IN THIS GUIDE · Reconstructing ownership, gifts or loans when start-up expenses ran through a family member's account
Start with the E-2 eligibility and application overview
Name the owner of every dollar spent
Begin with a ledger of each payment made from the relative's account: date, amount, payee, and the business purpose. Then state what the money legally was — the investor's own funds held elsewhere, a gift, or a loan. That characterisation drives everything else, because E-2 asks whether the investor possesses and controls the capital and has placed it at risk. Deciding it after the fact, to match the evidence, is what creates inconsistency. Create a transfer table before drafting explanations: payer, payee, date, amount, purpose, bank reference and supporting agreement. Then reconcile each line to the business account and expense record. The table often reveals whether a relative paid as a donor, lender, co-owner or temporary conduit, which are materially different accounts.
Document a gift as a completed transfer
A genuine gift should be documented according to the actual facts: a signed declaration from the donor, the donor's own lawful source of the money, and a transfer record showing it moved to the investor or directly to the enterprise for the investor's benefit. If repayment formed part of the actual arrangement, review and document the loan rather than calling it a gift. A later unilateral request does not automatically rewrite the original transaction. Unstated expectations inside a family are the detail that surfaces in an interview. Hypothetical example: a Canadian physiotherapist plans to buy a mobile equipment-sanitizing company after her aunt advances the vehicle deposit. The aunt later calls the advance a gift, but the bank memo says loan. Before relying on either description, the parties must decide the genuine terms and preserve the record that explains why the money was available to the investor.
Test a family loan against collateral
Borrowed money is not disqualified. What matters is whether the investor bears the risk. A loan secured by the investor's personal assets is generally treated differently from debt secured only by the enterprise's assets or its future earnings. Write the terms down: principal, interest, repayment schedule, and security. A verbal family arrangement with no security and no repayment plan is difficult to characterise, and the reviewer will ask. A review should also test the spending sequence. A signed lease, equipment invoice and properly structured escrow can show commitment, while an unspent balance may not. Do not cure an uncertain payment history by moving funds repeatedly among related accounts; obtain the contemporaneous record and explain the actual route.
Close the trail from origin to the enterprise
A closing balance proves nothing about origin. Show where the money was earned or realised — employment, business profits, a property sale — and then follow it account by account into the United States enterprise, including the leg that passed through the relative. Statements can be supplemented as the file develops, so a gap found now is a task, not a verdict. Convert currencies with dated rates and keep the working. The business plan should state which person makes pricing, hiring, purchasing and operating decisions after launch. Tie those statements to the ownership documents and forecast. If a relative retains control over the essential decisions, the reader must confront that fact rather than assuming a contribution alone shows the investor will direct the enterprise.
Sources reviewed 2026-09-07. This guide covers a preparation focus; it is not an individual eligibility assessment.