eb5exclusive

Representatives from Exclusive Visas, an EB-5 visa program consulting firm, recently returned from a trip to China to promote the federal program to potential investors.

The Chinese part of the trip lasted 12 days, spanned seven cities and saw Exclusive Visas sign 12 EB-5 clients.

The EB-5 visa program gives a chance for foreign nationals to earn U.S. green card eligibility for themselves and their families. If one invests $1 million (or in some specially designated areas $500,000) and that investment leads to the creation or preservation of at least 10 jobs, the investor, his wife and unmarried children aged under 21 become eligible for U.S. green cards.

On their trip, the representatives from Exclusive Visas visited a number of major cities in China including Beijing, Shanghai, Nanjing, Guangzhou, Chengdu, Dongguan and Kunming. In these cities, the firm met with potential EB-5 investors to discuss potential EB-5 visa opportunities in America.

In Kunming, Exclusive Visas President Fred Burgess and Vice President Joe Sloboda hosted three seminars in partnership with three of China's major banks: China Merchants Bank, China International Trust and Investment Corporation (CITIC) and China Bank of Communications.

Exclusive Visas is involved with a number of prominent EB-5 regional centers located across the country that present diverse EB-5 investment opportunities.

These EB-5 regional centers were established to help direct and manage foreign investments through the EB-5 visa program. These centers handle a great deal of EB-5 investments and, according to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS), can be "any economic unit, public or private, which is involved with the promotion of economic growth, improved regional productivity, job creation, and increased domestic capital investment."

These EB-5 regional centers are geographically based and there are about 100 of them located around the nation. One of the most attractive aspects of the EB-5 visa program is that investors do not need to settle in the area where they invest. For instance, if one decides on an EB-5 investment opportunity in the northwestern state of Idaho, he and his family can settle in Florida, in the extreme southeast of the U.S.

Nearly half of all EB-5 investors came from China in the fiscal year 2009, with 1,979 investors earning U.S. green card eligibility through the program.