Administrative Appeals office just dismissed a Chinese investor's I-526 petition. MATTER OF Y -G.

In this case, the Chinese investor used a loan proceeds from a property she used to own but gifted to her son. Her son later borrowed money from a bank and his mother used this money for her I-526 petition. She was also on the loan paper that guaranty the repayment of the loan.

This petition was denied because USCIS states that she cannot use loan proceeds where she did not own the property. She then tried to say that her son gave her the loan proceeds as gift. CIS counted that first of all a petitioner cannot change the nature of the fund after filing as it is considered “material change"; secondly since she is the guarantor of the loan, and if her son or she fail to pay the loan the bank would foreclose the property which she did not own, she could not demonstrate lawful source of her EB5 investment fund.

This case clearly illustrated how a bad legal advice could hurt your case. This case is clearly approvable if proper legal advice was obtained.