Posted June 8, 2024 by James Billings
Today, we’re going to talk about a business trust company. My name is James. You can set up a business trust company in any one of over 80 common law countries, including Australia, Canada, the UK, and, of course, the United States.
Why Set Up a Business Trust?
Why are we doing this? Because we do things on purpose. Are you looking for asset protection, maybe to reduce income taxes, or seeking anonymity if you’re involved in real estate, or to eliminate Secretary of State filings or Companies House filings as they have them in the UK?
Designing Your Strategy
We look at a strategy based upon the type of asset or assets that you have. Are these:
- real property rentals
- self-employment contracts
- e-commerce businesses
All these factors go into the design of your strategy.
Tactical Elements of a Business Trust
The tactical elements include the participants. Who are the people going to participate in your business trust? What are their benefits, what are their protections, and why are they doing this? We need to have an organized checklist in order to execute this properly, and then we need the proper documentation—the trust declaration.
Naming and Structure of Your Trust
Now, let’s begin with your trust name. How are you going to do your trust name? What do you want to call it? Are you going to advertise to the public? Do you have any trademarks or service marks? You have a domain name, you have an existing name, and there’s no Secretary of State registration. There’s a variety of elements that go into how you choose the trust name.
Trustees and Beneficiaries
Then what about your trustees? You’ve heard of a board of trustees. How many do you actually need to have—5, 10, 20? Are these individuals, or are these other corporations, LLCs, business trusts, and living trusts because they can be all of them? And what state are they based in, or what country are they all in one, or are they in different locations?
Operational and Compliance Considerations
What about banking? Okay, say, for instance, you want to get a bank account because you got that EIN number. You go to a big bank, you go to a little bank, you go to an out-of-town bank, out-of-state bank, or maybe out of the country. What kind of questions are you going to be asked?
Conclusion and Next Steps
In conclusion, this video is to talk about a business trust company, how you put them together, the different planning issues. If you do it intelligently, do some pre-planning, and have a proactive approach, you’re going to get it right. These business trusts are incredibly powerful instruments. They’re sort of secret in their own way, but actually have been around for hundreds of years.
Get your free copy of the LLC versus Business Trust comparison chart here.
If you have any questions, please contact James Billings, founder and owner of TrustArte, at james@trustarte.com or 619-537-8625. Visit my YouTube channel for video content.