Can I Start A Business As a U.S. Non-Citizen?

Immigrants Can Start U.S.-Based Businesses

Well, congratulations for not giving up on your dream and starting to research it for yourself. You are reading this article, so it must mean that you have not given up on your dream. In this article, I share some information that can help you START your path to owning your own U.S.-based business if you are a non-citizen. 

I am an immigrant so I know about questioning whether or not I can start a business in the U. S. As you can see, I have started my own company, Priscilla Kucer Consulting Solutions LLC. So I can tell you that it is possible for an immigrant to start a company based in the U.S. 

I’m sure that you may have heard of people who went to college or university here in the U.S., but they were not U.S. citizens. You may have worked or are still working in companies where you may know of colleagues who are here working in the U.S. on some type of visa because they are non U.S. citizens.

The point is that you have probably heard of or know of someone who went to school and even worked in the U.S. as a non-citizen. But, did you know that you can start a business in the U.S. even though you are not a U.S. citizen?

There are several things that we hear or that we are told when we first mention to others that we want to start a business. This is regardless of your immigration status. If you are a non-U.S. citizen, there may be people in your life you may have told you that you can’t start a business in the U.S. because you are not American. 

But have you truly looked into that to find out the truth for yourself or did you just simply give up on your dream of having your own U.S. based business?

As I mentioned earlier, you CAN start a business and even continue to build it as a non-U.S. citizen! However, there are a few limitations to the types of business, but they are still enough business types that you can use to form your business.

I will be launching a course soon on all the things that you need to know to start a business and I will have two versions: One for U.S. citizens and one for non-U.S. citizens. Keep up with me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram to know when I launch the courses.

I came across several articles as I was researching to develop the courses that I just mentioned. One of those resources included a Legal Zoom article that talks about knowing what you have to do to start an LLC as a non-U.S. citizen. It was an interesting article. In that article, there were two things that stood out the most to me that I wanted to share because I felt like these are two things you need to know as a non-U.S. citizen who wants to start and build a business in the U.S.

2 Things to Know as a Non-U.S. Citizen Starting a Business in the U.S.

By the way, Ronna DeLoe Esq wrote the article for Legal Zoom that I am talking about. In that article, these are the two things that stood out to me that I felt were important to share with you: 

1. Residency and status requirements

There are no residency or citizenship requirements to start a Limited Liability Company (LLC) or a C Corporation. You will need a U.S. address or have a Registered Agent in the U.S. in the event someone sues you. That is the address where you need to have someone to accept the service papers if you are sued (hopefully you won't get sued, but you have to be prepared for the possibility). In my course, I will be providing you with options on how you can find a Registered Agent.

2. Know your Green Card or visa status

There are only certain visas that allow you to work in the U.S. There are different routes to obtaining those visas as well as to different routes to obtaining a green card or permanent resident status. H1-B visas are the most popular for those who have bachelors or masters degrees so that they can work in the U.S. So be sure to check with your immigration lawyer to verify if you can work with the visa status that you currently have as well as to find out your options that you can pursue based on your unique situation.

Once you have completed those two things, then you are ready to file to get your LLC registered. You will have to select the state where you want to form your business. Since income taxes can be a difficult process for non-citizens, you may want to consider one of the 9 states that don’t have income tax.

Then your next steps will include picking a name, getting the Employment Identification Number (EIN) or Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN), finding a registered agent, filing your articles of organization, getting business licenses (if applicable), setting up business bank accounts, plus the other steps for making your new business official. 

By the way, you can run your U.S.-based business from your home country. This means that you need to spend some time with planning the structure for your business. Work with a business coach to help you with planning the structure of your business.

When you find a business coach, be sure to ask them if they have any experience in working with business owners who are non-U.S. citizens. That way, you are in a better position of knowing if that the person helping you can truly help you!

If you are ready to learn more about what you need to start your new business, download my planning guide.

Thank you for taking the time to read my article.

Regards,

Dr. Priscilla "Dr. P" Kucer

Solutions+Actions=Results! (SoAR!)