Pre-Seed Funding Checklist for First-Time Founders

A pre-seed funding checklist helps first-time founders raise the first outside money to validate an idea and build an MVP, or minimum viable product. Most rounds fall between $50k and $500k from founders, friends and family, angels, and accelerators before setting a share price, according to Raisek's pre-seed checklist.

This checklist focuses on decisions you control before you pitch. It covers size, instrument, readiness, and lower-dilution options. It will not make investors say yes, but it prevents basic delays.

How much should you raise?
How does a SAFE work?
What should be ready before you take money?
Can you fund without selling equity?
How do you protect the filing date?

How much should you raise?

Tie your ask to MVP milestones, then size the valuation cap with it. Carta reports that the post-money SAFE with a valuation cap and no discount remained the standard in 2025, with median caps around $10M for $250k-$1M rounds and $15M for $1M-$2.5M rounds, in Carta's 2025 pre-seed report. Capital concentrated last year.

Carta found U.S. startups raised $10.4B across 50,316 SAFEs and convertible notes, down 1% in cash but down 13% in count. Fewer, larger rounds won. Ask only for what gets you to proof, revenue, or a priced round.

How does a SAFE work?

A SAFE is not priced equity. Y Combinator, which created the post-money SAFE in 2013, describes it as a short free contract where investors fund now for automatic conversion into shares at the next priced round, usually negotiating only the valuation cap, as explained on Y Combinator's SAFE page.

That simplicity sets your task. Pick a cap you can defend with traction and comparables. Record what triggers conversion and what happens if you never raise a priced round.

What should be ready before you take money?

Get the business basics that unlock money movement, hiring, and filing. The IRS says founders can get a federal Employer Identification Number free directly online with immediate issuance after validation in one 15-minute session, needed for bank accounts, hiring, and tax filings, as described in the IRS EIN application guide. Use this short readiness pass:.

Open a separate business bank account once the EIN is issued.
Confirm who can sign, spend, and approve fundraising documents.
Keep a simple data room with formation papers, cap table, and SAFE form.

Can you fund without selling equity?

Yes, for small working needs. The Small Business Administration says SBA Microloans offer up to $50,000, averaging about $13,000, through nonprofit intermediary lenders for working capital and equipment. The program is non-dilutive but requires eligibility review and often a business plan and projections.

Public solicitation has stricter rules. The Securities and Exchange Commission says a company may raise up to $5M in 12 months under Regulation Crowdfunding only online through a registered broker-dealer or funding portal. Investor limits, disclosure, advertising restrictions, and bad-actor disqualification apply.

How do you protect the filing date?

File early if the product may be patentable. The Patent and Trademark Office says a provisional patent application secures a 12-month patent pending priority date without examination.

You must file the non-provisional within 12 months or lose the date. Fees in 2025 were $65 for micro entity, $130 for small entity, and $325 for large entity. Calendar the 12-month deadline on the day you file, because missing it loses the early date.