IN THIS GUIDE · Separate an investor’s qualifying case from a portfolio of opportunities
Start with the EB-5 eligibility and application overview
Use the applicable amount for the actual investment
As of September 2026, the ordinary threshold is US$1,050,000 or US$800,000 for a qualifying targeted employment area or infrastructure case. Statutory adjustments begin January 1, 2027 under filing-date rules. Show the individual investor’s lawful source and path and capital committed at risk. Gifts and loans must be in good faith and not circumvent the requirements.
Compare actual capital rights rather than marketing protection
Contractual repayment rights and guaranteed rates of return are excluded from qualifying capital. A statutory exception concerns an enterprise-only discretionary buyback; exercise requires petition withdrawal unless applicable sustainment and other requirements have been fulfilled. An advertised exit or risk comparison does not guarantee liquidity or immigration approval.
Identify the applicable jobs and participation framework
The investment must support at least ten qualifying permanent full-time jobs per investor under the applicable standalone or regional-centre framework. For direct employment, full time generally is at least 35 hours weekly; contractors, nonimmigrants, the investor, spouse and sons or daughters are excluded. Management or policy participation is required, and qualifying limited-partner rights may satisfy it without daily operating work. Do not borrow another project’s job explanation or governance rights.
Keep the person’s residence sequence distinct from project comparisons
Conditional residence starts with immigrant admission or adjustment approval. The ordinary I-829 filing window is the 90 days before its second anniversary; filing alone neither removes conditions nor triggers repayment. Eligible accompanying derivatives do not need another principal investment merely to join. Their eligibility, any CSPA protection and visa availability need actual individual analysis, not a project’s forecast.
Confirm the current capital threshold and the area designation
A limited-partner interest with voting rights on policy matters is a recognized form of engagement in a regional-center structure; read the partnership agreement to confirm those rights exist. The investor must engage through managerial control or policy formulation; genuine qualifying participation rights can matter without requiring every investor to manage day-to-day operations. Choosing a targeted employment area, whether a high-unemployment area or a rural area under the current definitions, lowers the capital threshold, and the designation must be established with the evidence the regulations require at the time of filing, not assumed from the town's character. Ask which method the project uses, how many jobs it allocates to each investor, and how many investors it plans to admit. The conditions are removed by filing Form I-829 with evidence that the capital remained invested and that the jobs were created or will be created within a reasonable time. A well-attended local information session does not verify a project's job-creation methodology or an investor's lawful source of funds; those still require independent documentation. In a regional-center investment, certain indirect and induced jobs may count under an economic methodology, which changes the evidence but does not remove the requirement. Read the offering documents for deployment, job allocation, redeployment, conflicts, and exit terms; a regional-center designation does not eliminate project-specific risk.
Investment amount, targeted employment area and job creation
Each investor must create at least ten full-time positions for qualifying United States workers, and the word full-time carries its own definition of a minimum weekly hours commitment rather than any combination of part-time work. 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. Ask the target business for a position-by-position list showing weekly hours, status category where relevant, and start dates, and separate the existing workforce from the positions the investment will create.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-08. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.