Moving to Canada diary

Applying for PR to Canada can be done with a choice of two applications, depending on the applicant's situation. In my case, I will need to submit a simplified application. This is a simple form of just a few pages, and no supporting evidence is needed at the application stage. Some time later (I'm led to believe one-two years after application), I will be asked to provide supporting evidence.

Although it will be ages before I will need to provide any supporting evidence, I thought it worth looking into just in case there's things I need to get hold of in the meantime. I'm glad I checked as there's a big list of stuff that Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) will need to see: from school exam certificates to expired passports. Most worryingly for me is they will need a list of addresses lived in, with dates, from the age of 18. I moved around a lot in my early twenties - in various rented flats - and I really can't remember dates, or even addresses, of them all. I'm glad I found this out now so that I can start working on a list.

So husband and I have decided to make a move from the UK to Canada. Our first step - before we do anything else - is to sell our house in the UK. We're currently decorating like mad, trying to get it in a suitable condition to sell. The housing market in the UK is rubbish at the moment so we're pretty realistic that the house will take a while to shift. Our plan is to get it on the market around October time and once it's sold we're going to rent somewhere instead. That way, once we get our permanent residency (PR) or a job offer we have no ties here and will be pretty much ready to go.

Here's the plan: Sell the house. Once the house is sold we're then going to put in our application for PR. The PR applications are taking five-plus years at the moment. This kind of suits us as it gives us time to make several trips to Canada to check out various areas that we want to live in. As husband will be the principle applicant, he's going to start job hunting in a year or so (once he has passed work-related exams), so we may get there sooner than the five-plus years it takes for PR to be approved. If he gets a job offer then he will get a temporary work visa (TWP) and I believe that our PR will be fast-tracked once we're in Canada working on a TWP.