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CALEDON · EB-5 FIELD GUIDE

Does a high salary establish enough lawful EB-5 capital?

Sources checked:

THE DIRECT ANSWER

It supports an income source but does not prove the capital accumulated or remained available. The evidence should connect lawful earnings to savings and then to the qualifying investment.

Show what was retained

Prepare an understandable history that accounts for taxes, significant household expenditure and transfers between accounts. Use employment and payroll records together with tax filings and bank entries. If some capital comes from dividends or asset redemptions, explain those as separate sources.

A source calculation should avoid counting the same money twice and should be supported by records rather than a savings estimate alone. A high income makes accumulation plausible and does not by itself establish that any particular sum was retained lawfully and is available. The two propositions require different evidence.

Earnings are shown by employment records, payslips and tax filings; retention is shown by the balances over time and by an account of what was spent and what was kept. Where a career produced substantial income across many years, the file usually needs to demonstrate a pattern rather than every transaction, and choosing that framing early keeps the volume manageable. Where the balance is larger than the recorded earnings would explain, the difference is the part that requires work.

The next-stage requirements remain separate: the capital must be at risk in a commercial enterprise, the project must meet the applicable job-creation rule, and the resulting permanent residence is conditional until conditions are removed through a later petition.