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Private Control, Private Ownership Provide Incomparable Strategic Abilities
Over the preceding pages we have shown how Nevada’s statutes relating to common “C” corporations have created a climate in which it is possible to both control and own a Nevada corporation maintaining a high degree of privacy.
You might remember your parents telling you something like, “It’s just not wise to go around telling everyone about your private business. It’s no business of theirs. You’re going to have to learn to keep your business to yourself” That seemed like sage advice back then and it seems even more applicable “in this day and age” when our financial affairs have for the most part become like an open book.
The lack of privacy wouldn’t be so bad except there are so many malicious and vexatious lawsuits now. If you’ve got assets, it seems like it’s only a matter of time before someone looks for an easy way to take them from you. For the price of an asset search, such an attacker can quickly and easily find out all they need to know to put you in their crosshairs.
Knowing what a tremendous tool private Nevada corporations can be, it’s time to start being proactive and thinking strategically. By acting in advance of the problems that ever more inevitably seem to arise we can often avoid frivolous, malicious and vexatious lawsuits altogether. A prospective litigant, someone who wants to make money the “new-fashioned way”—not by earning it but by taking it from someone who has earned it—is far more likely to go after a bone with more meat hanging from it. With a properly structured and operated Nevada corporation, that will not be you and your assets.
Rule Number One: Don’t go around looking like you’re a nice, juicy target. Keep a low profile!
Live comfortably but modestly, minimizing your personal income. For instance, if you want to have a nice trip to Hawaii, why not whisper in the ear of the Board about the potential for investing in Hawaiian real estate? Who knows, they just might resolve to send you over there to check it out for the company. The corporation pays the expenses, helping to minimize what you “need” personally in the way of income. And if the need arises, the Board might be amenable to helping you past any temporary financial difficulties with a LOAN. Oh sure, it might put you in debt—but later on, in a courtroom somewhere, that debt might save you a whole lot of money.
Similarly, you might want to re-think the idea that you need to have a lot of assets in your own name where they are at the greatest risk. If it comes to a lawsuit, you can be failry sure that the discovery process will reveal the true extent of your ownership of assets. A defensive strategy of perjuring yourself is neither wise nor usually successful. When it comes right down to it you will find that losing assets to friends, loved ones and family today is a lot less painful than losing them to a vexatious litigant in a lawsuit some time from now.
Creative estate-planning strategies have been developed around the use of Nevada corporations. Estate plans where trusts have traditionally been used can often be restructured more effectively using Nevada corporations. Nevada corporations generally allow for more flexibility and creative planning when passing estates to heirs than trusts do, while providing similar benefits such as avoiding probate and potentially eliminating all estate taxes. Remember: A corporation never dies, it just gets a new president!
Proper structuring within the laws can provide enhanced liability protection, asset protection and tax savings. Many other strategies, most of them possible only in Nevada due to its sheltering statutes, are covered in the “STRATEGIES” section of The Nevada Corporation Manual, a “must have” for anyone seriously interested in working with Nevada corporations.
Now that you’ve reached the end of this part of the site, we invite you to review the PRIVACY material by clicking on the buttons at the top of the page OR move on to “Working Examples” outlined in the Strategies section.
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