Tax Savvy US Expat Entrepreneur – Stewart Patton

Tax Savvy US Expat Entrepreneur

Entrepreneur: Complete tax and legal structuring solution for location-independent entrepreneurs

Living outside the US creates an awesome opportunity to own and operate your own location-independent business and pay no or very little tax. But actually understanding and implementing this opportunity can be difficult.

The Jungle Gets Thicker

Once you start putting together your own location-independent business as an expat or digital nomad, the complications intensify.

Now you have all sorts of issues to figure out:

• Can I operate my business through a non-US corporation?
• If so, what’s the best jurisdiction in which to form my non-US corporation?
• How do I set up a non-US corporation without getting scammed?
• Can I still bank in the US?
• How can I open a US bank account under a non-US corporation?
• What are the exact US tax consequences of using this structure?
• How exactly do I operate a business under a legal entity?
• How can I invest for retirement ?
• How do I report all this on my US tax return?
• Will I still have to pay state tax?
• And what about non-US tax?

The Paths get More Treachorous

Let’s look at different ways to answer these questions.

The IRS provides absolutely no help at all. IRS Publication 54 doesn’t discuss which legal structures are best in particular situations, and of course the IRS can’t tell you how to form a non-US corporation. The IRS is just silent on all these issues.

Then, the internet is full of unreliable yammering about these issues. The nuggets of good advice are buried under so many layers of supposition and contradiction that it would take you hours and hours to find the gold. You’ll be so fed up at that point that you wouldn’t recognize it.

Also, the crocodiles are thicker and meaner in this part of the jungle. All sorts of “offshore gurus” and fly-by-night incorporation services are looking to sell you a useless and over-complicated structure at an exorbitant rate.

Now, of course I have a package of services for location-independent entrepreneurs where I take care of everything for you. But I’m extremely busy and I get new inquiries all the time, so I charge several thousand dollars per year. Unfortunately, my services aren’t really accessible to many bootstrapped startups and early-stage lifestyle businesses.

A Better Way

That’s why I created the Tax-Savvy Expat Entrepreneur course.

My first online course, Tax-Savvy Expat Essentials, shows you how the tax rules create the opportunity to own a location-independent business and pay no or very little tax. Now, Entrepreneur shows you exactly how to take full advantage of this opportunity.

Beyond just discussing the tax rules, Entrepreneur also provides:

1. a step-by-step guide to actually creating the proper legal structure for your situation,
2. direct links to the people and resources you need to form your legal structure, and
3. the actual legal documents you need to get your legal structure together.

Plus, your purchase of Entrepreneur includes a one-hour consultation call. We’ll go over your particular situation and make sure you understand exactly how to move forward.

Entrepreneur is an complete actionable resource that contains everything you need to actually get your own legal structure up and running in as little time as possible.

The course contains the same information I provide my clients and the same resources and legal documents I use to get the job done.

Who this course is for

Entrepreneur is designed to help digital nomads and expat entrepreneurs who own and operate a location-independent business.

You own a “location-independent business” when (i) you sell something other than your own time (such as other people’s time, physical or digital products, advertising space, or access to software) and (ii) you aren’t tied to an on-the-ground location in any particular country.

Common examples of location-independent businesses include the following:

• affiliate marketing,
• digital agency,
• web hosting,
• niche websites,
• ad-based internet publishing businesses (such as a blog, podcast, or YouTube channel),
• SaaS and SwaS businesses,
• e-commerce businesses (such as Amazon FBA, drop-shipping), and
• traffic arbitrage.

One caveat here: the legal structure discussed in Entrepreneur does not work for businesses with a US-based founder or that operate using employees or dependent agents located in the US. However, it’s perfectly fine to use the services of a third party running their own business in the US.

Here’s how it works

Entrepreneur consists of nine video lectures where I talk over professionally designed slides. The lectures total up to 1.5 hours (but you can speed up or slow down the playback if you like).

You have instant and continuous access to the whole course, so you can go back and review whenever you have a question.

Each section also has notes that provide additional detail on the subject matter of each lecture and contain links to the resources you need to organize your structure.

Finally, the actual legal documents you need are attached right in the part of the course where they’re discussed and at the end (so you have easy access to everything when you’re done).

Table of contents

Here are the nine lessons that comprise Entrepreneur:

1. Course Overview
2. Tax-Savvy Expat Entrepreneur Structure: Introduction
3. Tax-Savvy Expat Entrepreneur Structure: Formation
4. Tax-Savvy Expat Entrepreneur Structure: Operation
5. US Tax Consequences: Business Income
6. US Tax Consequences: Investment Income
7. US Tax Reporting and Accounting
8. State Tax and Non-US Tax
9. Next Steps

Invest in your success

You’ve spent time and money to figure out your business and increase your revenue, right? Well, plugging tax leaks in your legal structure is even more important.

It’s not just about the money you make, it’s about the money you keep. Investing in the right legal structure pays a return year after year by legally keeping more money in your pocket.

In fact, several of my students use what they learned in Entrepreneur to easily save $25,000 or more in tax, every single year.