Part II: EB–5 A -Summary of a Job Creating Enterprise
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The challenge that had confronted many investors trying to meet the job creation requirement spawned the EB-5 regional center pilot program, which has been regularly renewed by Congress since the early-1990’s, when the program began. Regional Centers are organizations essentially licensed by the Federal Government to help fund EB-5 projects and attract EB-5 investment capital. Under the loan model that has been adopted by most regional centers, EB-5 capital is amalgamated and then loaned to a job creating enterprise. The key feature associated with Regional Center based EB-5 projects is that indirect and induced jobs can also count as EB-5 jobs, which can be a huge advantage in the case of EB-5 projects that do not lend themselves, generally, to creating 10 full time direct jobs. Because induced jobs relate to how the job creating enterprise may affect the larger economy of the TEA in which it is located (by inducing the creation of jobs in other enterprises that might provide services to the EB-5 job creating enterprise or the greater community), job creation in the regional center context is often determined by an economist using input-output economic models.
C: The Investment Needs to be Sustained Pending Green Card Approval
Not only must an EB-5 investor commit at least $500,000 to a project and create 10 full time jobs, but that investment and the level of job creation needs to be sustained over the term of the investment, which can be several years. An enterprise that begins with 10 hires but can only sustain 3 full time positions by the time the investor requests the removal of conditions, in the end result, may not qualify the investor for permanent residency under the EB-5 program.
D. The Take Away
Each of the EB-5 requirements described above implicates a host of other issues that we will consider in future articles, but the very basic requirements to qualify for an EB-5 visa is an investment of $500,000 or $1 million, depending on whether the investment is in a TEA, the creation of 10 full times jobs, which may include indirect and induced jobs if the investment is in a project sponsored by a regional center, and the ability to sustain the investment and levels of job creation over several years.
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