Lawmakers extend EB-5 program to September 30, RE industry has mixed feelings

The $1.3 trillion spending bill, which included an extension of the EB-5 visa program often used to finance RE projects, passed yesterday

 

 

 

 

March 24, 2018 04:15PM

(Credit: U. S. Air Force photo/Staff Sgt. Eboni Reams, Pixabay)

The EB-5 visa program is sticking around, though there are mixed feelings about the how.

The program, which allows foreign investors to obtain a green card if they put $500,000 into job-creating projects, will remain in place until September 30, thanks to its inclusion in the spending bill Congress passed yesterday as Mansion Global reports.

Known to some as the “crack cocaine of real estate financing,” the program was almost extended for five years, until the proposed legislation was scuttled earlier this week in what some call a victory while others are angry reform didn’t go through.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, who backed the legislation, went on a Twitter tirade when he learned the proposal was off the table, as The Real Dealreported, blaming the “moneyed interests” of “Manhattan real estate moguls” for the failure.

Other industry leaders such as Nick Mastroianni II, the CEO and chairman of the U.S. Immigration Fund, breathed a sigh of relief.

Grassley’s proposed law would have extended the visa program through to 2023, allocated 1,450 visas for projects located in rural areas and raised the minimum investment to $925,000. Despite some of the less-popular criteria proposed by Grassley, notably around the favoring of projects in rural areas, many within the industry were hoping that permanence would bring stability to the program, as Justin Gardinier, founder and CEO of TigerBridge Capital (formerly JSG Capital) told TRD. [Mansion Global] — Erin Hudson