I understand that you need at least 16 players for an event at a private location to be eligible for IFPA points but I am wondering, would a 16 player event at a private location be eligible for the same number of IFPA points as a public tournament involving an identical group of players?
Yes.
Apart from the requirement to have 16 players (and the limit on the number of events per year at a location), tournaments in private locations are treated the same as public ones.
Please don’t forget that a player must play in a least 50% of the games to be included in the results. I recently saw in a neighboring state a “private” tourney that only garnered 14 entrants. They then scraped up a couple more players who only played in the last couple rounds to get to 16, otherwise their event was going to be worthless for IFPA points. They reported 16 and it went through…
Also remember you can only run so many private events each year. Might be like 4.
By “private location” does this mean the tournament is by invitation only? Or is it just a normal tournament that is open entry, but at someone’s house?
The latter. The address is private and you have to contact the organizer directly to come to the event.