A good regional center will have a strong Economic Report that shows how many indirect jobs will be created from their EB-5 project.

These EB-5 Economic Reports use methodologies approved by USCIS to measure the impact that a project will have on the local economy.

Very simply stated, regional centers can use these methodologies to plug-in various factors into a model to determine how many indirect jobs will be created once an EB-5 project is completed. One example of the types of factors that could used are: the region the project is located in, the type of industry, and the amount invested in construction.

Regional centers can count indirect job creation, which is a major advantage over the regular EB-5 Program. The regular EB-5 Program can only count direct jobs and typically an EB-5 project creates far fewer direct than indirect jobs.As an example, a resort may only hire 50 people to run the valet, reception, management and housekeeping (direct jobs), whereas, that same resort may create nearly 200 indirect jobs. Since each EB-5 investor needs to create 10 jobs in order to receive their green card, each EB-5 project is limited in how much capital it can raise. An EB-5 project that projects the creation of 50 direct jobs can only attain 5 EB-5 investors and $2.5 million in capital, while an EB-5 project that projects the creation of 200 indirect jobs can attain 20 EB-5 investors and 10 million in capital investment.When EB-5 investors arrive at the Form I-526 stage, both investors in the Regional Center Program and the regular EB-5 Program submit their economic reports and job creation projections to USCIS for approval. At the Form I-829 stage, however, EB-5 investors in the Regular EB-5 Program must prove direct job creation by submitting payroll documents and tax records to USCIS. Investors in the Regional Center Program, at the Form I-829 stage, do not have payroll documents or tax records, instead, what they show USCIS is completed construction or nearly completed construction on the EB-5 project. By showing USCIS that the investment capital was spent exactly as outlined in the economic report, indirect jobs will be viewed as successfully created.That is why it's so important to select a regional center and EB-5 project team that you can trust not only to create a solid Economic Report, but one that will carry out the business plan as outlined in a timely and efficient manner.For more information on what to look for in a regional center EB-5 project, click here.