IN THIS GUIDE · Trace the funding behind an accountant’s investment schedule
Start with the E-2 eligibility and application overview
Trace every amount to actual records
Hypothetical example: a schedule combines savings, a loan and a family transfer into one total. Identify source, legal terms and transfers separately. A bank balance or accountant’s total does not establish how each component was obtained.
Read the complete financing terms
Identify borrower, repayment obligations and all collateral. Personal-asset-secured or unsecured loans may be considered; enterprise-secured borrowing does not count as qualifying E-2 capital. Mixed arrangements require full factual review. Debt secured partly by enterprise assets is excluded even when personal assets are also pledged; personal-only secured or unsecured borrowing may qualify on its actual terms.
Explain what is truly committed
Provide actual purchase, escrow and cancellation terms. Do not equate every planned amount with capital already at risk. Substantiality is contextual, with no universal fixed minimum.
Assess the business beyond the money schedule
Explain operations, marginality and actual control. An accountant’s financial description may not establish the legal right to develop and direct the enterprise. Obtain appropriate evidence and separate commercial and immigration advice.
Explain enterprise nationality and nonmarginality precisely
The enterprise generally must be at least 50% owned by nationals of the relevant treaty country; the applicant’s passport alone does not establish enterprise nationality. Nonmarginality includes capacity to provide more than a minimal living for the investor and family, with the alternative of a significant economic contribution. Apply those conditions to the real operating proposal rather than importing EB-5’s capital amounts or ten-job rule into E-2. The investor must also intend to depart when E status ends; business ownership does not replace that individual requirement. If relying on future capacity, it should generally be realizable within five years after normal business activity begins.
Committed, at risk, and substantial relative to this business
Debt secured by the assets of the business being purchased raises different questions from an obligation backed by the buyer's own assets or personal guarantee. Where a U.S. partner is involved, the Canadian investor must ordinarily hold at least fifty percent or otherwise have operational control, and the enterprise's ownership must remain at least fifty percent Canadian for nationality purposes. Funds released to the seller, equipment purchased, a lease executed and signed for, licences paid, inventory acquired and staff hired are all evidence of commitment. An agreement in which the franchisee owns the entity outright, hires and fires, sets pricing within brand limits and bears the profit or loss supports the control requirement; one where the franchisor can run the business over the owner's head does not. Build the budget around the real cost of buying or launching this enterprise, then distinguish committed purchases from funds that remain freely withdrawable. Where the buyers intend to borrow, distinguish borrowing they are personally liable for from a loan secured by the assets of the business being bought, because the latter is treated differently. Funds must also be irrevocably committed and genuinely at risk, and substantial relative to the total cost of the undertaking. The enterprise may not be marginal, so a plan based on the owner doing every revenue-producing task indefinitely deserves particular scrutiny.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-07. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.