Later-Life Love: A Partner Visa With an Adult Child, Granted Just Before the Child Turned 23

When applying for a partner visa, many people put all their attention on the relationship evidence for the primary applicant and the sponsor. But if the application also includes a child who is approaching 23, the time risk in the case may be even more pressing than proving the relationship itself.

We recently completed a very nerve-racking 309/100 partner visa case. The primary applicant applied together with a 21-year-old child who was a university student. After about 18 and a half months of processing, the 309 visa was finally granted when the secondary applicant was less than two months away from their 23rd birthday, and the 100 permanent residence visa was granted a week later.

The client’s background:

The client and her current spouse had both been married before, and they registered their marriage in China in 2018. The primary applicant has a child with her former husband, who was already 21 when the visa application was lodged and is still a university student.

On 26 February 2025, we helped the client lodge an offshore 309 partner visa application, with the child included in the application as a secondary applicant.

For an ordinary partner visa application, a processing time of around 18 months is long, but it will not necessarily affect eligibility directly. This case was different: the secondary applicant was born in October 2003, so as processing continued they drew ever closer to 23, and the whole case was in fact under very clear age pressure throughout.

The age limit partner migration sets for secondary applicants

Partner migration, whether 820 or 309, can include secondary applicants. The key is to prove that the secondary applicant is a family member of the primary applicant (Member of family unit). This is usually a child, who may be the child of both the sponsor and the applicant, or the applicant’s own child.

Under migration law, only a child who depends on their parents (dependent) counts as a family member, and there are three categories. Category one: under 18. Category two: over 18 and under 23, and not in a de facto relationship or married. Category three: over 23 and reliant on their parents because a physical disability leaves them unable to live independently or to work.

The biggest hurdle in this application: the secondary applicant was edging ever closer to 23

When the application was lodged, the secondary applicant (the child) was just over 21 — still at a stage where they could be included in a parent’s visa application.

But processing of the 309 visa went on for about 18 and a half months. As time passed, the secondary applicant was getting closer and closer to 23, and once their age went beyond the relevant dependent child requirement, the case could face an entirely different kind of risk.

So what made this case truly nerve-racking was not whether the documents had been lodged, but when processing of the visa would be finished.

By the second half of 2026 in particular, the secondary applicant’s 23rd birthday was drawing ever nearer. The 309 visa was finally granted on 1 September 2026, and the secondary applicant would turn 23 in October — in reality, less than two months away.

How we tackled it: making the evidence of study and financial dependence solid

For an accompanying child who is already over 18, you cannot simply assume they will be able to stay in the application as a secondary applicant just because they are the primary applicant’s child.

So from the preparation stage onwards, we paid very close attention to the secondary applicant’s actual circumstances — in particular their ongoing studies and their financial dependence on the primary applicant.

We organised the documents around the secondary applicant’s studies, their means of support and the long-term financial support provided by their parents, so that we could fully explain why this adult child was still a dependent child within the family, rather than an adult who was already fully financially independent.

At the same time, because processing in this case took a long time, we kept a continual watch on the secondary applicant’s age and on the progress of the application, making sure the study and dependence documents remained complete and consistent as the case reached its critical stage.

A week after the 309 grant, the 100 permanent residence visa was granted too

On 1 September 2026, the client’s 309 partner visa was formally granted. At that point, the secondary applicant’s 23rd birthday was less than two months away.

Better still, just 6 days later, on 7 September 2026, the 100 permanent partner visa was granted as well.

This case is another reminder that if a partner visa application needs to include an adult child, the child’s age, study status and financial dependence must be planned for as early as possible.

Families whose children are already 21 or 22, or only a year or two short of 23, are especially advised not to wait until the final stage before starting to think about it. Partner visas can have long processing times in their own right, and once a child’s age nears the threshold, an otherwise ordinary application can turn into a race against time.

In recent years, processing times for the offshore 309 partner visa may be long, but that does not mean offshore applications have stopped being processed. What really matters is still to lodge early based on the family’s actual circumstances, and to have the relationship documents and the adult child’s evidence of study and financial dependence fully prepared in advance.