Newbie question on forming an LLC

[Nathan Goodlove]

New to Bigger Pocket, and the real estate investing community. I had a question in regards to a beginner investor starting out. Currently in the process of forming a LLC to encompass my future real estate purchases. I wanted to ask if there are any pointers or recommendations when forming my LLC that any of you may have? I have read and watched several videos on anonymity in the rental property business and wondered if this was an issue that any of you feel warrants utilizing an attorney as the registered agent? Thanks!

[Tiffany Ralston]

If you call the state of Iowa, they will walk you through the steps to form your own LLC- it's a $50 fee to the state. It's really easy. The caveat to that is, ask your lender what paperwork they need from your LLC for your financing (operating agreement) - you could have your attorney draft it, or again, you could have it done on legal zoom.. This is a route to consider if you are starting out and buying SF's. If you are entering a partnership, or a bigger property, I would have an attorney do all of the work. Generally $500.

Also, call your insurance company and ask how many properties can be insured under one LLC. Our insurance company only allows 4 props per LLC. So we create a new LLC, after we have 4 properties. This also has the benefit of reducing liability to our other properties, held under other LLC's. Our friends just suggested we looked into series-LLC- I'm going to research that and see if that's a better approach going forward.

You can do a reverse entity search and find the owner of any LLC in Iowa- so you can "kind of" stay anonymous, but not all the way.