Reserved Visa Set-Asides, Explained: Rural, High-Unemployment, and Infrastructure

Before 2022, EB-5 investors competed for the same pool of visas regardless of where they invested. The Reform and Integrity Act changed that by reserving a share of the annual supply for specific kinds of projects. The law requires 32% of the new visas in each year’s annual allotment to be set aside (Figure 1).  Over time, the allotment varies as different categories go used or unused, but the proportion of total Reserved visas for 2026 remains in the same ballpark at ~39% (see Table 2 below).

Rural TEA projects receive the largest reservation at 20 percent of the annual supply, followed by High-unemployment areas at 10 percent, and infrastructure projects at 2 percent. The remaining visas stay in the standard, unreserved category. A reserved visa carries two advantages worth understanding: a dedicated allocation that is harder to exhaust, and, for rural projects specifically, priority in processing.

The set-aside system was designed to push capital toward rural areas and places with high unemployment, and it has demonstrated a solid track record in achieving this mission. For EB-5 investors, the practical lesson is that the category a project occupies is not a label. It determines the size of the visa pool you draw from and, for rural, how quickly your petition is read. 

As of mid-2026, all three reserved categories were “current” (meaning, unexhausted) for every country. Part of the reason is supply. The Department of State set the fiscal 2026 EB-5 limit at 13,206 visas, well above the usual baseline near 9,940, because unused family-based visas transferred over into the employment categories. About 7,634 of those are spread across the reserved categories. A larger pool takes longer to fill, which is why cutoff dates have not yet appeared for the reserved lanes.  

In the below data table from the State Department, “C” indicates “current” for each of the reserved categories. IIUSA’s monthly readings of the Visa Bulletin are another reliable way to watch those lanes for the first signs of movement.

Because a set-aside category that reads “current” today can retrogress as demand accumulates against a fixed annual supply, investors should track the State Department’s monthly Visa Bulletin (specifically the Final Action Dates in Table 3 above).  

The best practice is to monitor this information before committing capital and throughout the life of their petition, since it is the cutoff date attached to your project’s category (not the project itself) that governs when a visa becomes available to you. 

A Regional Center worth partnering with should be able to explain in concrete terms how its project’s category is positioned against current usage and where the reserved lanes are trending. 

When evaluating a Regional Center, ask whether it reads the bulletin every month, and how it sources and interprets demand data.  For instance, does it look up the DOS annual limits and IIUSA’s monthly readings like the tables given above? 

Also ask whether the Regional Center can offer a reasoned opinion or belief about where a given category might begin to move next. 

While no one has a crystal ball, a Regional Center that treats visa availability as a living variable to be monitored (rather than a fixed feature of the project) is one that genuinely understands the timeline it is asking you to underwrite.

This article is provided for educational purposes only and does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any security. All EB-5 investments must be at risk and may result in the loss of capital. Investors should consult their own legal, immigration, and financial advisors.