When somebody brings you an opportunity back home

Sooner or later somebody brings you something. A shop, a share of a business, a scheme, a plot, a friend of a cousin who needs a partner. It arrives at the worst possible moment for judgement: you are far away, you are earning in a stronger currency, you feel you owe somebody something, and you cannot go and look.

Some of these are real. The questions are the same either way.

Not "a share in the business". A number, on paper, of a named thing. If nobody can write down precisely what you would own, you do not yet have an offer, you have a conversation.

The single most expensive mistake in this corridor is money in one person's name and an understanding in another's. An understanding between relatives is not an asset, and it does not survive a death, a marriage, a falling out or a sale. If the answer is "we will sort the paperwork later", that is the answer.

• How much is everybody else putting in, and in what form?
• Who decides how money is spent, and how often will you see accounts?
• What is the process if you want your money back, and who buys you out?
• What happens if it needs more money later and you say no?

It matters whether what you are being offered is a regulated product or a private arrangement. In India, SEBI oversees securities and investment products and the Reserve Bank of India covers deposit taking, and both publish warnings and lists worth reading. A private deal between individuals has none of that behind it, which does not make it wrong, but it does mean there is nobody to complain to.

Pay for an hour with a lawyer you chose, in India, who is not acting for anybody else in the deal, before money moves. It is the cheapest part of the whole thing and it is the part people skip because it feels like distrust. It is not distrust; it is what makes the arrangement survivable if relations change.

Ask yourself whether a no would cost you the relationship. If it would, you are not being offered an investment, and treating it as a gift you can afford is usually the more honest answer for everybody.