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You’re a successful business owner and you’d like to plan ahead. Professionals are urging you to prepare a “succession plan” – but you look at it as a retirement plan. Getting out of the daily grind might be nice, but giving up your life’s work and your legacy business? Maybe not so nice. No matter how they sugar coat it, “succession planning” looks like you’re calling it quits.
Whether they call it a succession plan, an exit plan or a retirement plan, it usually amounts to a transaction where you cash in your chips and your legacy business goes away. And, as soon as you sign that transaction document, you may no longer have any input in the conduct of the business you built.
Is there another way? Can you cash your chips, continue your legacy business and still have a hands-on role? Can you have your cake and eat it too? The answer for you very well may be “yes!”
If your business entity is a corporation (or converts to one), an employee stock ownership plan (“ESOP”) may allow you to sell your business to your employees in a non-adversarial, tax-advantaged transaction and continue to manage operations by electing directors of your choosing. You can participate in the business as much or as little as you would like. Want to taper off over the next ten years or so? No problem!
What is an ESOP and how does it work? An ESOP, as a retirement plan, is first cousin to your 401(k) plan. The significant difference is that ESOPs are required to invest primarily in company stock and they are permitted to borrow in order to purchase that stock from shareholders. Any loan used to purchase stock for the ESOP is repaid from the company’s future earnings. Because repayment is made by deductible company contributions to the ESOP, the company is able to deduct the total amount of loan payments including both principal and interest.
And there are other ESOP tax advantages. For C corporations, tax on payments to shareholders for the purchase of their stock can be deferred indefinitely. For S corporations, the company can operate free of income tax if it is wholly owned by an ESOP, which is a tax-exempt entity.
And for many business owners, ESOPs treat the two major non-financial issues facing business owners “in transition”: the end of the business involvement of a lifetime, and the likely loss of the legacy business itself.
Takeaway: If a business transition is in your future, make sure an ESOP purchase is on your short list. It could be the best way for you to have your cake and eat it too.
Andrew S. Williams has practiced in the employee benefits and ERISA arena since ERISA was passed in 1974. He has been recognized by his peers through a survey conducted by Leading Lawyers Network as among the top 5 percent of Illinois lawyers in Small, Closely and Privately Held Business Law and Employee Benefit Law. He maintains a website, www.BenefitsLawGroupofChicago.com, with additional updates, commentary and analysis on benefits and employment topics.
The above material is intended for general information purposes and should not be relied on or construed as professional advice. Under the applicable Illinois Rules of Professional Conduct, the contents of this e-mail may be considered to be attorney advertising. The transmission of this information is not intended to create, and receipt of it does not create a lawyer-client relationship.