Congress created the EB-5 in 1990 to bring foreign capital and new jobs into the US economy. You invest in a new commercial enterprise, the enterprise creates at least ten full-time jobs for US workers, and in return you, your spouse and your unmarried children under 21 receive green cards. In 1992 Congress added the regional center program, which lets investors pool their capital in projects run by others. The EB-5 Reform and Integrity Act of 15 March 2022 rewrote much of the program.
Unlike the E-2, the EB-5 does not depend on a treaty with your country, and unlike the L-1 it needs no company abroad to send you. It does need a lot of capital, a clean record of where that capital came from, and patience: roughly 10,000 EB-5 visas are available each year, family members included.
For many European founders the faster way into the US is an L-1 or an E-2, with the green card as a later step. For others, especially families who want permanent residence from the start and do not want their status tied to running one business, the EB-5 is the direct road. Which one you are is the first thing we work out together.
Source: USCIS, About the EB-5 Visa Classification (updated 18 November 2025), amounts for petitions filed on or after 15 March 2022; 8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5). Read 25 October 2026. The amounts adjust for petitions filed on or after 1 January 2027.
The statute does not leave the amounts standing. Beginning on 1 January 2027, and every five years after that, the standard amount adjusts automatically in line with consumer price inflation, for petitions filed on or after the date of each adjustment. The reduced amount then becomes 75 percent of the new standard amount, and the figures are rounded down to the nearest $50,000.
USCIS publishes the adjusted amounts. We do not estimate them. When we look at your plan, we work with the amounts that apply on the day your petition would be filed, and we show you the source and the date.
The lower amount applies to an investment in a targeted employment area, judged at the time of investment, or to an infrastructure project through a regional center.
A targeted employment area is either rural or has high unemployment. A rural area lies outside any metropolitan statistical area and outside the boundary of any city or town with 20,000 or more people at the last decennial census. A high-unemployment area is the census tract, or contiguous tracts, where the business principally operates, with unemployment of at least 150 percent of the national average.
Since 2022 part of the annual visa supply is reserved: 20 percent for investments in rural areas, 10 percent for high-unemployment areas and 2 percent for infrastructure projects. Reserved visas that go unused stay in their category for one more year before they are released to everyone else. An infrastructure project is only open to regional center investors.
The capital must be at risk in a new commercial enterprise, which for petitions filed since 15 March 2022 must be expected to stay invested for at least two years. A new commercial enterprise is a for-profit business established after 29 November 1990, or an older one that was bought and restructured into a new enterprise, or expanded by the investment by at least 40 percent in net worth or staff.
The statute offers two roads to the same green card. They ask very different things of you and carry different risks. In both, you take part in the management of the enterprise, through day-to-day responsibility or policy formulation; as a limited partner, the rights and duties a limited partner normally holds are enough.
USCIS keeps a list of approved regional centers by state and a separate list of centers whose participation it has terminated. A place on the approved list is a starting point, not a recommendation.
Five questions before you take an offer seriously. Has the I-956F project application been filed, or approved? Is the project in a targeted employment area, and on what basis? How many jobs does the economic analysis project per investor, and how large is the cushion above ten? Who administers or audits the investors' money, and will you see the reports? What fees are charged, and who receives them?
Then the timing. The statute protects regional center petitions filed on or before 30 September 2026: if the program lapses, USCIS must keep processing them. A petition filed after that date does not have this express protection, and if the program ends on 30 September 2027 without being renewed, it depends on what Congress decides. Read what the offering documents say happens to your capital in that case.
Decide between your own business and a regional center project, and assemble the record of where every dollar came from, from the earnings, sale or gift to its arrival in the US enterprise. This is the most demanding part of the preparation, and it does not happen in the week before filing.
Form I-526 for a direct investment, Form I-526E for a regional center investment. If a visa is immediately available to you and you are lawfully in the US, you can file the adjustment application, Form I-485, together with the petition, while it is pending or after it is approved.
After approval, you apply abroad for an immigrant visa with the State Department on Form DS-260, or adjust status inside the US on Form I-485. The State Department's monthly Visa Bulletin shows when a visa is available.
When you enter on the immigrant visa, or your adjustment is approved, you and your family become conditional permanent residents for two years. You live and work in the US. Your capital stays at risk in the enterprise for the whole period.
You file within the 90 days immediately before the second anniversary of your conditional residence. You show that the investment was made and sustained and that the job creation requirement is met. The window is fixed, so it goes in the diary on the day your conditional residence begins.
Once USCIS approves the I-829, the conditions are removed from your permanent residence and from that of the family members you included.
Your spouse and your unmarried children under 21 receive their green cards through your petition. They need no investment of their own. Children count only until their 21st birthday, so the date of birth of your eldest belongs in the first planning round. More on moving with your family.
A green card also makes you a US tax resident. Under the green card test you are a resident for US federal tax purposes once you are a lawful permanent resident, and from then the US taxes your worldwide income. Your structure at home is best put in order before you enter on the immigrant visa, not afterwards, together with your adviser in your home country. More on personal tax.
Both involve investing in a US business, and they are fundamentally different. Many founders start on the E-2 and look at a green card later.
For petitions filed since 15 March 2022, $1,050,000, or $800,000 in a targeted employment area or an infrastructure project. For petitions filed on or after 1 January 2027 the amounts adjust for inflation, and USCIS publishes the new figures.
No, and it must not be. Capital with a guaranteed return, or with a contractual right to repayment, does not qualify. It has to be at risk, and it is expected to stay invested for at least two years.
Yes. Your spouse and your unmarried children under 21 receive green cards through your petition, and the conditions are removed for the family members you include in your I-829.
At least ten full-time jobs for qualifying US workers. In a direct investment your own enterprise must employ them. Through a regional center up to 90 percent may be indirect jobs.
USCIS publishes its fees in the fee schedule, Form G-1055, and the EB-5 fees have changed more than once in recent years. We give you the fees that apply on the day, with the source.
That depends on USCIS processing and on visa availability, which the State Department publishes every month in the Visa Bulletin. We give you the times the agencies publish on the day, with the date.
It is authorized through 30 September 2027. The statute obliges USCIS to keep processing regional center petitions filed on or before 30 September 2026 if it lapses. Later petitions lack that express protection. A direct investment does not depend on the program.
Whether the EB-5 is your route at all, and if so which of the two roads, depends on your business, your capital and your family. Many founders reach the US faster on an L-1 or an E-2.
Compare the routes →Your family, your capital and your timing. We will tell you whether the EB-5 fits, or whether another route gets you there sooner.
Mount Bonnell Advisors, Austin
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