File EB-5 Before September 2026? Grandfathering vs. the Coming Price Increase

If you can assemble a complete, well-documented petition in time, the answer is yes: file EB-5 before September 2026, because September 30, 2026 is the statutory grandfathering cutoff under INA 203(b)(5)(S), and filing by that date also locks today's $800,000 and $1,050,000 investment amounts ahead of the automatic CPI increase that takes effect January 1, 2027. Miss it, and you can lose both protections in a single quarter.

As of June 25, 2026. No reauthorization, extension, or change to either the September 30, 2026 grandfathering cutoff or the September 30, 2027 program sunset has been enacted.

The decision is not really one question. It is two dates roughly a year apart, each carrying a different kind of protection, and the smart move is to read them together rather than fixate on one.

What are the two dates, and why do they get conflated?#

The first date is September 30, 2026, the grandfathering cutoff. Under INA 203(b)(5)(S) (8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5)(S)), a petition filed on or before that date keeps being processed even if the Regional Center Program lapses after its sunset. USCIS may not deny a grandfathered petition solely because the program expired. File on October 1, 2026 or later, and you get no such statutory shield.

The second date is September 30, 2027, the program sunset itself: the last day the Regional Center Program is currently authorized under INA 203(b)(5)(E)(i). These two dates are exactly one year apart, and they are easy to blur. The 2026 date governs who is protected; the 2027 date governs when the program needs Congress to act again.

Layered on top is a third, separate trigger: the January 1, 2027 automatic inflation adjustment. That one is about money, not program survival. We unpack all three below, and our companion piece on the September 2026 grandfathering deadline goes deeper on the cutoff mechanics.

What actually happens if you file before September 30, 2026?#

Two things happen at once, and that is the whole reason this date is worth circling.

First, grandfathering attaches. A petition properly filed on or before September 30, 2026 is insulated from a future program lapse. This is not theoretical. From June 2021 to March 2022, the Regional Center Program lapsed and USCIS could not approve affected regional center petitions; investors sat frozen until Congress passed the EB-5 Reform and Integrity Act of 2022 (P.L. 117-103, Div. BB) on March 15, 2022. Grandfathering under (S) exists precisely so that a repeat of that freeze cannot strand investors who filed in time. (Note the citation: it is subsection (S), not (M); (M) is the separate post-termination investor-protection provision.)

Second, because September 30, 2026 falls before January 1, 2027, filing by the cutoff also means you file at today's investment amounts: $1,050,000 for a standard project and $800,000 for one in a targeted employment area (TEA) or qualifying infrastructure project. Those figures have held since the RIA took effect on March 15, 2022. You can confirm the term-of-art definitions, including what counts as a TEA, in our glossary.

So the September 2026 cutoff is the rare date that buys you two unrelated protections for the price of one filing.

Why does January 1, 2027 matter as much as September 30, 2026?#

Because the price changes then, automatically, with no vote required.

Under INA 203(b)(5)(C)(iii), the EB-5 minimums adjust beginning January 1, 2027, and every five years thereafter, by the cumulative change in the CPI-U (the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers, all items, U.S. city average, published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics). The statute measures that inflation from January 1, 2022 to the adjustment date. The standard amount rounds down to the nearest $50,000, and the TEA amount is set at 75% of the standard. USCIS publishes the new figure as a technical amendment in the Federal Register.

Two things to be careful about. One: no official 2027 figure has been published as of June 2026. Every specific 2027 dollar amount circulating online is a third-party projection, not a confirmed number, so treat any precise figure with suspicion. Two: the increase applies to petitions filed on or after January 1, 2027. File on or before December 31, 2026 and you are on the current amounts. Our 2027 CPI increase explainer walks through the indexing math in full.

Put the two dates together and the timeline is clean. File by September 30, 2026 and you lock grandfathering plus current pricing. File between October 1 and December 31, 2026 and you still get current pricing but forfeit grandfathering. File on or after January 1, 2027 and you lose both the lapse shield and the lower amounts.

Who benefits most from filing before September 2026?#

Not everyone needs to sprint. The investors with the most to gain fall into a few clear groups.

High-demand countries facing retrogression#

If you were born in India or mainland China, timing is not abstract. The July 2026 Visa Bulletin tells the story: in the EB-5 unreserved (non-set-aside) category, India is Unavailable for the remainder of FY 2026 because its pro-rated limit was reached, and China's unreserved final action date sits at December 1, 2016. Meanwhile, every set-aside category is Current for every country.

For these nationals, a future program lapse would be especially punishing because their cases already move slowly through a retrogressed queue. Locking grandfathering protection removes one major variable from an already long wait. See the live cutoffs on our visa bulletin tracker, and the country-specific picture on our India hub.

Investors who want a set-aside category#

The RIA reserves visas by project type: 20% rural, 10% high-unemployment, and 2% infrastructure, leaving 68% unreserved. Those reserved pools are valid pull factors right now because they stay Current while the unreserved category retrogresses for high-demand countries. An investor choosing a rural or high-unemployment TEA project at the $800,000 amount is exactly the profile that benefits from filing before both the grandfathering cutoff and the price adjustment. We compare the tiers in detail in our piece on TEA versus standard investment amounts.

Families whose capital and documentation are already in place#

Grandfathering and current pricing only help if you can file a genuinely complete petition. An investor whose funds are committed, traced, and lawfully sourced has far more to gain from moving now than one still untangling a complicated paper trail.

What if your source of funds is not ready?#

This is the honest counterweight to all of the above. A rushed, thin petition is not a bargain.

EB-5 requires documenting that the full investment was obtained through lawful means: salary, business income, gifts, loans, sale of property, inheritance, and so on, each traced from origin to the project. Source-of-funds preparation is the single most time-consuming part of a credible filing, and it is the most common reason petitions draw a Request for Evidence or a denial. If chasing the September 30, 2026 cutoff means submitting an incomplete or weakly supported source-of-funds story, the calculus flips. A denial wastes the filing fee, restarts the clock, and can surface admissibility problems you would rather have caught earlier.

Work the readiness question concretely before you commit to a date. Our filing checklist tool lays out what a complete petition needs, and you should validate your plan with an EB-5 immigration attorney who can pressure-test the source-of-funds narrative before you file. The deadline is a reason to start now, not a reason to file something half-built.

What are the real risks on each side?#

Filing early carries risk. So does waiting. Name both.

Risks of rushing: an under-documented petition, a higher chance of a Request for Evidence, and the temptation to pick a project for its timing rather than its fundamentals. The current filing fee for Form I-526E is $3,675 (the pre-April-2024 amount, reinstated after the 2024 fee increase was stayed in November 2025), plus a $1,000 Integrity Fund contribution collected with each I-526E. Those are real but recoverable costs compared with the years a flawed filing can cost you. Note: do not anchor on the $11,160 figure some marketing materials cite; that was the vacated 2024-rule amount and is not in effect.

Risks of waiting: losing grandfathering if you slip past September 30, 2026, and paying a higher, CPI-adjusted minimum if you slip past December 31, 2026. There is also political risk. As of June 2026, Congress has not reauthorized the program beyond the September 30, 2027 sunset, and history shows reauthorization is never guaranteed to be smooth. Our reauthorization and 2027 outlook covers that scenario.

Remember too that filing is the start, not the finish. I-526E adjudication takes years, and the petition is only the first of several steps before conditional residence and, eventually, Form I-829 to remove conditions (current fee $3,750). Check current adjudication windows on our processing times tracker so your timeline expectations are grounded in data, not hope.

So should you file before September 2026? A decision framework#

Walk it in order.

1. Is your source of funds documented and your capital committed? If no, the deadline is your cue to start preparation immediately, not to file prematurely. If yes, continue.
2. Are you a high-demand-country national or targeting a set-aside category? If yes, the grandfathering shield and the Current set-aside availability make filing by September 30, 2026 especially valuable.
3. Can you realistically file a complete petition by September 30, 2026? If yes, doing so locks both grandfathering and current pricing. If you can only make a later date, aim to file by December 31, 2026 to at least lock current pricing, while accepting you forgo grandfathering.
4. Has anything changed? None of the three dates has moved as of June 25, 2026, but reauthorization debate is live. Verify before you rely.

The framework rewards investors who are ready and protects those who are not from a costly false start. For most prepared families, filing before the September 2026 cutoff is the stronger play. For everyone else, it is a deadline to plan against, with an honest assessment of whether the documentation can be done right in time.

Common questions#

Does filing by September 30, 2026 lock my investment amount? Indirectly, yes. The CPI increase applies to petitions filed on or after January 1, 2027, and September 30, 2026 falls before that, so filing by the grandfathering cutoff means you also file at the current $800,000 or $1,050,000 amount.

What is the difference between the 2026 and 2027 dates? September 30, 2026 is the grandfathering filing cutoff (lapse protection). September 30, 2027 is the program sunset (when authorization expires). January 1, 2027 is the separate automatic price adjustment. All three are distinct.

Is there a confirmed 2027 investment amount? No. As of June 2026, USCIS has not published the adjusted figure. Any specific 2027 dollar amount you see is a projection.

Sources#

• USCIS, About the EB-5 Visa Classification
• 8 U.S.C. 1153(b)(5) (statute, including (S) grandfathering and (C)(iii) CPI adjustment)
• USCIS Policy Manual, Vol. 6, Part G (EB-5 and TEA definitions)
• USCIS court-order alert on the 2024 fee-rule partial stay
• USCIS EB-5 Integrity Fund
• DOS Visa Bulletin for July 2026
• Congress, P.L. 117-103 (Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2022, Div. BB)

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This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal or investment advice. Consult a qualified immigration attorney and financial advisor before making any EB-5 decision.