In today’s increasingly restrictive immigration environment, skilled Indian professionals have very few options to relocate permanently to the United States and become Green Card holders. For so many of us, the United States has become not only where we work but also our home. We’ve begun families here and developed our careers. And no country in the world offers the wealth of professional and business opportunities of the United States.
My name is Shiv, and I’m originally from India. With my family, we found the best possible solution that allows us to live and work in the United States as permanent residents: the EB-5 program.
In this post, you’ll learn my rationale for making a safe EB-5 investment—specifically, how I found an EB-5 project (Bay Creek) and regional center that will help us get our Green Cards as quickly as possible and also recover our funds.
Background
Finding an EB-5 Immigration Attorney
Why I Chose the Bay Creek Rural EB-5 Project
Final Thoughts
Background
I’m from Mandsaur, India. I’m a software engineer. I’m here with my wife and three kids, and I’m on H-1. My story in the U.S. goes back a long time, and it matters because it explains why EB-5 became important for my family.
I first came to the U.S. in 2005 as a software engineer. I stayed for only a couple of years. At that time, it just didn’t click for me, so I went back. Later, in 2015, I got an opportunity that was very good for my career. I moved back to the U.S. with my family. I was still on the same H-1 that I had received in 2005, and my employer did my green card petition around 2016. I later changed employers, but I retained the same priority date. I’ve been with my current employer for more than five years.
For most of this time, my immigration life felt normal. I never faced major issues with visas. My wife is on EAD. From day to day, things were fine, and I was not thinking too far ahead. That is also something I have seen with many parents in a situation like mine. You stay here. You focus on work and school. You hope that everything will work out before anything becomes urgent.
Then my kids got older, and the timeline became more urgent. When we moved back in 2015, my daughter was in fourth grade. In 2024, she went to college. Now she is going to age out in 2027. That changed how we looked at everything. Until your child is close to that point, you can tell yourself there is still time. But once the date is in front of you, you start to calculate what is actually possible.
I was hoping that, with a 2016 priority date, things would move in a reasonable way. But they did not. Based on today’s timelines, I do not think it is realistic that I will get a green card through my employment route in the next ten years.
The problem for me was not daily life. The problem was my kids, because my daughter is aging out, and my two daughters were both born in India. If they want to stay here long term, they would face the same cycle later. They grew up here. They consider this their country. I did not want them to go through years of uncertainty again.
We did try the F-1 route from here, but it has risks. We got an RFE, and we started thinking more and more about what could happen. This was around early last year, around April 25. With new administration policies and other factors, the F-1 path was getting harder to follow. And when I looked ahead, it seemed like we would keep hitting the same wall. That is when a friend told us about EB-5, and that is where my EB-5 journey started. From there, I decided I needed to do real due diligence and see if EB-5 could actually work for my family.
When I first heard of EB-5, I already knew what it was, but I never took it seriously. The main reason was the money. You need $800,000 now. Earlier it used to be $500,000. I assumed it was out of reach. But once my daughter’s timeline became clear, I started digging. I joined a Discord group with people in similar situations. People were sharing what they were doing, what terms meant, and how they were thinking about EB-5 categories like reserved and unreserved, HUA, rural, and infrastructure. I learned how people were thinking about pros and cons, and I started following blogs and discussions about retrogression.
That research pushed me into the next hard question: how would I fund the investment? I learned a lot about source of funds and what people use. I saw options like HELOC, SDIRA, 401(k)-based loans, and a liquidity access line where you use your equities as collateral. I also saw people using other forms of loaned money and even unsecured loans offered against certain assets. Some of those options were newer, and there was skepticism in the community. I did my own analysis and kept multiple options open, because I needed flexibility.
I also considered selling Indian assets and moving money over, but I decided not to do that. It adds complexity and adds legal work on both sides. It would require more documentation and likely more time. My goal was to file the I-526E as soon as possible, so the timeline made my choices more limited. The more I learned, the more I realized that speed matters. You want to file sooner, not later. I also became cautious about certain structures, including the idea of taking a loan from a regional center, because I kept hearing concerns about how that could be viewed under the at-risk rule.
Finding an EB-5 Immigration Attorney
After I got clearer on funding options, the next big step was choosing a lawyer. EB-5 is not something you want to do with guesswork. It is a long process. You start with the I-526E, but it does not end there. You have later steps and you have to remove conditions. So I was not only thinking about filing. I was thinking about the full timeline and the kind of support I would need.
I looked at different options, including large firms and private attorneys. The Discord group and the broader community helped again, because I could see which names were repeated and which firms people had good experiences with. I also used general resources about choosing an EB-5 immigration attorney to keep my process structured. I did not want to pick someone just because they were well known. I wanted a team that would actually work with me and move my case forward.
The most important thing for me was availability. Many legal teams have a backlog right now. That matters because the source of funds work takes time, and you need real attention from the team. I wanted a clear commitment that they would work with me and that the petition could be filed within a month or two. Cost mattered, of course, but once I compared firms, the fees were competitive and close enough that it was not the deciding factor. What mattered more was how the team approached timing, communication, and the actual work.
During my review, I kept coming back to the same basic idea: I needed the right questions up front. I wanted to know how they would handle multiple funding sources, how they would build a clean paper trail, and how they would manage the timeline. I also wanted to know what kind of involvement the main attorney would have, versus only staff. I used a list of critical questions as a guide while I talked to firms, because I did not want to miss anything that would become a problem later.
In the end, I hired Darren Silver. I had an initial call with him. I explained my case and how my source of funds would likely look. Community feedback about him was very positive, and my initial call matched that. The decision felt clear once I saw how direct the conversation was and how quickly the next steps could start. It also helped that I had already learned a lot about the basics of selecting an attorney, so I knew what I needed from the relationship.
Once I signed the retainer, the process got real fast. I received a document checklist, and it was very exhaustive. I was honestly surprised by how detailed it was. Even small parts of my history mattered, including the full time I had been in the U.S. It was not just “give us your current paperwork.” It was everything that supports a complete story.
Source of funds was the biggest piece. If someone has one clean source, like equities in one place, it is much easier. But I was using multiple options. I was trying to use HELOC, SDIRA, and an equity-based liquidity access line. That made everything more complex, and it meant I had to collect documentation from many places. The legal team was building a strong package, so that if USCIS asked follow-up questions later, we would have the support ready. That kind of work is a big part of what an immigration attorney can advise on, and it mattered a lot for my case because I did not have a single simple funding path.
HELOC took me the longest. I had to gather evidence from when I bought my house, which was around eight years back. I had to show how the funds were sourced at that time. The problem was that banks usually keep statements for only seven years. Some keep more, but many major banks do not. For some transactions, I could not get statements older than seven years, and that created a real challenge. I did find some older documents from my original mortgage process, and those helped, but I learned a lesson: if you are starting EB-5, download as many historical statements as you can right away.
For equities, it was also a lot of work. I was spread across multiple brokerage houses, and I decided to consolidate into one place using a Morgan Stanley liquidity access offering. That meant I had to collect statements from all those brokerage accounts across multiple years. It took time, but it was necessary to support the paper trail. On top of that, I had to gather immigration history, prior visas, and the documentation needed for concurrent filing. Filing from the U.S. means you can file the I-485 and advance parole along with the I-526E, and that brings in more documents like salary slips, spouse salary slips, and tax returns. It is a lot. If you can take time off, it helps you move faster and keep the process moving.
There were also basic identity documents that can slow people down. Birth certificates are a common issue for people born in India because they may not be in English. You need them in English, and you may need translations. Marriage certificates matter too. I was lucky that I already had those ready, because I had heard about similar issues before. All of this work made me think a lot about how Indian investors handle timing and risk, and stories from other EB5AN investors helped me see what was realistic in terms of process and expectations.
Why I Chose the Bay Creek Rural EB-5 Project
Once the legal team was working through my source of funds, I started focusing on the project and the regional center. I had already spent months reading forums and learning from other investors. I had reviewed many regional centers. At first, I was very attracted to an unsecured loan option offered by some regional centers. The interest rate looked almost too good. It was tempting because it meant you might not need to sell equities or move funds around as much. I evaluated a few regional centers that offered those loans, and at one point I thought I would choose that path.
But the more I learned, the more doubts I had. I kept hearing concerns that a regional center-affiliated loan could raise issues under the at-risk rule. That was enough to make me rethink the entire funding plan. I asked myself a simple question: if there is any chance this could create a problem later, why take that chance? I realized I could still fund the investment by leveraging against my equities, and that felt cleaner. Once I made that decision, I started focusing even more on project structure, and especially on whether a project used a true senior loan.
After I ruled out the regional center loan idea, I considered infrastructure projects. There were very few at the time, and the quota was small. I was not sure how that would play out, especially if retrogression started affecting categories. I also looked at HUA projects. Many looked solid, and in a world where rural and HUA had similar timelines, I would have chosen HUA because it is often in more urban areas. But HUA did not have the same priority processing. I also felt the quota situation was tighter there.
So I shifted to rural. Rural processing speed was the main reason. At that point, I was looking for what I called a trifecta (key winning characteristics): rural, senior loan, fast deployment, and a shorter loan term. I also wanted the I-956F to be approved, if possible. I started looking closely at EB5AN because their projects looked solid, and several fit that set of criteria. I also started talking to Jordan from EB5AN, and that relationship became a key part of my process.
My conversations with Jordan were different from other regional centers. Most people you talk to at a regional center are professional, and they explain the basics. But with Jordan, it was not a one-time call. It was a relationship that lasted around five months. It continued from early exploration through my due diligence and even into post-investment questions.
EB5AN was transparent. Jordan talked about downside scenarios, not only best case. He was not pushy. He let my source of funds process move at its own pace, and he stayed available for questions. He also had real depth on the program, including topics like the sustainment period and pending litigation around interpretations. That level of depth, combined with a calm approach, made me more comfortable. It also helped me stay focused on how to select the best EB-5 projects instead of getting distracted by marketing.
When I looked at EB5AN’s offerings, I saw that some projects were earlier in later phases and had longer deployment timelines, sometimes a couple of years. That mattered to me because deployment time was a big factor. In August, when I invested, Bay Creek was new. It hit the main points I cared about: rural, senior loan, quick deployment, and a shorter loan term. It also supported partial investment, which mattered because I wanted to commit in steps. That option gave me flexibility while still letting me move forward.
There was one item Bay Creek did not have at that time: the I-956F was not approved yet. That was the only major gap. My legal team helped me think through that risk. EB5AN’s track record with I-956F approvals gave me confidence, and when I reviewed the project documents, the rural designation and job creation numbers made sense to me. I did not see any major reason the project would not get the approval. I was not guessing. I was reviewing documents and following a structured due diligence framework to make sure I understood what I was looking at.
The rural piece was still the driver. I wanted faster processing. Bay Creek also had a shorter loan term, which was closer to what I had seen in some HUA projects. So it felt like I was getting the speed benefit of rural without giving up the shorter timeline characteristics that I liked in other categories. Once that clicked, Bay Creek became the clear choice.
I also liked how Bay Creek’s structure was explained and documented. I spent time reading about the project’s loan structure and investor protections, because I wanted to understand how the EB-5 funds fit into the bigger picture. I wanted the EB-5 loan to be in a strong position and to have a structure that made sense. I was not looking for promises. I was looking for a structure that was simple to understand and backed by clear documents.
I also saw Bay Creek as a strong overall offering as a rural project. It fit what I wanted in terms of risk and processing speed, and I felt it was a compelling rural EB-5 project based on the information I reviewed.
After I invested, Bay Creek did receive I-956F approval, and that was important. Even though the approval came after my initial decision, it matched what I expected based on the documents and the team’s history. Seeing the project get Form I-956F approval supported the idea that the project was structured in a way USCIS accepted.
The rural designation remained a big part of the reason. I cared about speed, and I wanted to lower the chance of long waits. The way Bay Creek is classified matters, and I spent time reading about why the project’s rural designation can lead to faster outcomes compared to other options.
Over time, I also watched how early approvals came in for the project. Seeing that Bay Creek had its first I-526E approval in a very short period reinforced what I was aiming for with rural processing. It does not change the work needed on the personal and source-of-funds side, but it showed that the project side was moving through review as expected.
Once I chose Bay Creek, the onboarding process was smooth. One key item for me was SDIRA support, because I wanted to use SDIRA funds. Bay Creek supported that. The platform used was Alto IRA, and setting that up was straightforward. I also had to complete the accredited investor step. Then came the test wires and the escrow steps. Instructions were clear, and the wires went through without problems. I received confirmations quickly and shared them with my legal team. Overall, the process felt organized, and I had a clear place to go when I had questions.
Final Thoughts
If someone is looking at EB-5, they have probably explored other paths. I looked at options like EB-1A and EB-1C, and they did not work for me. Many people arrive at EB-5 after trying other routes. For me, the key was accepting that $800,000 is a large amount, but it might still be possible if you plan carefully. You can move assets around, use collateral, and build a lawful source-of-funds story. It can feel impossible at first, but if you get serious and work the problem step by step, it can come together. Understanding the overall EB-5 process helped me stay calm, because I could see where each step fits.
My advice on timing is simple: move fast once you decide. Even if retrogression is not here yet in certain categories, there is always noise that it could happen. You want to file as soon as you can. That means you need to work closely with your legal team and keep following up. Lawyers have many clients. If you want your case to move, you need to stay on it. Taking time off to gather documents can also make a big difference. This is not a process you finish in spare time if your case has multiple funding sources.
I also think the partial investment option can be very helpful. It helped me because I could commit in stages. I made my commitment in two parts, starting with partial investment and then completing it later. If you are still pulling funds together, partial investment can let you start and lock in your place while you finish the rest. That can matter a lot if you are trying to protect your timing. I spent time reviewing how partial investments work, and it matched what I needed for my situation.
I would recommend both Darren Silver and EB5AN. Darren and his team prioritized my case, completed the source of funds work in a short time, and helped me file quickly. He is knowledgeable, familiar with many projects, and willing to give his professional opinion without steering you into one specific option. EB5AN was also strong for me because of the relationship and the transparency. I got responses quickly, and I felt I could ask questions without being rushed. If your goal is to start and fast-track the Green Card process, you need both a legal team that will move and a regional center team that will stay engaged through the full process—and, preferably, a rural project.
