HI. I am an American citizen living LEGALLY in Canada. I can legally stay here with my kids and common law wife as long as I go to the border every 6 months and get stamped. My question is this, I am finally getting ready to start my immigration procedures and I was looking for a general time line as for how long it takes to get to get approved for either Perm. Residency or an open work permit. I NEED to get to work, and I don't know how, or really want to work illegally. The immigration website is really unreliable on updates. I have heard as little as 3 months to as many as 12 months for the entire process. Does anyone here know of how long it takes?

Your best bet is to have your wife sponsor you for permanent residence, filing for a work permit on your own usually won't work and has many restrictions. Time depends where you live (In Quebec it's longer). It also depends how you file, there is an application to file inside Canada or outsde Canada. If you file while your in Canada then your already with your spouse so they don't consider it as urgent as someone waiting to come into the country.

Filing while inside Canada can be up to a year, if you file from outside it's around 3 to 6 months. But, here's the odd part, you can fill out the "outside Canada" application and mail it from within the country and they don't care.

Wow. Thanks for the quick response. So usually around 3-6 months eh? Well I guess I could go to Detroit to work and live in Windsor. Then it's off to Edmonton when I get perm. Residency. Again. Thank you for your response.