Business Ownership (LLC vs. DBA)

[JasonKal]

I own an LLC is Mass. I'm in the process of buying a small business. I want to give three people each an ownership interest in the small business but not the LLC. The LLC will own the small business. Can this be done?

Thanks!

 

[FlyingRon]

Your post makes little sense. If the business is owned by the LLC it can not also be owned by somewhere else. It's possible that LLC could own a portion of the business and the other entities the other part. What is the nature of the business?

 

[JasonKal]

The LLC doesn't have anything attached to it, yet.

The yet will be a small service business.

My original plan was to have my LLC buy the small service business. I want to give a few of the employees an ownership interest in the service business. However, because I intend to buy or start additional businesses in the future, I don't want to give them ownership in my LLC, just the service business. It dawned on my today that this is a problem.

I'm trying to figure out the best way to handle this. I suppose I could always create a new LLC but there will be the additional fees. I also like the idea of sticking with my one LLC for all the entities I start or acquire in the future.

Are you saying I could buy the service business and give them (which would total 10%) worth of the value of the service business and then have the LLC own the remaining 80%?

Thanks for your help on this.

 

[LdiJ]

The LLC doesn't have anything attached to it, yet.

The yet will be a small service business.

My original plan was to have my LLC buy the small service business. I want to give a few of the employees an ownership interest in the service business. However, because I intend to buy or start additional businesses in the future, I don't want to give them ownership in my LLC, just the service business. It dawned on my today that this is a problem.

I'm trying to figure out the best way to handle this. I suppose I could always create a new LLC but there will be the additional fees. I also like the idea of sticking with my one LLC for all the entities I start or acquire in the future.

Are you saying I could buy the service business and give them (which would total 10%) worth of the value of the service business and then have the LLC own the remaining 80%?

Thanks for your help on this.

The bolded can be done but you would need the business to be an entity of its own, even if it defaults to a partnership. If you formed a separate LLC for the business, then your current LLC could be an 80% member of that LLC, with the other people being members at the remaining percentage.