What are the requirements for funds used to pay EB-5 fees?

Currently, there is no requirement to prove lawful source of funds for administrative fees/syndication fees or other fees above the $500,000 or $1 million minimum investment amount. In many cases, however, it is wise to document the lawful source of those as well, just out of an abundance of caution and to avoid a request for additional evidence. There are proposals to change the EB-5 requirements to require evidence of the lawful source of such fees. The same source of funds rules and strategies used for investment capital would apply to these funds.

Under current law, it is not required to prove lawful source of funds for syndication fees paid to a regional center project. However, a best practice is to be able to demonstrate it if you are paying by a lump sum wire transfer together with the investment amount. A loan should be fine if it is accompanied by proper loan documentation and secured by a collateral owned by an EB-5 investor. You are not required to demonstrate lawful source of funds for legal fees or other expenses.

You can use a loan so long as the loan is not secured by the project itself.

Normally, you would not have to show the lawful source and path of the administrative fee (AKA, the subscription fee, syndication fee, etc.). But in the present form of a proposed law before the U.S. Congress, proving the source for the admin fee may become required. It would be advisable to take steps to proving it - or being able to if asked. Also, you mention that you might use a bank loan to pay for the admin and legal fees. You can use a bank loan, but you will want to make sure that the bank has properly secured assets that you own. Also proposed by the bill in the Congress is the requirement that you own 100% of the collateral used for any bank loans (with the exception that if your spouse is listed in the account, then you can still use the bank loan). Your immigration counsel should look at your case conservatively, even if some of the items in the proposed law are not law, yet.

There has been some confusion in the past as to showing the source of funds for the "administrative fees." The best policy is to show the source of funds for all monies used. If the bank loan is personal there should be no problem.

There is no requirement to trace the source of fees paid to the regional center or an attorney.

The legal source of funds will have to be proven and tracked for the $500,000 EB-5 investment as well as the $50,000+ administration fee or syndication fee of the regional center. You do not have to prove the legal source of funds for paying the attorney fees or USCIS filing fee.

According to the proposed change of the EB-5 law, in the future, money paid to the regional center, such as the full investment amount of $500,000 and the administration fee, may be required to prove their legal source of funds. However, it is not necessary to prove the legal fee originated from a legal source, assuming the legal fee is not included as part of the administration fee charged by the regional center.

USCIS generally does not concern itself with the professional fees (like your immigration attorney), but they may inquire into the source of the funds used to pay a regional center administration fee (sometimes called a cost allocation fee). The standard should not be as high as your actual EB-5 investment.

The fee assessed by the EB-5 project (usually between $45,000 - $55,000) must also be traced to a lawful source. The source of the fees you pay your immigration lawyer for compiling and submitting your I-526 petition do not have to be documented. So, if you are using a bank loan, I recommend that you take out a loan for at least $550,000 to cover the investment and the regional center/project fees. If the development project is not in a TEA, you will need $1 million + the project/administration fee.