I've been getting conflicting reports on exactly what is required in the process of immigration to the UK via spousal visa, so I just figured I'd lay out the situation and hopefully someone can help.

I've recently married my wife, who I have known and been close friends with for about 7 years. There are tons of letters and emails, etc. that can show that. She's been over here in the states on a J-1 Summer Work Travel visa for about 4 months now, and is leaving in a week. I have very little family over here, whereas she has a very large family in the UK and so we decided that we would rather have a life over there than over here.

We are both currently university students, and therefore have very little income. Enough to live on, but not a lot. I had been told 1), that most spousal visa applications process in about three months, and 2), that there have been recent changes to spousal visa applications and the spousal visa status that lift many of the regulations on the visa holder working while in the UK. But just here now I've heard that the UK resident spouse needs to have over ₤18,000 annual income, unless the immigrating spouse is coming from a country within the EU, which I am not (I'm a United States citizen). And yet I hear conflicting reports on that as well.

My concern is that we're missing something major here and our life together will end up being drastically delayed. Any light shed on the matter would be great!