Galen Moore Contributor Galen Moore is director of Business Development at New Alchemy. Right now, most participants in U.S. private placements must be “accredited” investors, meaning $200,000 annual income over multiple years or $1 million in net worth, not including your primary residence. These numbers have not changed since 1982, though inflation in the intervening decades has more than halved the real wealth they represent. This means your mother, who owns a vacation home on Cape Cod, may be getting phone calls from boiler room broker-dealers.