Start with the EB-5 eligibility and application overview
Read repayment and risk terms carefully
Identify the actual investment agreement, business conditions and applicable sustainment requirements for the case. Do not assume a universal guaranteed two-year return or that every pending case has identical requirements. Capital must meet the relevant at-risk rules. Read the subscription or other governing agreement with the business plan, financing documents, and any side letter that affects redemption, collateral, or repayment. The relevant question is not whether an exit date looks plausible, but whether capital remains exposed to commercial gain or loss throughout the period required for the individual case. Hypothetical example: a Sooke archival-scanning business owner considers a direct investment in a U.S. records-conversion company whose presentation forecasts a sale to a national contractor in year four. Before deciding to proceed, the owner must compare the forecast with the signed redemption language, project budget, and hiring plan; a slide about a buyer is not a substitute for terms that describe risk or for evidence of the required jobs.
Retain the complete eligibility framework
Capital generally is US$1.05 million or US$800,000 for qualifying TEA or infrastructure cases, with statutory adjustment starting January 1, 2027. Lawful source/path, ten qualifying full-time jobs per investor and management or policy-formulation participation remain necessary. Petition approval does not confer residence. I-829 generally is filed in the 90 days before the second conditional-residence anniversary; filing alone does not remove conditions or assure repayment. A spouse and unmarried children under 21 may qualify as derivatives. Verify the current filing-date capital threshold before any money moves. EB-5 capital must be placed at risk in a qualifying investment, with the applicable amount, lawful source and path, required job creation, and participation evidence established for the filing. Each investor generally needs ten qualifying full-time U.S. jobs. Approval of the immigrant petition is not residence: the route ordinarily leads first to conditional permanent resident status, and the investor later seeks removal of conditions when the statutory requirements are met. A sound review identifies the record that supports every job, distinguishes existing payroll from projected positions, and decides whether the schedule can credibly support the investor’s own case before a commitment is made.
Decide between a regional-center project and a direct investment
Investing through a designated regional center allows jobs to be counted using an economic methodology that includes indirect and induced employment, whereas a standalone investment counts only direct employees of the enterprise. In a project structure the investor is typically a limited partner or equivalent, relying on the project's own reporting and its economic methodology to establish the jobs. Outside a regional centre, only employees of the new commercial enterprise count, and each must be a qualifying U.S. worker in a full-time position of at least thirty-five hours a week, or a job-sharing arrangement that adds up to one. The statutory investment is one million and fifty thousand dollars, reduced to eight hundred thousand where the investment is in a targeted employment area or an infrastructure project under the 2022 reform legislation. The investor must be engaged in the enterprise through day-to-day managerial control or policy formulation, which in a direct investment means genuine involvement rather than a passive interest. The denominator is the number of investors, which is not fixed either: a partially subscribed offering may fund a partially built project, and an expanded one needs a correspondingly larger total. A regional-center designation or marketing estimate does not guarantee job compliance or financial performance. An enterprise-only discretionary buyback option has a statutory exception: exercising it requires petition withdrawal unless applicable sustainment and other requirements have been fulfilled.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-07. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.