Read the general investor planning overview
Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga maple and agri-food processor invests in a small American co-packing operation that, in its first year, will support the owner and one employee. The enterprise must not be marginal: it must have the present or future capacity to generate more than a minimal living for the investor and family, ordinarily within about five years. That is a question about evidence and reasoning, and it is answered with a plan whose numbers someone can check. Hypothetical example: a Tyendinaga buyer of a U.S. commercial-laundry route must decide whether to pay for vehicles before or after the application. The decision turns on whether the contracts make the funds genuinely vulnerable while providing a coherent exit if the transaction cannot proceed. The paperwork should reflect a real commercial arrangement, not a staged appearance of risk.
Understand what marginality actually asks
The test is not whether the business is profitable on day one. It asks whether the enterprise has the present or future capacity to produce more than a minimal living for the investor and family within a reasonable period, generally taken as around five years, or whether it will make a significant economic contribution. A small operation that grows into a real employer can satisfy it; a business designed to occupy one person and produce a modest income indefinitely is the harder case, and the honest response is to change the plan rather than to describe it optimistically. Reconcile the source narrative to original records before funds move. Sale proceeds, savings, gifts, or loans each require their own paper trail. A spreadsheet is useful only when it points to bank, tax, and transaction documents that independently prove the entries.
Build projections from facts, not templates
A defensible projection is one whose assumptions are stated and sourced. Start with what is known: contracted or likely customers, the capacity of the equipment purchased, prices actually quoted, the cost of labour in that location, and the investor's own trading history in a comparable business. Show the arithmetic connecting those to the revenue line, and show the hiring schedule with the months in which each position is added and why the volume requires it. A plan built this way survives questions because each number can be traced back to something outside the plan. Read every purchase and escrow term for cancellation rights, release triggers, and who bears loss. The question is not whether the buyer prefers protection; it is whether the arrangement shows meaningful financial commitment to the enterprise.
Support the plan with what already exists
Projections carry more weight when accompanied by evidence of an operating business: signed supply agreements, purchase orders, the equipment invoices and delivery receipts, the lease, licences obtained, and any revenue already earned. Where the investor has run a similar operation in Ontario, its financial statements demonstrate that the assumptions are not invented. Keep the plan and the evidence consistent, since a projection describing three shifts and an equipment list that supports one is the kind of inconsistency that undermines an otherwise sound file, and it is entirely avoidable. Where a number in the plan changes during preparation, update every document that depends on it rather than only the summary page. Test marginality with operating assumptions that a business owner could defend: customers, staffing, fixed costs, and timing. A forecast should show how the business grows beyond household support, not merely repeat a revenue number without the steps producing it.
What else is on your mind?
Is there one minimum investment that guarantees E-2 eligibility?Is holding money or owning an asset enough for E-2?Editorial source review: 2026-09-07. General preparation guidance, not an individual assessment.