Can you attract EB-5 investors outside of a Targeted Employment Area?

If your project does not qualify for $500k treatment then the minimum investment must be 1 million.

You should ensure your opportunity is outside TEA first. I have previously commented on how to determine if an opportunity is within TEA on this website. If the opportunity is not within TEA, the required minimum investment is $1 million. Overall, it depends on the viability of your project, rate of return, exit strategy and similar factors which may be attractive to potential EB-5 investors even if the required minimum investment is not $500,000. Some well-established regional centers have implemented projects with the minimum of $1 million in investment funds. Feel free to contact our office should you have further questions.

Many of the EB5 investments are within the TEA. It is sometimes difficult to attract $1 Mil investors.

If the project is outside of a TEA and you want to use the EB-5 program, each investor will have to invest $1 million dollars. If you have any other questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.

It will be difficult to attract investors for your project because the market (mostly in China) is geared toward $500K investments. There is no immigration law or regulation that would prevent what you suggest, but it is a function of marketing to the right potential investors.

From a market perspective, you are correct that it is unlikely that you will be able to attract one million dollar investors unless you are a brand name or are known internationally.

If you require 1M, then nobody will be interested in your project for immigration purpose.

The investment minimum is $1.0 Million US if the job opportunity lies outside of a TEA. Feasibility of securing foreign investors probably depends more on the viability of the project than the amount of the investment.

EB-5 investment eligibility is quite clear: you must invest $ 1 million or more unless the project or business is located within the TEA. This is true also for the Regional Center Pilot program. If a project of RC is not located within a TEA, their investor also must invest $ 1 million, not $500K.

The EB5 investors may come from any jurisdiction. They do not have to necessarily being from the Target Employment Area.

We are doing 4 projects right now for Chinese clients that are investing $1 million each. The Chinese investment advisors that brought this investors to us seem to have a lot of clients that can invest $1 million each. Contact me directly for more info.

There is no reason why investors cannot be attracted at the $1 million level outside a TEA. However, since most Regional Center projects are located in TEA?s it may be difficult to find investors willing to invest at that level. The success of such a project will no doubt depend on a number of factors such as the efficacy of the business plan, anticipated rate of return, exit strategy and whether this is a ?real business? or a low quality investment such as often offered under the EB-5 program. How such a project is marketed (and where) will no doubt be an important contributor to the success or failure to attract investors.

It''s challenging. But, how do you know it''s not a TEA? Many times it can be a TEA.

No, it is difficult to do.

It is certainly possible to attract investors willing to invest $1 million in non-TEA projects, but it is relatively difficult to do so since there are so many other competing TEA projects out there competing for EB-5 investors. I would focus on how to distinguish your project from the perspective of potential profit or pursue investors which have a vested interest or connection of some kind already in your type of project.

You may want to seek expert opinion as to how you may analyze and calculate the geographical area of business activity as a TEA. Definitely more difficult to find USD $1,000,000.00 than $500,000.00.

Yes, if outside it''s a $1million investment. Very hard to find $1million investors.

It is doubtful that an investor would spend $1 million for your project when there are numerous $500,000 investments available, but you never know. Since workers from TEA areas commute into non-TEA areas for work, it is possible that you might be able to make a claim that TEA census tracts that are contiguous to your Project should be included in your TEA analysis. This could raise the unemployment figures associated with your Project enough for you to qualify for a TEA. You should reach out to an EB-5 Service Provider on this list for assistance or a referral.

EB-5 programs which allow for $500 thousand investments require investment be made in a commercial project located in a TEA.

No. Very difficult competing for investors.

It is possible, but you have two concerns: 1) You have to convince the investor that they should invest $1M for a green card when they could get the same green card for $500k. This is difficult, but not impossible. Some investors have fallen in love with a project and don''t mind committing more to it. 2) You need to show that the investment creates the job. If only a portion of the investment creates the jobs and the rest of it does not, that might create approval issues from USCIS. Note, there *may* be ways to structure around this TEA issue.

It depends how and who you market to.