IN THIS GUIDE · Put the right questions to a regional center before Saint-Augustin-de-Desmaures sale proceeds are wired
Start with the EB-5 eligibility and application overview
Questions about the jobs
How does the project count its ten jobs per investor: direct payroll, or the economic model a regional center may use? What happens to the count if construction is late or the project is scaled down? How many investors is the job total shared among, and in what order are they credited? A project cannot promise that jobs will exist when the removal-of-conditions petition is filed, so ask what evidence it will provide at that stage.
Questions about the reduced amount
On what basis is the site a targeted employment area, who designated it, and on what date? Designation is tied to the location and to current data, and the reduced threshold applies only if the project qualifies at the relevant time. Ask for the designation record rather than the brochure's assertion, and have counsel confirm the current statutory amounts before relying on the lower figure.
Questions about the money's path
The founder's proceeds passed through a lawyer's trust account, a holdback, and a currency conversion before landing in a personal account. Every step needs a record: the sale agreement, the closing statement, the trust ledger, the holdback release and the conversion confirmation. The petition must show lawful source and lawful path, and a final balance proves neither.
Questions about what the investor gets and gives up
Read the subscription and loan documents for redemption rights, fees taken from the capital, and the point at which the investment becomes at risk. An investor who can withdraw at will has not invested. Separately, understand that the family's move depends on petition adjudication, visa availability and a later removal-of-conditions decision, none of which the project controls.
Conditional residence, and the petition that ends it
Identify standalone or regional-center structure and the applicable method for qualifying job creation, generally ten jobs. Full-time normally means at least 35 hours weekly, and investor, spouse and children are excluded as qualifying workers. After the petition come visa availability, then an immigrant visa abroad or an adjustment you are genuinely eligible for, conditional residence, and ordinarily an I-829 filed within the ninety days before the second anniversary. Form I-829 is filed within the ninety days immediately before the two-year conditional period expires, and it asks for proof that the enterprise was sustained and that the required employment was created or, in some circumstances, will be created within a reasonable time. Where the investment is made through a designated regional centre, a defined portion of indirect and induced job creation may be counted using an accepted economic methodology, but the arithmetic still has to reach ten for every investor in the offering. The investor must also have engaged in the management of the enterprise or in its policy formulation; a wholly passive holding does not satisfy the requirement, though the rights ordinarily attached to a limited partnership interest can.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-07. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.