.
Good luck to you.
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