I go to UC Berkeley and my friend’s financial aid was decreased and now she will be dropping out unless she can get in state tuition. I’m willing to marry her (it would actually be pretty funny) so she can have in state residence, but I’m wary of long term implications. Does anyone know how easy it is to divorce, and how long you have to be married for her to keep the in state tuition? What should we know and what precautions should we take?
This sounds like an absolutely horrible idea regardless of the perspective from which one chooses to view it. My advice would be to not even consider anything like this, regardless of ‘funny’ you might find it.
I don’t think there is any guarantee that she would be reclassified, since she started OOS.
This seems like a bad idea, and unlikely to work. It’s also kind of sad that one would think marrying someone is funny. Marriage is a serious commitment and divorce causes serious emotional and financial pain. It should never be entered lightly.
A bad idea for an infinite number of reasons, not the least of which is that you want to transfer to Duke (other thread). This would defeat the whole purpose, obviously.
It’s not your job to solve this problem. How did you get in a place where you would consider doing something very serious for (what sounds like) a “friend”? Marriage for financial advantage goes WAY above and beyond being a good “friend.”
Not to mention, this might not work - in which case you have entered a binding legal agreement (at the very least) for what, exactly?
Read the fine print: many unis when you start OOS you stay OOS.
Also California has strange divorce laws…you want to make sure you would not be liable for alimony or such. And you can’t later say to a lawyer/judge “i only married her so she could get instate tuition” because that would be fraud.
This would be a same sex marriage…right? What you are suggesting is tantamount to marriage fraud.
Who knew this was a thing? Getting married makes you legally independent from your parents, which is one of the requirements for in-state status.
Just.don’t.do.it.
Actually, while marrying someone for immigration purposes is illegal, marrying someone so they can get a tuition decrease is not. It’s not true that students who start OOS stay out of state at all - for example, one of my friends’ parents moved to CA so she got in state tuition. Yes, it would be same sex marriage, which is legal and we both happen to be queer anyway. My parents agree that legal documents don’t make a marriage real, and anyway, what’s the bigger crime - marriage for tuition or a smart student dropping out because of financial aid? I really don’t care for the moral judgments here, I’m asking what legal avenues I should pursue.
LOL, @StarsAndBoxes did you really think that parents on CC would back you up on your idea.
Because my husband is foreign and knows many people from his country locally, I have seen similar scenarios play out with college students over the years. For these students, most were looking for ways to stay in the country after graduation. In some cases marriage fraud did take place. As a note, I had nothing to do with any of these things, I just knew of them.
In two cases, where students married other students after graduation, in order to stay there were problems. For both students, after marrying an American and paying money (fraud), they both met people that they actually wanted to marry. Of course, this caused problems because they were already married. You might be thinking to yourself, well I am single and happy, this will never happen to me. Well that is what both of these folks thought. Suddenly they had to get divorced which was not a simple process. They had to pay money to a lawyer (I don’t know how much) and file paperwork, etc. In one case the situation was drawn out. In both cases it required money that nobody had. It is a lot easier to get married, than it is to get divorced. (And all this was in CA.)
In one of the cases above, the student paid for someone to marry him and that person ended up having feelings for him, causing more problems. They lived together. It was messy.
In the end both students went back to their home countries to marry their current spouses - just to give you the ending to the story.
To reiterate. I had nothing to do with the above situations. I only knew of them.
In a third situation I knew a person who married someone to stay in the country, and the person they married believed they were marrying for love. I knew this to be the case when the person who wanted to stay asked my honest opinion about whether this was a good idea. I told him this was a stupid idea and wrong. He did it anyway, and is now divorced with two small children. Idiot.
There are other cases. You are not the first person to consider married as a means to an end. But do go in with your eyes open, aware that your choices have consequences. And be very aware that divorce cost money.
And yes, I know this is married for immigration not tuition but it is similar in potential problems.
If you want legal advice, go talk to a lawyer, not random people on the internet.
According to this (http://www.ucop.edu/general-counsel/_files/ed-affairs/uc-residence-policy.pdf) on page 25/26, one spouse does not derive residency status from another. The same is stated on UC Berkeley’s website (http://registrar.berkeley.edu/Residency/legalinfo.html).
So I would imagine your friend would still need to meet all UC’s California residency requirements if she wants in-state tuition, regardless of whether you are married to her or not. As described here (http://ucop.edu/residency/establishing-residency.html), your friend would need to be continuously present in California for 366 days and demonstrate intent to make California her home permanently, which has a variety of requirements. Marriage might help with establishing financial independence for her if she is under the age of 24. However, this only works if she was not claimed as a dependent by anyone in the prior tax year:
there’s nothing funny about getting married. The implications go well beyond cheap tuition.
Even if you were to marry, your income would be attached and possibly decrease your financial aid.
The UC’s are very stringent about OOS, such that marrying would have legal implications for fraud. She would still pay OOS fees.
If you ain’t no punk, holla “we want prenup!”
“we want prenup!”
That’s kind of prostitution and a horrible idea. This girl obviously is not well off, it’s not a good idea to tie yourself to her financially and legally.
You might have problem getting security clearance if you work for defense industry. They ask for everything. I wouldn’t take these things likely.
Everyone who knows you would know it’s fake.
Everyone who knows you would always know you committed fraud.
Everyone who knows you might include enemies who would one day want to hurt you.
Get the picture?