EB-5 Investor Testimonial: Sid from India,
Part 2—I-526E Approved

Sure. Hi, Sam. Yeah, nice to meet you again in this interview. To answer my background, originally I’m from India. Even my wife is from India. I did meet her I think back in 2015, 2016. And after that, we decided to get married, and she was already pursuing her master’s in the U.S. She’s a dentist. So I decided to join her here, and we got married and moved here in 2016. She came from India. Graduating straight out of college, she applied for H-1B and luckily got picked. I applied for my H-4. I think in 2018 her employer sponsored her Green Card application. I think that’s the I-140 under EB-2. And since then I’ve been on H-4 EAD. I was working on that. She’s been working on H-1B tied to her employer.

I think most of the people know here in the EB-2 or the EB-3 or even EB-1A or B category now, if I’m not wrong, the backlog is huge, especially for EB-2. I think her priority date was 2018, but the backlog is … I think what they say is approximately over a hundred years, so there was absolutely no chance that we were even thinking of getting a Green Card. EB-1 was really not an option for us at that point, so we were exploring multiple options. We even took the Canadian PR, so both of us have the Canadian PR right now, and we were all set to move to Canada.

But then I think the Reform and Integrity Act of ’22 happened, and later that year I got to know about it. Yeah, after that, I knew that EB-5 was a legitimate option, because I’d known about this for the longest time, but I think I always thought, wrongly for some reason, I thought it was always a scam, so I never really looked into it. And I was told that there’s already a backlog before the Reform and Integrity reup actually came into place. But then because of that law change of the new process, that gave a lot of investors like myself an opportunity to invest and actually get on the route for a Green Card and hopefully eventual citizenship of the U.S.

I think it took me about one, one and a half months to decide the attorney. I was actually initially … Sorry, wait, let me remember. It’s been a while now. But I don’t think I ever just Googled “EB-5 attorneys” or anything like that. I started speaking with different regional centers, and they were the ones who would point me in the direction of EB-5 attorneys and I would speak with them. And I spoke with I want to say about six to eight attorneys, and I almost signed up with a couple of them in the sense that I was okay signing up because they seemed … They were all big firms, and they were just partners at big firms, extremely difficult to get a hold of.

And then I got introduced to Anahita George. And I think the first meeting, within the first 30 or 40 minutes, I was pretty convinced that I wanted to go ahead with Anahita as my immigration attorney. It’s almost like a long-term relationship you’re looking at when it comes to EB-5 because there are multiple stages. You have to file your I-526 [I-526E], your 485. At least in our case, we filed it concurrently. Then you have your I-829s, or even after that, maybe helping you file your N-400 for citizenship. So I knew that this was the long-term relationship that me and my wife were looking at, but like I said, with Anahita I spoke for an hour within the first meeting, I was convinced.

To be very honest, it was too good to be true. For me, I thought that there was some catch to it because everything could not be so simple the way she laid it out. Part of my funds were from India, and the other half was coming from my parents in … Sorry, I probably misspoke. Half of my funds were from here in the U.S., and the other half was a gift from my parents, who were in India. And the first time I spoke with Anahita, the same evening, I was able to set up a call with her with my parents, because they also wanted to talk to her. And she made it so simple for them in terms of what exactly is needed, what are the forms that will be required. The first meeting she basically just gave us exactly the plan that we wanted to know. And there was no way she could have done any homework. I think it was just sheer experience which she had working with multiple investors, that she knew exactly the documents that were needed. And she was naming tax documentation which even I hadn’t heard of from India. But those were extremely easy to gather.

And yeah, I think she filed the I-526 [I-526E] petition for us, and she did the whole documentation. And yeah, I’m glad that it all worked out and we were able to get the approval. Sorry, just to add, the source of funds were never even questioned after they were filed. That was a straight approval pretty much.

I’ve heard from people that it’s a really long, drawn process. And to be honest, I think it depends on the kind of source you’re talking about. Our source was pretty straightforward and clean. I think, end to end, just collecting all the documentation and everything probably took us about two weeks. And like I said, Anahita made it really simple for us. She basically just knew everything at the back of her hand what exactly was needed.

Another thing is that, with Anahita, she was extremely … What is the word I’m looking for? To access her was really easy. She was available on WhatsApp, so that made it extremely simple for us. With the other attorneys, I had the experience that I would mail them and keep waiting for a reply. The mode of communication was extremely difficult. But with Anahita, that ease of communication was there. At times, she has messaged me at 1 a.m. at night. I think she lives in Seattle, Washington, on the west coast. Let’s say it’s 1 a.m. my time and 11 p.m. her time. She has texted me at that time asking me for documentation, and if I was up, I would just send those to her at that time. And I have no idea when she sleeps, because at times she’s messaged me at 11 p.m. her time, and if I wake up in the morning and I think about something and if I have to text her, she’ll respond at 5 a.m. or 5:30 a.m., so I’m not really sure when she sleeps.

I think with Anahita it became extremely easy to just get the whole thing sorted in probably two weeks. At that time also, she was able to … I told her that I wanted to file at a specific time, and we tried keeping a lot of it ready. But like I said, she was on the ball, and she was able to help and guide us through the process in two weeks.

I think you have to be … Definitely, the first thing is level of comfort. I know I said that I made up my mind within the first 30, 40 minutes of meeting Anahita, but that was because I had gone through several attorneys. I had conducted basically the introductory meetings with them. It’s all about how you follow up. With a couple of attorneys, I did the introductory meeting, and you have to understand they’re trying to reel the client in, so they’ll be at their absolute best. But after that, if I would reach out to them and ask them a simple question—and this was before I signed the agreement with them—they would just not answer any question and say, “Oh, first you sign, and then we’ll answer.”

Now, that was a huge red flag for me, because I didn’t know if they knew it or they were not revealing it. Because it was just simple pieces of information. I wasn’t getting into the nitty-gritties of the legalities of anything. I was just asking some simple basic questions which would help me. But they would always say, “First sign the agreement. Only after that we would give you the answer or respond to your queries.”

With Anahita, that was never the case surprisingly. I think I started talking to Anahita a month before we actually ended up filing. And within the first two weeks, I was just having conversations with her. There was no guarantee that I would sign up with her, or there was no guarantee that I would even go ahead with the EB-5 project or even end up investing my money, but she was always there to help. Yeah, I think that is definitely one of the few things that you have to look out for: a) the communication which is there. The second is the ease of communication.

And one of the most important things is that you have to be sure that your attorney understands your source of funds. Anahita being from India, it was a huge advantage for us. But even if you’re from a different country, make sure that the attorney you go with is well-versed with the laws and the taxes and other documentations which pertain to your country of origin specifically.

Again, I obviously came into this an absolute amateur in the world of EB-5, so it took me some time. It was almost a second job for almost a month, month and a half, trying to understand what the industry is about, trying to even gather and understand basic knowledge like capital stack, what are the basic different kinds of investments, the preferred equity investment or loan investment, how things work, can there be guaranties or not, what kind of guaranties are okay. It took me some time to understand that.

And then I was talking to … I think I spoke to pretty much all the top regional centers that are out there. And I think EB5AN was pretty much the last one I spoke with, because even before I spoke with you, Sam, or I spoke with Mike, I saw the Twin Lakes project, just a high-level presentation of the project, whatever was available on the website. And because of all the other projects that I looked at, I honestly thought, “This is too good to be true. There has to be some or the other catch.” I’m not sure what it was, but I wasn’t sure.

I really almost had gone ahead with a couple of other projects as well because those looked good as well, but none of them were rural. And rural has its own advantages, especially considering the country of birth which I have, which was India, because Indians and I think Chinese nationals are really, really susceptible to get into the backlog really fast. So I wanted to avoid that and wanted to get into the rural category because I think there was 20% set aside amongst all the visas.

I think, to answer your question, I decided to work with EB5AN … My experience was great because you guys were always really responsive. You were really knowledgeable about the product that you guys had, which was Twin Lakes at that time and a couple of other projects. And you guys had pretty much all the answers that I was looking for. I remember sending you a list of questions, and I wanted those questions answered in writing. And Mike was kind enough to do that. You guys were available pretty much all the time. Whenever I had questions, I had timely responses. And then if I wanted to verify something extra, you guys always went above and beyond in providing me with those documentations. For example, I think I was looking at some documentation with regards to the developer Kolter and some financial approvals and stuff, and you were pretty diligent about providing that as well. Those were the things. In terms of client servicing, you guys were pretty much one of the best that I came across. And to add to that, the project which you guys had, Twin Lakes, was pretty much unbelievable. That was one of the main things when it came to selecting the regional center for me.

understand what the industry is about

Sure. One of the things was that the other regional centers that I was working with, they had … That could be because they had been in the game for such a long time, but they had some bad projects—in the sense that projects that had failed in terms of even creating the jobs or in terms of returning the money. EB5AN did not have any of those. That was a huge green flag. The developer you guys were working with had a really good reputation. That was another thing which was working for you guys. Like I said, client servicing was top-notch.

And apart from that, the other regional centers I worked with, unfortunately it was almost like I had to read between the lines about what they were saying. I did not get the actual picture of what the situation was. It was almost like the projects that they had at that time were just basically bad projects which did not get enough bank loan maybe, and that’s why they were looking at EB-5 investors. The health of the project was not great, and I had to dig that up and find that on my own. And the regional center was not there to help me find that. I wouldn’t say that they were lying to me, but it was almost like they were not telling me the information on their own. I had to ask them the right questions, because I’m pretty sure they cannot really lie to their clients. So they would not tell me willingly. They would not give me the cons of the project unless I specifically asked them.

That was one of the things which definitely worked in your favor because you guys are pretty transparent from the word go. If something was done, something was done. If it was not, you would just be pretty upfront and vocal about it that now this is not done. You’d basically call a spade a spade, and that really impressed me. And that is what made me decide to go with EB5AN.

Got it. Well, to start with, I transferred the funds in February and actually filed the Form I-526 [I-526E] in March. I did that. and, well, I was pretty relaxed about the fact that everything is great—now I just have to sit back and relax. And I think about a week, or less than a week, somewhere around that time, right after that I started hearing the news about Silicon Valley Bank. And I loosely knew what was going on, but I wasn’t really paying much attention to it because it didn’t really concern me. And suddenly somewhere, I probably saw a Reddit post or maybe a post on Twitter/X that Signature Bank was in trouble. And at that time, Signature Bank was the bank where I had transferred my funds, $800,000. It was being kept in an escrow account at Signature Bank.

And I distinctly remember it was a Thursday night. I don’t remember the date. but it was a Thursday night when I realized that Signature Bank … Online, the forums were just going crazy with the fact that Signature Bank, there was something going wrong over there I think with a lot of cryptocurrency and stuff. Gosh, it’s been such a long time. At that time, I probably understood a lot more of what was going on, but now when I look back, there was something to do with cryptocurrency, because of which the bank was on the verge of bankruptcy. And people were going in and taking their funds out, and their stocks were tanking. Thursday night, I heard that Signature Bank might be the next in line after Silicon Valley Bank. Friday morning, everything tanked. The bank stock went down some insane amount, I think 70%, 80% or something like that.

It was a Friday evening, so Saturday, Sunday were just the weekend. There was no action whatsoever. And I remember I started reaching out to Anahita and I started reaching out to you and Mike frantically wondering what was happening with regards to the escrow account. Because if the bank is basically … If the bank is going down, all the funds are going down with it, because everyone was just basically … I think it was called a bank run if I’m not wrong. There was a bank run—everyone wanted to cash out. The bank did not have enough cash, so they had to shut down the bank. Now, according to the law, I think FDIC only ensures about $250,000 of your funds. Well, I was pretty nervous that whole weekend about what was going to happen with my funds. I think it was Sunday evening where finally I think the government came out with the fact that some other bank was going to take over Signature Bank and the funds will be secure.

And after that, I think you guys got into action, and I was in touch with you guys the whole weekend. I was panicking, and rightly so, and I think I was hounding you guys as well. But what you guys did was you had all the paperwork and documentation prepared, and I think by Monday afternoon, the money was transferred out from the escrow account and had been transferred over to the bank accounts of Kolter. That was what happened during those four days—made me lose a lot of my hair, quite literally, those four days.

But yeah, I think after that it was really straightforward. It was just a waiting game. I did touch base with Anahita a couple of times every now and then just with regards to if she’s heard anything, if any movement is happening. But apart from that, not much.

Especially from you guys, the good thing was that with regards to the project, I would keep getting quarterly reports or you would keep actually messaging me on WhatsApp—you guys, you and Mike—basically with all the information with regards to the home sales. I would get a monthly email blast from you guys saying these many homes were sold or those many homes were closed or so and so, X number of homes were delivered, these many number of houses left out of 1,300. It was a lot of that.

I think in December, I received an update that “Your I-956[F] was approved.” I’m not sure if it’s 956F, but I know it’s something to do with 956. So that was approved. That basically meant that the project has been approved by USCIS. That was great news. And I’d been hearing at least through different Telegram or WhatsApp groups, I knew that there were some other projects where 956 or the project was approved, and within a couple of months, investors started to get approved. So I was pretty hopeful that if December of ’23 the project got approved, and after that it was just a matter of months that the 526E would be approved.

But lo and behold, in January we actually ended up getting a request for initial evidence. I had never heard that before. But I think they treat it as a request for evidence or whatever. And it was just the most basic request for evidence ever. I think there was some bizarre question which was not marked as “no,” I think something which said, “Are you planning on getting involved in drug trafficking?” or something like that, something ridiculous, and you could not really check no because there was an error in the PDF documentation which USCIS would provide. The moment you would click no, it would just disappear. That was the question. And I think they needed some 956 approval documentation or something, which, again, I just didn’t understand, because the reason why they were looking at my source of funds was because the project was approved. So why do you need the receipt notice? My bad, sorry—why do you need the approval notice of the project? It’s definitely there in your system.

But anyway. That happened in January. Anahita was nice enough to basically respond to it within the hour. I was able to upload the documents within an hour online. And we were convinced that it’s as good as done, because I’ve had RFEs with other visas in the past and it has just taken me maybe a couple of weeks tops for the application to get approved. But that was January 23rd of 2024 where I got the RFE, and after that, it was just no movement, nothing. It was just complete silence from USCIS. And there were other investors who were getting approved, either straight approvals or … I’m not sure what exactly was the process which USCIS had. I had no idea. Were they looking at my source of funds? Were they concerned about something else? And I kept wondering that if they have any question, just ask me. Everything was legal, so I could just answer pretty much any question that they had to throw at me. But there was just complete silence.

And then after that, on I think April 29th, I received an update from USCIS where they said that ”we are actively reviewing your case.” Again, I’m not really sure what that meant because I genuinely thought that they were reviewing my case all along. And then I started also hearing that they started issuing similar RFEs to a lot of other clients, just similar RFEs. I’m not sure if they were delaying the process or if it was just an automated thing which happened at USCIS, not really sure. Like I said, within a lot of paperwork, I think somewhere it just got lost probably in my application, and there was just nothing, no response. I would follow up with USCIS. I would give their customer care a call once every couple of weeks, but I would just get absolutely … They would say that they were reviewing my case, and they would give me different timestamps, but that “Oh, on so and so and so date, some officer reviewed your file. On so and so date, some other officer reviewed your file.”

I’m just wondering what they … I was getting a little nervous about the fact. What exactly are they reviewing? Like I said, if they had to ask me any more questions, just go ahead, just ask, but at least put an end to this madness.

But then Anahita, obviously because she had experience with other clients as well who were going through this and who were just not getting the approval, what she did was she actually reached out to me and she got me introduced to Matt Gulati, another attorney who I think works with the EB-5 industry, and she said that he is going to file a writ of mandamus against USCIS. And a writ of mandamus actually is basically a lawsuit which you can file just basically asking the government to do their job. That is what the writ is about.

If I’m not wrong, there were 10 other people, 10 other EB-5 investors, who were actually waiting for their approval notices, or basically not approval, their files to get adjudicated. Like I said, Anahita was nice enough to put me in touch with Matt Gulati.

I got in touch with him. It took me about a week. I think we started the process at the end of May, and June 7th was when he actually filed the writ of mandamus. We got an email—all the clients got an email that the writ of mandamus had been filed. June 11th, I saw online through this website called PacerMonitor that the electronic summons were issued to USCIS. And June 21st of this year, basically just about last week, just on Friday, I get a notification that the case was being approved. Yeah, like I said, that was a huge relief because that at least put an end to just basically the waiting period.