[41209]

For one, you should probably have an LLC if you want to be serious about business in the first place. If it's just a hobby, then I guess don't charge money for it. But the moment you're charging people money, you practically need an LLC for so many little reasons. One you want to have separate finances established for the LLC and for yourself.

If I were you I'd go ahead and establish the LLC, and then just see if the client wants to move forward. If they do, there's no shame of hiring a few contractors on to help you get to where you want to get to. If they don't, then you still want an LLC

I have an LLC, and I'm well aware that I'll probably never make a dime on my side project. I just have no interest in commingling my personal and business finances.

Overall I'd definitely go for it

[singleauroa]

Great advice. The reason I have no LLC yet is that in my country (I am not from the US) setting up a limited would require around 25.000€ upfront locked investment. Given my low MRR until now there was no need to do it by any means. Most small SaaS companies run as a sole prop for the time being. (Germany/Austria area) Coming up with the 25.000€ also seems unreasonably high and would instantly require me to do proper accounting for which I would need to hire a dedicated accountant which adds to the cost again... Hope you can see that for my 500$ MRR it's simply not economically feasible.

That being said, I am seriously thinking about setting up my company in another country with a more appealing legal entity structure. Either the US or Estonia (EU E-Residency). Appreciate your advice here as well!

[clorohk]

I had a look into this for Austria some time ago, for small companies there seem to be looser rules and it seems to be possible to start out with 5k deposit (or 10k, not sure). Then you would slowly add to the Stammkapital over time I think. More can be found here: https://www.wko.at/service/wirtschaftsrecht-gewerberecht/Ges...

Concerning LLC be careful that there are double taxation treaties and that you first find an accountant who specialises in running a LLC from Ger/Aut. Otherwise you’ll pay twice in tax + high fees for the extra paperwork the accountant needs to do locally.

I personally had a look at having a UK Ltd run from Austria, there are plenty of companies specialising in that (just google UK Ltd Österreich/Deutschland). Not sure to what extent that’s still possible post Brexit.

All in all, especially if the big company is willing to pay upfront, I would personally go for a GmbH, might be more expensive to set up but saves you troubles in the long term I think.

Having said that, I’m only a programmer myself, please don’t rely on my advice here, definitely talk to a local accountant about that, they usually have a free consultation to get started.

[singleauroa]

Super interesting! Will look deeper into this now! It gets even a bit more complicated since I started nomading this year...