You can now access private equity with $25,000 to $75,000 instead of the $5 million a traditional LP commitment requires. Evergreen funds from Blackstone, KKR, and Hamilton Lane, plus platforms like Moonfare and iCapital, opened the gates. The catch: layered fees of 3 to 4 percent a year and liquidity capped at roughly 5 percent of fund assets per quarter.
Key takeaways
- Evergreen (perpetual) funds are the main low-minimum route. Blackstone's BXPE starts at $25,000, KKR's K-PRIME at around $25,000 depending on share class, and Hamilton Lane's Private Assets Fund at $50,000.
- Eligibility gates still apply. Most evergreen PE funds require you to be an accredited investor at minimum, and flagship products like BXPE also require qualified purchaser status ($5 million in investments), so the low minimum is not the real barrier.
- All-in costs run far above the headline management fee. Hamilton Lane's Private Assets Fund reports total expense ratios of 3.38 to 4.08 percent depending on share class, before any platform layer.
- Liquidity is a feature on paper and a queue in practice. Quarterly repurchases are typically capped at 5 percent of NAV, and managers can gate redemptions entirely, as Blackstone's BREIT did in 2022 and 2023.
- The August 2025 executive order is pushing private equity into 401(k)s. The Department of Labor proposed fiduciary safe-harbor rules on March 30, 2026, with final rules expected late 2026.
Why the minimums dropped
A traditional private equity fund is a 10-plus-year limited partnership with capital calls, no redemptions, and minimum commitments of $5 million to $25 million at the flagship firms. That structure was built for pensions and endowments, and those investors are now largely allocated. Individual investors hold a small fraction of their wealth in private markets, so the big managers rebuilt their products for the wealth channel.
The result is the evergreen fund: a perpetual vehicle you buy at monthly NAV, fully invested from day one, with no capital calls and limited quarterly liquidity. Blackstone, KKR, Apollo, and Hamilton Lane all now run evergreen private equity strategies aimed at individuals, distributed mostly through financial advisors and wirehouses. Fundraising in this wrapper has grown fast enough that it is reshaping how the industry sells itself, a shift the private equity hub covers in more depth.
The real minimums in 2026
Every number below comes from the provider's own materials or SEC filings. Minimums vary by share class and distribution channel, so treat these as the published entry points, not a guarantee your advisor's platform offers them.
| Vehicle / platform | Minimum | Structure | Liquidity | Fee reality |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Blackstone BXPE | $25,000 initial, $1,000 subsequent | Perpetual private fund (accredited investor and qualified purchaser required) | Quarterly repurchases at the manager's discretion | 1.25% management fee on NAV plus 12.5% performance allocation over a 5% hurdle, plus distribution fees on retail share classes |
| KKR K-PRIME | ~$25,000 (varies by share class and region) | Evergreen private markets equity fund | Quarterly repurchases up to 5% of NAV; 2-year soft lock with a 5% early repurchase fee | Management fee around 1.0 to 1.25% depending on class; watch for servicing fees layered on top |
| Hamilton Lane Private Assets Fund | $50,000 (Class R and D); $1M (Class I) | '40 Act tender-offer fund for accredited investors who are also qualified clients | Quarterly tender offers, anticipated at no more than 5% of net assets | Total expense ratios of 3.38% (I), 3.63% (D), 4.08% (R) per the prospectus |
| Hamilton Lane Private Infrastructure Fund | $500 via the Republic platform | '40 Act interval fund | Quarterly repurchase offers of at least 5% of shares | Interval-fund expense stack; cheaper entry, same illiquidity math |
| Moonfare (US) | ~$75,000, down from $125,000 | Feeder funds into name-brand PE funds | Fund-dependent; a secondary matching window exists but is not guaranteed | Platform fee stacks on top of the underlying fund's 2-and-20 |
| iCapital / CAIS (via advisor) | $25,000 to $100,000 | Advisor-mediated feeder funds into institutional funds | Matches the underlying fund, i.e., mostly none for drawdown funds | Underlying fund fees plus a feeder/administration layer |
| Fundrise Innovation Fund (VCX) | Price of one NYSE share | Formerly a $10-minimum private fund; listed on NYSE March 19, 2026 | Daily, it trades on an exchange | 1.85% flat fee, no carry; traded at a large premium to its roughly $19 NAV after listing |
The Fundrise story deserves a flag. The Innovation Fund was the most retail-friendly option in the market, $10 minimum and a flat 1.85 percent fee, until it converted to a listed closed-end fund. Since the VCX listing, direct low-minimum investing is gone, and the shares spent their first weeks trading at multiples of net asset value. Paying a 200 percent premium for venture exposure is not access, it is speculation on the wrapper.
The eligibility gates nobody leads with
The minimums get the headlines, but SEC investor classifications decide what you can actually buy:
- Accredited investor: $1 million net worth excluding your primary residence, or $200,000 income ($300,000 with a spouse) in each of the last two years. Certain licenses (Series 7, 65, 82) also qualify. This unlocks feeder platforms and most '40 Act tender-offer funds.
- Qualified client: net worth above roughly $2.2 million (the SEC inflation-adjusts this every five years). Required for funds that charge performance fees under the Advisers Act, including Hamilton Lane's Private Assets Fund.
- Qualified purchaser: $5 million in investments. Required for 3(c)(7) private funds, including BXPE. This is the quiet punchline of the "democratization" pitch: Blackstone's $25,000-minimum fund is only open to people with $5 million already invested.
For a typical fatFIRE household, accredited status is trivial and qualified purchaser is realistic somewhere north of a $5 million liquid portfolio. That puts essentially every vehicle in the table on the menu, which makes the fee and liquidity analysis the real decision.
The honest trade-offs
The fee stack eats most of the illiquidity premium. The academic case for private equity is a return premium of a few percentage points over public markets in exchange for locking up capital. An evergreen fund charging 3.5 to 4 percent all-in, or a feeder adding a platform layer on top of 2-and-20, consumes most of that premium before you see it. Compare that with what hedge funds' returns against the S&P 500 look like after fees and the pattern is familiar: the structure gets paid whether or not the premium shows up.
Evergreen convenience has its own drag. To fund quarterly repurchases, evergreen funds hold cash and liquid sleeves, which dilutes private equity returns. Fully invested from day one also means you buy at today's NAV rather than averaging in through capital calls across vintage years, so you carry more entry-point risk.
Liquidity is capped and can be gated. A 5 percent quarterly repurchase means that if even a modest fraction of investors want out at once, you wait in a queue for years. This is not hypothetical. Blackstone gated BREIT redemptions for months starting in late 2022 when withdrawal requests exceeded limits. Every semi-liquid fund's documents allow the same move.
NAV is a managed number. Private valuations are appraised, not traded. Monthly NAVs move smoothly because the marks are smoothed, not because the underlying businesses are less volatile than public ones. You will not know what your stake is truly worth until assets are sold, and the leverage inside these deals behaves the way it does in any credit structure, a dynamic worth understanding via the leveraged loan primer since those loans finance the very buyouts these funds hold.
Retail is arriving late in the cycle. The industry is opening the wealth channel while exits are slow and dry powder is high. When an asset class starts marketing hard to smaller checks, it is fair to ask whose liquidity problem you are solving. The 401(k) push under the August 2025 executive order, now moving through a Department of Labor proposed rule issued March 30, 2026, will widen access further, but wider access is not the same as better expected returns.
Who should actually bother
Skip it if your portfolio is under roughly $2 million liquid. A 5 to 10 percent PE allocation at that size is $100,000 to $200,000 in one or two funds, which is concentration risk dressed up as diversification, and the fee drag on a small allocation rarely justifies the paperwork, K-1s, and lockups. Plain equity index exposure, covered across the investing hub, captures most of the same corporate profit pool at near-zero cost.
Consider it if you are at $5 million-plus liquid, already maxed on tax-advantaged space, and can genuinely leave the money untouched for seven to ten years. At that level you clear qualified purchaser, you can diversify across two or three managers and vintages, and a 10 to 15 percent private markets sleeve will not force a fire sale if life changes. Buy the cheapest share class your advisor or platform offers, read the expense table in the prospectus rather than the pitch deck, and treat the quarterly liquidity as an emergency exit, not a plan.
If you cannot see the full fee stack in writing, that is your answer. The managers offering these funds are excellent at making money in private markets. The open question, and the one your allocation depends on, is how much of it they leave for you.
Frequently asked questions
What is the lowest minimum to invest in private equity?
You can now access private equity with $25,000 to $75,000 instead of the $5 million a traditional LP commitment requires. Blackstone's BXPE starts at $25,000, KKR's K-PRIME at around $25,000 depending on share class, and Hamilton Lane's Private Assets Fund at $50,000. Evergreen or perpetual funds are the main low-minimum route, distributed mostly through financial advisors and wirehouses.
What is an evergreen private equity fund?
An evergreen fund is a perpetual vehicle you buy at monthly NAV, fully invested from day one, with no capital calls and limited quarterly liquidity. It contrasts with a traditional 10-plus-year limited partnership that has capital calls, no redemptions, and multimillion-dollar minimums. Blackstone, KKR, Apollo, and Hamilton Lane all now run evergreen private equity strategies aimed at individual investors.
Do I need to be an accredited investor for low-minimum private equity?
Yes, most evergreen PE funds require you to be an accredited investor at minimum, so the low minimum is not the real barrier. Accredited status means $1 million net worth excluding your home, or $200,000 income ($300,000 with a spouse). Flagship products like BXPE go further and require qualified purchaser status, meaning $5 million in investments, so the $25,000 minimum fund is only open to people with $5 million already invested.
How much do low-minimum private equity funds really cost?
All-in costs run far above the headline management fee. Hamilton Lane's Private Assets Fund reports total expense ratios of 3.38% to 4.08% depending on share class, before any platform layer. An evergreen fund charging 3.5 to 4 percent, or a feeder adding a platform layer on top of 2-and-20, consumes most of the private equity return premium before you see it.
How liquid are evergreen private equity funds?
Liquidity is capped and can be gated. Quarterly repurchases are typically limited to 5 percent of net asset value, so if even a modest fraction of investors want out at once, you wait in a queue for years. This is not hypothetical: Blackstone gated BREIT redemptions for months starting in late 2022 when withdrawal requests exceeded limits, and every semi-liquid fund's documents allow the same move.