a question about address history in form IMM5444

I would put down the same address that you gave anyone else as your residential address. If you had a drivers' license, that address (so long as it was really your address).

There is no need to fudge around with this. You have to list your attendance at school. (Item 20) You have to list the places you were staying while in the U.S. going to school. (Item 21) (Thus you cannot avoid the work of enumerating "all [your] address in the U.S. when [you] studied there" anyway.) Whether the addresses you list in items 19 and 21 are the same or not depends on where your "residence" was while you were at school. (I experienced both: I went to school for a few years but maintained my residence in the home of my parents; later I went to school and my residence was where I stayed each respective year, and yeah it changed from year to year as I moved around.)

Key is to be honest. Other key is that your time in Canada add up to 730 days. Sounds like you might be cutting it close. I strongly suggest staying honest and if you do not meet the 730 day threshold, wait, stay in Canada and wait to apply for the renewal of the PR card until you have indeed met the 730 days in Canada threshold.

There really is no need to overthink this. Just give what you used as your "address" for item 19, and be sure to enumerate the "long list" of places you stayed while abroad for item 21.

Longer version: Item 21 requires you to identify "your location during your absence" and it basically provides for a month to month accounting for this, so you have to list all your addresses (your "location") for all the time you were abroad anyway, simple as that, and if it is a long list, it is a long list (I had to account for four decades of addresses in my PR application, so I have an idea of how arduous the task of reconstructing addresses can be and how long the list can be).

So, again, you have to provide that information, that "long list" as you say, regardless of what you decide to provide for item 19.

For item 19, just be honest as to what you considered to be your "residence," that is, your residential address. As I say, it does not matter much one way or the other, so long as you give the address which you used as your residential address, whether that was for credit cards or drivers licenses, or bank accounts, or school records, or whatever, just the address that you gave other people, businesses, government entities, and so on, when you were asked for "your address."

Once a person establishes their residence at a certain place (as indicated by intention plus the factual circumstances, where the person lays their head at night being a big one), it is fairly easy, for most government purposes, to maintain their residence at that place even though they go away to other places and lay their head elsewhere on many or even most occasions, so long as they continue to intend that that original home remain their home address and so long as they continue to maintain sufficient ties to that address to show an in-fact maintaining of it as their residence. So a person's "intent" weighs a great deal in this, remembering, though, that intent is not just a matter of what a person says when asked, but may be a matter of what their actions and words at other times indicate ... as in if you tell people your address is at XYZ it will not work to later say you intended to maintain your address at JKL.

(On various occasions in my life I have maintained a home address, my "residence," at a particular location even though I was most often elsewhere; the entire time I was in the military, for example, being sent here and there and overseas and this place and that, I maintained my home address in one place . . . when it came time to apply for PR, I listed my home address and then added a supplemental page explaining and enumerating the various places I stayed or boarded or, later in my life, addresses that were secondary residences I used for extended periods of time ... but you do not need a supplemental page since item 21 specifically requires you to list all the places you stayed while abroad whether they were your residential address or not.)

Anyway, if, for example, the school you attended showed your "address" to be your home in Canada, that is a fairly strong indication you were maintaining your address at your Canadian home even though you were abroad. If, however, you gave the address of the place you were staying while attending school when you were asked for your address, that in contrast is a strong indicator that you were "residing" at those respective addresses while at school.

There really is no need to overthink this. What will matter is that you can identify the dates you were in Canada and that they add up to 730 days or more. If not, stay in Canada until they do (or not ... I mean it is up to you whether you really are making Canada your home or not, just that if not you cannot expect to maintain PR status).

To what extent you would be put to the proof, I do not know. I think it depends on the totality of your history and circumstances. If you accurately and precisely disclose the dates you were outside Canada, and still meet the 730 day threshold, it is my impression that it will go OK. Where PRs usually run into trouble regarding the residency obligation is when they are outside Canada without a currently valid PR card and thus must apply for a Travel Document to return to Canada, otherwise it is while attempting to enter Canada when it is apparent that the PR either has been absent for more than (or perhaps close to) 1095 days, or there is some other circumstance alerting the CBSA officer that a residency breach is likely. Some PRs with residency obligation issues have reported delays in the processing of their application for a renewed card, but as the cautionary tale I posted about in another thread illustrates, it is apparently not uncommon for a PR to obtain a renewed card even though in fact they have been in breach of the residency obligation.

Hi dpenabill,
I might be overthingking this too, but I am also a bit confused what to write in my situation in 19 and 21.

I have lived only at two different palces over the 5 year periode. One location was in Germany, where I own a house and have a residence for me and the other location is in Canada, where I own another house and have a residence too. I traveled back an forth between the two residences.

I would call both places my residence for the whole time, but I am not sure, if this is correct.

I need a separate sheet for the 21 anyway, so I will also add a comment to 19 explaining the situation.

It is just a bit confusing, because I kind of have two residences and there were times when I was just on vacation in Germany and I would still call my Canadian residence as my residence for that time, when otherwise I was in Germany for work purpose and for longer time, when I would call my German address my residence. And there were moments, when I was more on vacation in Canada and still call my German address my residence.

As I stated, I might be overthinking this, but I think I will list all the addresses on the additional page, and keep the residences in 19 and the times outside Canada in 21 syncronized, leaving no doubts, where I "resided" for the past 5 years.


Edited by jogruni - 14 Aug 2011 at 5:56pm

I added a separate sheet and created a long list of addresses. But for the last two years I consider my Canadian address as my residence and the last trips to Germay were just "vacations".


Edited by jogruni - 16 Aug 2011 at 1:12am