For foreign investors
Foreign capital invested in U.S. real estate and operating businesses is productive capital: it finances construction, employs American workers, and puts assets into service. The obstacles are rarely about appetite. They are structural, and most of them are solvable before the first dollar moves.
Why Brazilian and Latin American investors look at the United States
Currency and jurisdictional diversification. Depth of debt markets. Enforceable contracts and predictable title. Asset classes — workforce multifamily, self-storage, industrial, build-to-rent — that are institutional in the U.S. and thin or unavailable at home.
What usually stops a first-time cross-border investor is not the asset. It is the discovery, late, that the holding structure created a tax outcome nobody modelled.
The five issues that decide the outcome
1. FIRPTA
The Foreign Investment in Real Property Tax Act generally treats gain on the disposition of a U.S. real property interest by a foreign person as income effectively connected with a U.S. trade or business, and imposes a withholding obligation on the buyer at closing. The withholding is a mechanism, not the final tax — but if nobody planned for it, it arrives as a surprise on the settlement statement.
2. Choice of structure
Direct ownership, a U.S. LLC, a corporate blocker, a REIT vehicle. Each changes the rate of tax, who files what, whether income flows through, and how a future sale is treated. The right answer depends on the investor’s home jurisdiction, the asset, the horizon and the exit — which is why there is no generic right answer.
3. FATCA and reporting
The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act imposes information-reporting and, in some cases, withholding obligations on foreign financial institutions and certain non-financial entities. Getting documentation right at onboarding is straightforward. Fixing it afterwards is not.
4. Estate tax exposure
This is the one most often missed. A non-resident, non-citizen holding U.S.-situs assets directly may face U.S. estate tax exposure with a very small exemption compared with the amount available to U.S. persons. It is a structuring question, and it has to be addressed at acquisition.
5. Sponsor diligence
The tax structure gets the attention; the sponsor determines the outcome. Track record through a full cycle, reporting quality, alignment of economics, governance rights, and what happens when a project goes wrong.
What we do — and what we do not do
NAJA Capital works as a bridge: translating between a Latin American investor’s expectations and U.S. market practice, coordinating the U.S. attorneys and accountants who provide the actual tax and legal advice, building the diligence and reporting frameworks, and sourcing and underwriting opportunities.
We do not give tax or legal advice. We do not promise a tax outcome. We do not guarantee returns. A structure that is aggressive today and unwinds in an audit three years from now is not a service to anyone.
Where this connects to community investment
Cross-border capital and Opportunity Zone development are the same work seen from two ends. Foreign investors are looking for durable, income-producing U.S. assets. Designated tracts need construction capital. Our intent is to connect the two through structures that are compliant, transparent, and written with community terms in them. More on Opportunity Zones →
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