Jump to content

Applying for a Chinese Green Card


Randy W
 Share

Recommended Posts

Anyone applied recently?

I've been living in China for 15 years. For the next 15 (???) I sort of plan to be back and forth between China and the US of A, since now my husband has (well, almost has ... we'll do his POE stuff in Newark on Thursday!!!!) his American greencard, with husband and the kids situated in the States. I think it would be mighty convenient if we had both green cards for each country, assuming we make sure not to screw up the residency requirements for both. Is it 9 months in country per year for the Chinese one? That's what I've heard, which is pretty strict if so.

I've been on marriage related residence permits for the past 10+ years, since we got married back in 2006. Main stumbling block is lack of property here in China -- I don't want to buy into this crazy housing market but if I have to, I may buy a small little place just to tick off that box.

I know one foreign wife of a Chinese guy who got approved recently. Their case didn't seem extraordinary. In fact, pretty sure they're both of the missionary persuasion, which I woulda thought China might have frowned upon, but nope.

So any updates? Curious if anyone here has any new experience.

Edited by Randy W (see edit history)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The 10 year Q2 visa with 180 day stays may work better for you. A green card must be processed by Beijing, and comes with the residency restrictions (I was thinking 6 months). Check with your PSB.

My wife is happy with the 3 year (locally issued) residence permit, so so am I.

Edited by Randy W (see edit history)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 8 months later...

Jiaying asked again about getting a green card for me - requirements can vary, depending on which path you take (family, investment, employment, or money in bank) but for us it would involve showing the title to our property, ¥100,000 in the bank (I'm unclear as to how long), and US criminal records check for both of us (since she spent some time in the US).

We may follow through on this at some point during the next three years.


link to http://docs.google.com/document/d/1dpSczWo4I5zMXMEeaTPAu9peTgw6Mo8XxIEYSWtgUgk/

Edited by Randy W (see edit history)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/18/2017 at 4:18 PM, thelocaldialect said:

Anyone applied recently?

I've been living in China for 15 years. For the next 15 (???) I sort of plan to be back and forth between China and the US of A, since now my husband has (well, almost has ... we'll do his POE stuff in Newark on Thursday!!!!) his American greencard, with husband and the kids situated in the States. I think it would be mighty convenient if we had both green cards for each country, assuming we make sure not to screw up the residency requirements for both. Is it 9 months in country per year for the Chinese one? That's what I've heard, which is pretty strict if so.

I've been on marriage related residence permits for the past 10+ years, since we got married back in 2006. Main stumbling block is lack of property here in China -- I don't want to buy into this crazy housing market but if I have to, I may buy a small little place just to tick off that box.

I know one foreign wife of a Chinese guy who got approved recently. Their case didn't seem extraordinary. In fact, pretty sure they're both of the missionary persuasion, which I woulda thought China might have frowned upon, but nope.

So any updates? Curious if anyone here has any new experience.

The requirement SEEMS to be NINE months of every year for 5 years PRIOR TO applying for the green card - and THREE months of every year afterward.

Edited by Randy W (see edit history)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 months later...

in the Shanghaiist

1,881 foreigners have received Chinese permanent residence permits in the last two months!

That's as many as all of last year

green-card.jpg

 

Quote
Previously, only hundreds would receive the honor each year.
 
However, over the past couple of years, China has been doing much to revamp its work permit process, looking toattract the right kind of “high-quality” laowaiand keep those individuals working in the country. A newtalent-based systemhas been rolled out which groups foreigners into A, B, and C tiers with “A-level” expats including the likes of Nobel Prize winners, senior research fellows, highly-published scientists, managers of financial institutions, and famous actors and athletes.

 

Edited by Randy W (see edit history)
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...
  • 1 year later...
  • 4 years later...

Well, it sure has been a long time since I've been here on Candle.

Randy, how you doing?
Still down there in Yulin?

Was just bouncing around the different forums and came across this old topic.

I applied for the Chinese Green Card this January, and got it in June. Still can't believe it really worked out, but feels great to have, never have to consider visa issues again.

We used to live in Beijing, but during the pandemic started going back and forth between Beijing and Kunming. That is still the plan we have discussed, but in reality over the past year and a half have just been back to Beijing for 10 days, Kunming is so much more comfortable.

But we had to apply for the Chinese Green Card in Chengdu, as that is where my wife's hukou is.

Anyways, if anybody has any questions about the whole Chinese Green Card process, I'd be happy to help.

Hope all the "old-timers" on here are doing well!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Congratulations! I still haven't done that since it's relatively easy to apply for the residence permit here. There's a topic here somewhere about the green card.

CFL is pretty inactive these days.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Many thanks!

Definitely, I was previously on the residence permit as well, but thought we might as well give the green card a go at it as we met all the requirements. Still can't believe it all worked out, haha, had to grease some wheels along the way......

It seems like CFL is pretty inactive these days. I wonder why......? Are people mainly using that VisaJourney forum these days?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, dan1984 said:

Many thanks!

Definitely, I was previously on the residence permit as well, but thought we might as well give the green card a go at it as we met all the requirements. Still can't believe it all worked out, haha, had to grease some wheels along the way......

It seems like CFL is pretty inactive these days. I wonder why......? Are people mainly using that VisaJourney forum these days?

I've thought about the dropoff... lots of reasons, nothing having to do with CFL itself:

Old-school style forums like CFL have largely been replaced by Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and many other avenues. When CFL was founded in the early 2000s, these types of forums were king and there was one for basically any topic. So you had a massive user base here until about 2008, but by 2012, you started to see more members leaving or going inactive than new members joining, as anyone new to the Chinese dating scene could look elsewhere for faster information. 

There's also been a massive dropoff in Americans going to China. A lot of early threads were started by young guys who went to teach English in China, got married or engaged, and wanted to bring the wife back to the US. I haven't done a ton of research on this, but most statistics I've perused suggested a (roughly) 30% decrease in foreigners living in China between 2011 and 2018, probably higher for Americans. Now add COVID and English school bans to the mix... I would be shocked if there are 1/3 as many Americans in China now as there were in 2011. 

Another issue was the immigration challenges of 2016-2020... much easier to go to Thailand, Philippines, Vietnam... easier immigration process, less scrutiny/hassle. The statistics are available somewhere, but once again, my guess is there are simply fewer American/Chinese marriages, so even less reason to look up CFL.

Still great to have this site around as a "snapshot" of the golden era IMO. And a major thanks to Randy for keeping it chugging along.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...