#family-business
Guidance for family-owned businesses on governance, succession, and managing family dynamics
Only 23% of family farms have a succession plan. Transfer management first, use LLC interests plus IRS Sections 2032A and 6166, and keep the farm intact.
Corporate officers who work in the business are employees under IRS rules — wages, withholding, and FICA apply even to sole shareholders taking distributions.
Your spouse's travel is deductible only if they are your employee on a bona fide business trip — otherwise the IRS treats employer-paid costs as W-2 wages.
An unfunded living trust controls nothing — retitle real estate, accounts, and business interests into it, and back it with a pour-over will.
A spouse on W-2 payroll can fund a second solo 401(k) and pretax health coverage — if the IRS sees real work, market pay, and payroll records.
An IRS Section 453 installment sale spreads the gain across your retirement, while $19,000 annual gifts and 20-40% valuation discounts move value tax-free.
A teen owes a tax return at just $400 of net self-employment income — no age minimum. How the 15.3% SE tax, the $1,000 estimated-tax tripwire, the $20,000 1099-K threshold, and a custodial Roth IRA fit together.
A married couple co-owning an unincorporated business is taxed as a partnership by default, but the qualified joint venture election lets each spouse file a separate Schedule C and Schedule SE instead — no Form 1065, and both spouses earn Social Security credits. Both spouses must materially participate, and businesses held in an LLC or corporation cannot use it.
Bankrate's January 2026 survey found 43% of U.S. adults consider financial secrecy at least as bad as physical cheating, and 40% of adults in live-in relationships admit to a money secret. For couples who co-own a business, a hidden card or debt also distorts pricing, payroll and joint tax liability — here are the bookkeeping controls, monthly review cadence and entity rules that make transparency structural rather than voluntary.
40% of small business owners plan to retire within 10 years but 70% have no formal succession plan and only 8% are fully prepared; Revenued finds 59% of successors assume a plan exists while only 35% of owners have one — this guide explains the 24-point gap, valuation methods, clean-book QofE prep, and a 12-month exit plan to make your business lending-ready.
ASC 850 requires four things in the footnote for every material related-party transaction — the nature of the relationship, a description, dollar amounts for each period presented, and any change in how terms were set — and it applies even when the price is fair. This guide identifies who counts as a related party for a small business (10%+ owners, officers, immediate family, and entities they control), shows a model two-paragraph footnote, and gives a 10-step year-end checklist plus a Beancount account structure that turns disclosure into a query.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act permanently raised the federal estate and gift tax exemption to $15 million per person ($30 million per couple) starting in 2026, eliminating the scheduled TCJA sunset to roughly $7 million. Here's what changed, which existing plans are now outdated, and the succession moves business owners should make — from portability filings to buy-sell agreement reviews and state estate tax exposure.
