IN THIS GUIDE · A millwork buyer whose target business supports one working owner and nobody else
Start with the E-2 eligibility and application overview
Marginality is about capacity, and capacity can be built into the deal
The requirement is not that the business be large. It is that the enterprise must have the present or future capacity to generate more than a minimal living for the investor and family, either through income that clearly exceeds that threshold or through a demonstrated capacity to make a significant economic contribution within about five years. That is a forecast, and forecasts are evidence when they rest on something. Patrice can strengthen the file before he buys: a signed supply agreement that requires more output than one person can produce, quotations for equipment that changes the shop's throughput, or letters of intent from contractors. A plan written to satisfy an officer reads as such. A plan the bank would also lend against usually does not.
Committed and at risk means the money can be lost
Capital must be irrevocably committed to the enterprise and genuinely at risk of partial or total loss. Funds sitting in Patrice's Quebec account earmarked for the purchase are neither. The usual structure is an escrow arrangement whose release is conditional only on issuance of the visa, together with spending that has already happened and could not be recovered if the business failed: a signed lease, deposits on machinery, fit-out work, inventory. Cash held back to see how the first year goes is the opposite of the requirement. This is also where a seller's convenience and an applicant's interests diverge, because a seller would rather have the deposit in his own operating account, where it is neither escrowed nor traceable as committed capital.
Substantiality is proportional, not a fixed number
There is no minimum dollar figure. Substantiality is measured against the total cost of purchasing an established enterprise or of establishing a new one, so a low-cost business demands a proportionally higher share of that cost, and the investment must be enough to make it likely the investor will successfully develop and direct the business. For a modest millwork shop this usually means the great majority of the purchase price plus working capital. Applicants are frequently told a round number circulating in the market; there is no such number in the requirement. The evidence that matters is a supported valuation of what the business genuinely costs to acquire and operate, set beside proof of what Patrice has actually put in.
What the category will never give him
A treaty investor status is renewable, potentially for many years, and the spouse is employment-authorized incident to that status, which makes it attractive to families. It offers no direct path to permanent residence. That is not a delay or a longer queue; there is simply no step within the category that converts into a green card. Households that intend to settle permanently should understand this at the outset, because the decisions that follow differ: children who will age out of derivative status at 21, a spouse's own long-term plans, and whether an immigrant route should be started in parallel rather than considered later. Nothing about the enterprise's success changes the answer, and it should not be treated as a formality that will resolve itself.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-07. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.