This process is a bit of a scammy to say the least. I can understand why people would want nothing to do with it. Apart from the suit of sleazy law firms that offer to “help”,similar to other visas the us applies a quota per nationality, with waiting times of many years depending on where you are from. Unless you have $500k to throw away it is not a viable option as far as I could see.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/real-estate-developers-look-to-...

For people born in certain countries like China, it is indeed a bad deal, due to per-country quota. Yes, there are scams. A Chinese attorney couple in California got busted.

USCIS mandates that the investment (in this case, $500K) should be at risk.

However, if one has $1M to invest and create 10 jobs for two years, this pipeline hasn't exhausted per-country quota as yet. The GP makes enough money to go through this route. Buy a failing business in some area, run it for a loss and get the green card. Here, one doesn't need to deal with sleazy lawyers.

$7.25 per hr is the min wage in some states. $20K per year per job. 10 jobs per year = $200K. Run it until conditions are removed for the green card. Due to delays in gc processing, add one more year to 2 years conditional period. So, 3 years in total. The total cost: $200K * 3 = $600K.

I don't want to risk $500k on this. Would rather go back and invest it in my home country. It's also a scam and I don't want to get my GC this way.