I found this community very helpful for navigating US immigration for my non-American wife:
It was also really nice to see almost in real time how long processing was taking, because you could see when people ahead of you got their interviews scheduled and guess how long you had left.
I did the paperwork for my wife to get her a k1 visa. Cost only a few thousand dollars in filing fees an a good amount of time preparing all the documents. It is a little frustrating that you put so much effort into the documents then they are simply looked at a bit and stamped. My wife reported that during her interview the officer looked at the papers we put together for a minute. Said, looks good and stamped them. 5 minutes total, while people before her had much more lengthy discussions.