Starting business with a foreigner?

[dlaw86]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Connecticut (and or Wisconsin)

Kind of a different question I suppose. Me and a longtime friend are looking to start buying some rental properties together and forming a business (LLC?) to serve as the business that will own and manage the properties.

We would like for this to be a 50/50 partnership and realistically just keep rolling the money back into the business to buy additional properties. Where my question comes from though, is while I am a US Citizen, he is a Saudi Arabian without US citizenship and no work visa. Does this stand as being a problem for us, and would it be better if the business was under my name and he was a primary investor in the business?

 

[FlyingRon]

As long as he is just investing and not actually working he shouldn't have any immigration issues. What the tax issues for him back home are outside the scope of this forum. Certainly you LYING about the nature of what you are doing is NOT advisable. Note that there are requirements for reporting money transfer from foriegn sources (not onerous unless you fail to do so). Parnerships to own property are problematic at times even with two US nationals. You may wish to get REAL legal assistance here. You'll want to cultivate a relationship with a lawyer to handle your real estate transactions anyhow.

 

[dlaw86]

Yes we would like to keep everything above board and legal. The day-to-day activities of the business, finding additional properties in the future, dealing with tenants, etc would be handled primarily by me until we hired someone to manage these activities. We have no want/need to take money out of the business for ourselves, as this would purely be an investment opportunity for us to grow a portfolio of properties over time.