[acjohnson55]

Are you getting stock or options? Because the 83b election applies to grants of stock, not options.

If options, then I've only ever heard of doing an 83b election in concert with early exercise, so that you are effectively making the election on a stock grant.

I'm not sure whether you can choose to do within 30 days of every tranch of vesting. I've never heard of this, but I'd be interested to know whether this is actually possible.

[1] https://blog.wealthfront.com/always-file-your-83b/

[JumpCrisscross]

> the 83b election applies to grants of stock, not options

Unless you exercise early, in which case it does.

Disclaimer: I am neither a lawyer nor a CPA. This is not tax advice.

[pc86]

At which point the election is on the stock that you exercise, not the options.

[acjohnson55]

Yeah, that's mentioned in my post.

[sk5t]

83b is on grant, not vest. It can be used for options, but may not be a very good idea if the strike is appreciably greater than 0.

[acjohnson55]

I am not a tax lawyer, so I'm just doing my non-expert best to understand this. Correct me if I'm wrong.

According to [1], you have to pay the company for your shares in order to not be at substantial risk of forfeiture [2]. I understand that to mean that you need to both be granted and vested in the equity within the same 30 day period in order for it to qualify for 83b election. The timing doesn't work if your grant vests over a period years, hence the need to early exercise.

[1] http://www.seedsafefinancial.com/how-to-make-an-83b-election...

[2] http://www.henssler.com/blog/2015/3/27/substantial-risk-of-f...

[sulam]

You early exercise, which means you pay for options that are not yet vested. If you quit you get refunded what you paid on un-vested shares.

[acjohnson55]

I've mentioned this on every post.

> If options, then I've only ever heard of doing an 83b election in concert with early exercise

And

> The timing doesn't work if your grant vests over a period years, hence the need to early exercise.

Am I being unclear or are people just not reading what I'm writing? Also not sure where these downvotes are coming from. Definitely open to correction, but I've yet to see how it's possible to elect 83b on an option plan with vesting, if you can't / don't opt for early exercise.

[sulam]

Yes, of course you have to early exercise. As you've pointed out. I don't know about downvotes, wasn't one of them.