A California shelf corporation, also sometimes referred to as a shell corporation, is defined a corporation formed under the laws on the state of California, but which has not conducted any business to date.  Instead, the corporation is "on the shelf", until purchased by a client for use in their new or ongoing business venture.  The description of shelf corporations on this page also applies to shelf LLCs.

Advantages of shelf corporations include aging and minimization of formation time.  Aging refers to the length of time a corporation has existed; for some purposes, an aged corporation that has been in existence for a number of months or years but that has not conducted any business and thus has not accumulated any liabilities is preferred by the promoters of a new business venture, or by their prospective business partners, investors, creditors, or customers.  Aged corporations may also, in conjunction with other steps, enable corporate credit to be established more readily.

Probably the greatest of the advantages of a California shelf corporation is that the corporation is ready to start doing business in California or elsewhere immediately; a employer identification number (or EIN, which is sometimes also called a Taxpayer ID Number: TIN, and which is needed in order to open a corporate bank account) may be obtained the same day, and then a bank account may be opened within a couple of days, or sometimes the same day, that the California shelf corporation is purchased. There is no need to be concerned with sometimes slow California business entity formation processing times, or with paying additional fees to the state to expedite the incorporation process.  Simply put, the fastest way to incorporate in California is to purchase an existing shelf corporation.

When available, the firm's standard California shelf incorporation package includes:

• Turnkey, aged California business corporation (aging varies)
• Name change if desired
• Custom bylaws on expedited basis
• Custom organizational meeting minutes on expedited basis
• Rush EIN number
• S corporation election if desired
• Custom share certificates
• California limited offering securities registration exemption notice filing including filing fees if qualified under California Corporations Code Section 25101(f)
• Initial or amended Statement of Information filing, including payment of filing fee
• Additional corporate law services generally available at $225-300 per hour
• California resident agent and opening of local bank account services also available at additional cost
• Price discount available if you don't require the corporate legal services above and want to handle any name changes, filings, bylaws, meeting minutes, S corp election, SS-4 filing yourself

Rush (1-2 week total turnaround time) incorporation or LLC formation may also be an option to consider.  And if time is not of the essence, save money with our standard flat fee California incorporation and flat fee full service California LLC formation services.

List your shelf corporation or limited liability company here, for sale on a commission basis. Inquire by email with the details of your company. Only true shelf corporations - those that have never conducted any kind of business whatsoever - will be considered. Pre-used, inactive or suspended corporations are not shelf corporations, strictly defined, and may have known or unknown liabilities, and thus are not acceptable for my clients. The only liability that may be acceptable is franchise tax owing to the State of California.