In short
  • Formation, EIN and registered agent from one source.
  • Support with banking and payment providers, without empty promises.
  • As a pass-through entity, profit is attributed to the owner.
  • Your actual tax burden arises where you are resident.
  • US duties such as Form 5472 and the annual report are handled.
  • Built for solo founders and small teams without US staff.

Why a US LLC

It is fast to form, light on administration and widely accepted by payment providers and clients worldwide. For service businesses with no US staff and no fixed place of business in the States, it is a solid entry into an international structure. What it does not do is replace a residency strategy.

A Limited Liability Company combines two properties that rarely come together: liability protection like a corporation and tax treatment like a partnership. For location independent service businesses, that combination is precisely why the LLC has been the default entry vehicle for years.

There is a second factor most people underrate: acceptance. An LLC is not an exotic offshore construct. It is one of the most widely used legal forms in the largest economy on earth. Banks know it, payment providers know it, clients raise no questions. Anyone who has tried to open an account with a Caribbean entity understands what that difference is worth.

What the structure is built for

  • Consulting, agency work, software development and other services sold to business clients.
  • Digital products, courses and licensing models with customers across several countries.
  • A single owner or a small team, with no staff and no inventory inside the US.
  • Access to US payment infrastructure and multi-currency accounts.
  • A residence outside the classic high tax countries, or a move towards one.

What the LLC does not do

It does not replace a residency strategy. The LLC does not determine how much tax you pay. It determines only at which level the profit is treated. Skip past that sentence and you may end up with a structure that creates work and delivers no advantage at all. The rest of this page is therefore as much about the limits as about the possibilities.

The short version: the LLC governs the corporate level. Your residence governs your personal tax liability. Only both together make a structure.

What is included

Included are the choice of state, registration of the LLC, the registered agent, a draft operating agreement and the EIN application. On top of that comes support with banking and payment providers plus the setup of ongoing bookkeeping. On request we keep handling the annual US filings permanently.

The setup is scoped so that you end up with a working company rather than a certificate in your inbox. Four components make that happen.

COMPONENT 1

Formation and corporate documents

Choice of state, registration of the LLC, a registered agent with a deliverable address, and an operating agreement matched to your situation. The operating agreement is not a formality: banks ask for it, and when a foreign tax authority classifies your entity, it is the document they read.

COMPONENT 2

EIN from the IRS

The Employer Identification Number is the company's tax number. Without it there is no account, no serious payment provider and no filing with the IRS. For founders without a US social security number the application runs through a separate route that takes longer than the online path available to US persons.

COMPONENT 3

Banking and payment processing

We prepare the file for accounts and payment providers and stay with the process until a decision arrives. A second banking route is standard, so a frozen account does not stop the business. Nobody makes promises here, because the decision always rests with the institution.

COMPONENT 4

Ongoing bookkeeping and US filings

On request we take over bookkeeping, deadline monitoring and the annual US filings permanently. This is the part that decides, over years, whether the structure stays clean or turns into a remediation project.

What is not part of it

  • Individual tax advice in your country of residence. Licensed advisers there deliver that.
  • Any guarantee of an account or a merchant account. Institutions decide on their own criteria.
  • The residency move itself. That is a project of its own and sits inside the Nomad all-inclusive setup.
  • State filing fees. They fall where they arise.
On pricing: it depends on the state, the scope of ongoing support and your residency situation. That is why no figure appears here. The range is discussed on the call, before you commission anything.

Taxation explained honestly

A single-member LLC held by a non-US owner is generally treated as a disregarded entity, so the profit is attributed to the owner. As long as there is no trade or business in the US and no US-source income, federal income tax usually does not arise. Where that profit is actually taxed is decided by your country of residence.

The most common half-truth about the LLC is that it is tax free. The accurate version: under specific conditions no US federal income tax arises. What happens to that profit in your country of residence is an entirely separate question, and the LLC has no influence on it.

Pass-through taxation explained

A single-member LLC held by a non-US owner is treated as a disregarded entity for US income tax purposes. The company exists legally but is ignored fiscally. Profit is attributed directly to the owner as if he had earned it personally. That is what pass-through means.

For no US income tax to arise, two conditions have to hold.

  • No US permanent establishment: no office, no warehouse, no employees and no dependent agent regularly concluding contracts inside the US.
  • No US trade or business: the LLC must not operate on US soil. Selling to US customers from abroad does not, on its own, normally create one.

Where both hold, the US does not tax the profit. It counts as the owner's income and is captured wherever the owner is tax resident. If you live in a country that does not tax foreign income, or taxes on a territorial basis, the effective burden can be very low. If you live in Germany, the profit is taxed under German rules, LLC or no LLC.

You will therefore not find a promise of a zero tax outcome here. What applies in your case depends on residence, days of presence, income type and the relevant double tax treaty. The binding assessment is made by licensed advisers in your country of residence. The underlying mechanics are covered in our guide on forming a US LLC.

Ongoing US obligations

A foreign-owned single-member LLC generally has to file Form 5472 together with a pro forma Form 1120 each year. Add the state annual report and the state fees. Missing these is expensive, which is why deadline monitoring is part of the setup.

No tax does not mean no obligations. The LLC carries a fixed set of annual duties, and missing them costs considerably more than doing them. Three apply to practically every foreign-owned LLC.

DUTY 1

State annual report

Almost every state requires an annual report with a fee. Miss it and the LLC loses its good standing. Consequences range from penalty fees to administrative dissolution, and banks react quickly once an entity stops being in good standing. Due dates and scope vary by state.

DUTY 2

Form 5472 with a pro forma Form 1120

Foreign-owned single-member LLCs report their transactions with the owner to the IRS every year. That includes contributions, distributions and offsets. The filing is mandatory even when no tax whatsoever is due. The statutory minimum penalty for a missing or late Form 5472 is 25,000 US dollars, and the IRS does assess it.

DUTY 3

FBAR and further reporting

The FBAR filing applies to US persons whose foreign financial accounts exceed 10,000 US dollars in aggregate at any point during the year. For owners with no US connection it generally does not apply. US citizens and green card holders are covered regardless of where they live. This is a question to check, not to assume.

On top of that come duties in your country of residence: registering the shareholding, disclosing the foreign entity, declaring the attributed profits. That side is frequently more demanding than the American one.

Why bookkeeping is not optional: without clean records Form 5472 cannot be completed correctly, and without reliable numbers every bank eventually asks. A lean monthly routine costs little and prevents exactly the letters nobody wants to open.

State, banking and payment providers

Wyoming, New Mexico, Delaware and Florida differ on fees, disclosure and how banks treat them. We pick the state based on your business model and the intended banking route. For accounts and payment providers we prepare the file, but the decision always rests with the institution.

The choice of state is oversold in marketing. For an LLC with no US trade or business it has no effect on federal tax. It affects fees, disclosure and, within limits, how banks read your file. Nothing beyond that.

The usual candidates

State Strengths Limits
Wyoming Low ongoing fees, lean administration, members do not appear on the public register Some institutions and payment providers read it as the nomad default and review the file more closely
Florida Straightforward administration, solid bank acceptance, sensible where you have genuine ties to the state Members are visible on the public register, and the annual filing deadline is comparatively strict
Delaware The most developed corporate law, established with investors, a clean base for a later conversion to a corporation Higher running cost, usually unnecessary for a straightforward service business with no investor plans
New Mexico Very lean, no annual report, minimal administrative load The weakest card of the four with banks and payment providers, so it needs to be used deliberately

We pick the state based on the intended banking route and your business model, not on whichever advert quotes the lowest fee. With investors on the horizon the decision looks different than for a one person consultancy.

Accounts and payment providers

The bottleneck is never formation, it is the account. Institutions assess the business model, the owner's origin, proof of address and source of funds. Payment providers additionally assess industry and chargeback exposure. What you control is whether your statements contradict each other.

  • Certificate of formation, operating agreement and EIN confirmation, complete and legible.
  • Identity documents and an address proof consistent with the residence you declare.
  • A website describing the same business as your application forms.
  • Sample invoices and a traceable revenue history.
  • A second banking route, opened before you need it.

Who this is not for

Not suitable if you stay registered in Germany, Austria or Switzerland and expect the LLC to cut your tax bill. In that case it can be treated domestically as a permanent establishment or as opaque for tax purposes, which means more work rather than less. If you have US employees, US inventory or investor funding ahead, better structures exist.

There are constellations where the LLC does not merely fail to help, it actively hurts. Four of them come up regularly.

  • Residence stays in Germany, Austria or Switzerland. The tax authority classifies the LLC by comparing it to domestic legal forms. Depending on its design it may be treated as a corporation, and running it from your living room creates a domestic nexus. Result: more obligations, no benefit.
  • Real business inside the US. Staff, inventory or an agent concluding contracts there triggers US tax liability. A different structure is then the right answer, often a corporation.
  • Raising capital from investors. Funding rounds in the US run through corporations, not LLCs. If financing is planned, start in the target form.
  • An expectation of anonymity. The IRS knows you through the EIN and Form 5472, banks know you through beneficial ownership checks. Privacy towards the public is achievable, hiding from authorities is not.

Caution is also warranted at low revenue. Below a certain profit threshold, state fees, bookkeeping and reporting effort outweigh the benefit. We say that before an engagement, not after.

Process and timeline

After the call comes the choice of state and structure, then registration. The EIN takes anywhere from a few days to several weeks depending on the route. Banking and payment providers come last because they need the EIN and the formation documents.

The sequence is predictable, the duration only in orders of magnitude. Authorities and institutions work at their own pace, and no provider changes that.

STEP 1

Call and structural decision

Clarifying residence, business model and objective. It ends with a decision for or against the LLC and, if for, the choice of state. This is the only step that does not depend on third parties.

STEP 2

Registration and corporate documents

Filing in the chosen state, appointment of the registered agent, operating agreement. Registration itself usually runs from days to a few weeks depending on the state and the processing option.

STEP 3

EIN application

The item with the widest spread. For applicants without a US social security number, issuance can take anywhere from a few days to several weeks depending on the route chosen and IRS workload. It cannot be accelerated.

STEP 4

Banking and payment providers

Only possible now, because formation documents and the EIN are required. Expect further weeks depending on institution, business model and how complete your file is. A second provider is set up in parallel.

STEP 5

Ongoing operation

Bookkeeping routine, a deadline calendar for the annual report and Form 5472, an annual review. From here the LLC is infrastructure rather than a project.

In total, a fully operational setup is realistic in the order of several weeks to a few months. If someone commits to a fixed date, be sceptical.

Two cases from practice

Both cases are anonymised and altered in detail. The pattern behind them is typical.

CASE 1
Starting point A software developer planning to leave Germany forms the LLC six months ahead of the move so he can invoice his existing clients through it immediately.
Problem He still lives and works in Germany. The profit therefore lands squarely in domestic tax liability, with an argument about place of management on top. During that phase the LLC delivers nothing but additional work.
Solution Clean sequencing: invoice as a sole trader until the move is genuinely complete, then switch operations to the LLC. The structure stayed, only the timing of its use was corrected. Result: a clear separation of tax periods and nothing to attack later.
CASE 2
Starting point A consultant with a Wyoming LLC and residence outside the EU has served clients worldwide for three years. Her bookkeeping lives in a spreadsheet and no US filings were ever submitted.
Problem Neither the annual report nor Form 5472 had been filed. The entity lost its good standing, the account was restricted, and the missed filings carry a minimum penalty of 25,000 US dollars per year.
Solution Reinstatement of good standing in the state, late filings submitted with reasonable cause, then a fixed bookkeeping and deadline routine. Cleaning it up cost a multiple of what three years of ongoing support would have cost.

Common mistakes

MISTAKE 1

Forming before deciding on residence

The classic wrong order. Settle where you are and want to be tax resident, then choose the structure. An LLC that does not match your life is not a structure, it is a risk with an annual fee.

MISTAKE 2

Treating banking as an afterthought

Formation is the easy part. Building the setup on a single account, or concealing a high risk activity, risks frozen funds while obligations keep running. A second route belongs in the plan from day one.

MISTAKE 3

Mixing personal and company money

Private spending through the company account is more than untidiness in a limited liability entity. It complicates Form 5472, it unsettles banks, and it weakens the liability separation when it matters. Distributions get documented, not improvised.

MISTAKE 4

Postponing filings

The annual report and Form 5472 are predictable. They arrive every year, they rarely change, and they take hours when the books are in order. Push them for two years and the cleanup plus penalties costs far more than ongoing support ever would.

Frequently asked questions

Will I pay tax in the US with an LLC?
Usually not, provided there is no US trade or business and no US-source income. Filing and reporting duties still apply regardless of whether any tax is owed.
Does a US LLC work if I still live in Germany?
You can legally form one, but it rarely helps you for tax. The profits stay taxable at home and the structure can even create extra obligations.
How long does formation take?
Registration itself is often done within days. The bottlenecks are the EIN and then the bank account, so plan on several weeks until the setup is fully operational.
What is Form 5472?
An information return that foreign-owned US entities file on transactions with their owner. It is submitted with a pro forma Form 1120 and is mandatory even when no tax is due.
Which state is best?
There is no universally best state. Wyoming and New Mexico are lean and inexpensive, Delaware is established with investors, Florida can make sense with local ties. Your model decides.
Do I need a US address or a social security number?
No SSN is required, the EIN can be obtained without one. A deliverable address and a registered agent in the state of formation are mandatory.
Bastian Köhler
US LLC, HK Ltd & Growth

Bastian Köhler

Responsible for this topic within the Apatridus expert network. This article is a general orientation and does not replace advice in an individual case. Apatridus develops strategies and brokers the execution, the advice itself is provided by licensed partners.