Sole Member LLC A spouse is not automatically a member

Membership is a document, not a vibe

The company agreement and the state filing say who the members are. A spouse who is not named there is not a member because the household is shared, or because they answer the phone, or because their name is on a personal account that sometimes pays a bill.

In a community property state, spouses who both own a company have a filing choice that single owners do not. That choice is for people who are actually owners. We do not apply it to a spouse who was never admitted as a member. If both of you are members, tell us before a return goes out. The federal shape can change.

We will not decide this from a photograph of a check. We will read the agreement. If the agreement is missing, the first task is to find out what the state has on file, not to guess from who does the invoicing.

Helping is its own question

A spouse who works in the shop may be an employee, a co-owner, or a volunteer the tax rules do not treat as a volunteer. Those are different payroll facts and different return facts. Putting them on a wage without an employee relationship, or skipping a wage that the facts require, both cause trouble.

We set payday up with a provider when wages are real. We do not run the cycle. If there are no wages, we do not open a payroll account to look busy.

Draws to a spouse who is not a member are not 'the other owner's draw.' They are either wages, a gift, or a company payment that needs a true category.

Draws belong to members.

Everyone else needs a different word.

How to talk about it without a fight

This is ordinary. Couples build shops together and only later write down who owns what. The books can still be honest while you sort the document. What we will not do is file a partnership return, or a single-member return, as a coin flip.

Bring the agreement if you have it, and a sentence about what each of you actually does. We will tell you what the filing looks like under those facts, and what would change if the agreement changed.

Health coverage for a spouse sits on the premium page.

It does not answer the membership question, and the membership question does not answer the premium.