What is the success rate for investors receiving the EB-5 visa? During what part of the application process do most rejections occur?
The consulate mainly checks two parts of the application. One is the legal source of funds and the other is the program documents. You need to know which program you are investing in and there should be no false info for your legal source of funds.
Most rejections occur early, at the I-526 stage. USCIS posts its adjudication statistics and the overall I-526 approval rate is historically above 80 percent. After I-526 approval, approval rates are not easy to track, but is safe to assume that nearly all I-526 approvals result in conditional lawful permanent residence.
The success rate for receiving the EB-5 visa depends on a host of factors. Among these factors are: the fact that an investor has to meet the basic financial investment requirement of $500,000 for a rural area and $1 million; ensuring that the investment funds are from legal source(s); and that the investment must eventually result in the creation of a minimum of 10 jobs within two years of investment. To a greater degree, the time to watch for is the period when the conditions on the initial conditional green card need to be removed; again a host of factors may intervene during the two year conditional period that may prevent an approval of the permanent green card. It is not unheard of that a project may fail; the regional center may go bankrupt and 10 jobs were not created, just to name a few scenarios. A good preparation though may forestall any of those unsavory occurrences that could prevent an approval of a permanent green card. It is advisable that good due diligence is done right from the initial investment. To get a good bearing on how this matters, consult an EB-5 attorney on how to use due diligence as a guidance.
You may look up the most recent statistics at uscis.gov. The most challenging part is properly documenting source of funds for the I-526 petition. You should hire an experienced EB-5 immigration attorney who would be able to prepare the I-526 petition appropriately.
Approval rates of I-526 petitions are fairly good (something like 75 percent in the most recent quarter). Approval rates for the visa applications themselves are a different matter in which I do not have a statistic for. Denials can come at the I-526 stage (for project related or source of funds related reasons) or at the visa application stage (for the foreign applicant's personal background). Working with experienced EB-5 immigration attorneys will help avoid denials, but no attorney can guarantee approvals.
I believe the latest statistics are posted under the USCIS website, but my last look was around 85 percent. Most rejections come during the review of the application, many times because of the process of explaining the sources of funds.
I think the overall statistics from USCIS are approximately 89 percent for regional center investments. Generally, the most challenging portion of the application is the source of the investment funds.
Approval rates for I-526s, the first stage, are presently at about 80 percent - most denials are at this stage, as I-829 final stage denials are at about 1 percent.
More than 85 percent. The most denials will be at the I-829 removal of condition.
No attorney should provide you with a success rate. The goal is to put together the most comprehensive/detailed application and evidence package.
Rejections typically occur initially at the I-526 level.
