I live in FL... I know some google could help me but seeking advice from those that may have done it what the best process is- did you use a 3rd party like legalzoom or whatever to prep and make the forms easy or did you peace together everything from the state and local resources?
How do you pay yourself? How much of my car use has to be for the business to write it as an expense? etc.
thanks, and mods delete if there already is a thread like this - I looked
I have two LLCs, one for my Second Life business (I'll call this the SL LLC), and another for my real estate business with my wife. The SL business is an S-Corp, and the real estate is a partnership (so more or less an LLP but for texas, they recognize only as LLC).
A few things here - more geared toward an S-Corp which is probably desirable for taxes, but check with your tax advisor first:
1. I used the same attorney to set up my SL LLC and my real estate LLC. The real estate however was a special LLC available in Texas called a "Series LLC" which is good to keep assets (read: houses) completely seperate from each other legally but still owned by one master LLC. I'm not sure what florida has in this regard, or whether or not you would need it, but it's there in Texas at least. It's true in Texas, fill out 2 pages, and send it off and walla, LLC. However, there are many parts to owning an LLC, and I highly suggest a lawyer for this purpose. Ours charged $600 (on top of filing fees in Texas) and gives us support "for the life of the corporation".
2. The SL LLC I'll talk more about because it's a single LLC. As I said above, for IRS purposes, it's an S-Corp. For this reason, I need to treat it like a bonafied corporation. Therefore, I have board meetings, policies and procedures (eg: Capitalization agreements) etc. I have a complete operating agreement, for example, what happens when I die who gets the assets of the corporation, etc. LOTS of shit you don't think of, another reason I'd suggest a lawyer. Also my situation being a Second Life business is unique. Linden Lab only recognized individual ownership of the avatars, but my business technically owns my in-world avatars, so my lawyer, in the operating agreement of the corporation, had to go through a lot of legalese to explain it.
3. I pay myself a salary, and cut myself a check every month for a small amount but should still be "reasonable for your position". I put that I'm a "senior app developer" and a salary of around 50k a year. However, if I want more, I generally have retained earnings in my bank account and can just pay myself a bonus by withdrawing them (untaxed because they have already been taxed though a K1 on my personal return since I am 100% shareholder). DONT pay yourself a bonafied bonus, or you'll have to pay a lot more tax. My CPA handles my payroll, and I'm registered through EFTPS to handle automatic debits from my business checking account for my taxes and payroll taxes. Also federal unemployment and state unemployment through there as well.
4. You need to make sure you can even use the name. In Texas, for a DBA, any name will be granted. However, for an LLC, you can't even have the name that is even close to another (i.e. There's a "Dragon Financial" in texas, but "Dragon Games" will not fly). Florida might have something similar. Your lawyer can handle all this.
5. You will need to handle yearly "meetings" to satisfy the IRS requirement that you have a legitimate corporation. My CPA handles all this. I'm more than happy to show you an example of the kind of agreements I'm talking about.
6. SEPARATE 100% OF EVERYTHING. Buy all your shit legit (Windows 10, Office, etc). DO NOT INTERMINGLE ASSETS. This is the #1 mistake people make. In my home office, 99.99999% of everything in here was bought and paid for by the corporation. My bank account for my business is separate from my personal. I don't use personal funds to buy things for hte business and vice versa. While I do buy things like computers and stuff through the corporation, they are legit business expenses. I cannot stress this one enough. If you get sued, and the court or anyone else can prove you've been intermingling shit, the court will just toss out your LLC and make you personally liable.
7. I hired a seperate lawyer to make a terms of service and a privacy policy for me, both of which cost me about $1,500 to do. Not sure if this is needed for your stuff or not, but make sure you protect your business.
ask anything else specific if you wanna know.