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How to pay yourself LLC
You have formed a limited liability company and have successfully started your business.
Now you wonder how you pay yourself with an LLC?
In a nutshell, there are three ways LLC owners can get paid:
- Earn a salary as an employee of the LLC
- Earn a distribution from the profits of the LLC as a member of the LLC
- Earn fees as an independent contractor
Let’s break this down so you know how this works.
Paying yourself as an employee
The first option in how you can get paid from your LLC is to pay yourself a salary or regular compensation just like an employee.
Your LLC is a company able to hire the necessary resources to run its business.
Even though you own the LLC, you can be hired as an employee to get the job done for the LLC.
As a wage earner, you are able to pay yourself a regular stream of income throughout the year helping you pay for your personal and living expenses.
When an LLC pays employees, it incurs operating expenses.
Salaries and wages are expenses that an LLC can deduct from its revenues or profits.
As a result, the amount you are paying yourself from your LLC as a salary can be deducted from your LLC revenues.
Since you are the business owner deciding how much salary to pay yourself, although you can choose whatever amount you wish, you must ensure that you remain reasonable from a tax perspective.
The Internal Revenue Services or the IRS will typically audit self-employed business owners to ensure that they declare salaries and wages within industry norms and standards.
Another element to consider when paying yourself a salary when self-employed is that you’ll need to file an IRS Form W-4 relating to the payroll withholding requirements.
All LLC employees are paid as W-2 employees and their employer must deduct the appropriate amount of withholding tax from their paycheck.
Single Member LLC
How to pay yourself single member LLC?
In a single member LLC, if the owner has a management role or has an actual role in the daily operations of the business, he or she can be paid a salary to be compensated for the work.
A salary can be paid to an employee or wage earner when the employee is really doing concrete work for the LLC.
If the employee happens to be the single member LLC owner, it will not change the fact that the single owner of the LLC must do real work and have real responsibilities for the LLC as an employee.
Multi Member LLC
How to pay yourself multi member LLC?
In a multi member LLC, just like a single member LLC, if the business owners are performing daily operations management or running the business operations on the regular, they can be paid a salary.
In the context where one of the LLC members participates in the management of the LLC, then this member can be paid a salary.
If all members are equally participating in the business operations, then all of the limited liability company members can be paid a salary.
Paying yourself as an owner
How do LLC owners get paid?
Another way to pay yourself from an LLC is to get paid a distribution of profits.
If your LLC is earning money and profits, you can choose to keep some of that money in the business to fund future operations of the business or you can choose to take some of the profits and pay the business owners.
When you take some of the LLC profits to pay the business owners, you are making a “distribution” to the LLC owners.
Typically, at year-end, the LLC will look at its yearly revenues and expenses to establish its yearly profits and losses.
However, an LLC owner can “draw” against the LLC year-end profits without having to wait for the year-end distribution.
For example, an LLC member can expect to receive $20,000 in year-end profit distribution.
In that case, the member can draw against this “expected” profit during the year.
If the member drew $10,000 during the year, then his or her year-end profit distribution will be $10,000 (representing the actual year-end profit distribution minus the sums that were drawn during the year).
Single member LLC
How do single member LLC owners get paid?
In a single member LLC, one person owns 100% of the LLC interest.
As a result, the single member LLC can choose to get paid profits based on what the LLC earned as profits and what the single member believes makes sense for the business.
For example, if the LLC earned a net profit of $50,000, the LLC owner can pay himself or herself $20,000 from the profits as distribution and keep $30,000 invested in the company.
As a single member of the LLC, the distributions made to the owner will be taxed on the owner’s income tax.
The IRS considers a single member LLC as a “disregarded entity” whereby the LLC profits and losses are passed directly to the business owner.
The sole owner of the LLC will need to file a Schedule C to report the LLC profits and losses on his or her income tax return (IRS Form 1040).
Multi Member LLC
How do owners of a multi member LLC get paid?
When there are more than one LLC owner, the members can get paid profit distributions based on their interest ownership in the LLC.
For example, if Mary owns 60% of the LLC interests and John owns 40%, any distributions made to the owners must observe their ownership proportions.
Imagine that the LLC year-end profit amounts to $100,000 and the members want to pay the entire amount to the owners.
Mary will be entitled to receive 60% of the year-end profits ($60,000) and John will get 40% ($40,000).
When there is more than one LLC owner, the IRS will consider the LLC as a partnership from a tax perspective and each LLC member will need to report their share of the LLC profits on their personal income taxes.
The LLC members will need to file the IRS Form 1065 to report their share of the LLC profits.
At the end of the year, each LLC member will receive an IRS Schedule K-1 to report their share of the LLC income.
Paying yourself as a contractor
Another option that may be possible to get paid from an LLC is to work for the LLC as an independent contractor.
An independent contractor is not an employee of the LLC but a person rendering specific services for a fee.
For example, if your LLC is operating an e-commerce business, you may need to hire the services of an independent contractor to help you with your website or online marketing.
However, if a member of the LLC has expertise in that area, the LLC can hire the person for a website design project or a specific online marketing campaign.
As a contractor, the service provider will not have the same benefits as an employee such as vacation or other.
You must also be sure to pay fees that are industry standard for the type of services you are getting to avoid any issues with the IRS or from a tax perspective.
When an LLC pays a company or person as an independent contractor, you’ll need to file the IRS Form W9 and IRS Form 1099-MISC.
Takeaways
How do I pay myself from my LLC?
Should I go for a single member LLC draw vs salary?
How do I pay myself as an LLC with multiple owners?
Let’s look at a summary of our findings.
How to pay yourself LLC:
Related legal terms
Business accounting
Business formation
Business taxation
Double taxation
LLC payroll
Multi member LLC
Owner salary
Pass through taxation
Single Member
Starting a business
Tax management
Related business questions
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