A US business address for a company run from Europe: virtual office, registered agent or a real desk

Your LLC is in Texas, you are in Copenhagen, Lyon or Milan, and every form asks for an address. Which one? A US company has up to three of them, each with its own rules: the registered office the state requires, the mailing address where letters arrive, and the place where the business is actually done. Most European owners do not need to rent an office for any of them.

Three addresses that people mix up

The three can be the same address, but they do not have to be, and the rules differ for each.

The registered office: required by law, and not your business address

Under the Texas Business Organizations Code, every company formed or registered in Texas must continuously maintain a registered agent and a registered office in the state. The registered office must be at a street address where legal process can be personally served on the agent. It does not have to be a place where your company does business. It may not be solely a mailbox service or a telephone answering service. An agent that is an organization must have an employee at the registered office during normal business hours.

The agent cannot be your company itself, and it appears in the state's public record. Its job is to receive lawsuits and official notices for you, not to be your company's postal address. Our guide to the registered agent covers the rules for every formation state.

The virtual office: a mailbox with a street address

What is sold as a "virtual office" in the United States is usually a commercial mail receiving agency (CMRA): a business that receives mail for you at its street address, scans it and forwards it. The US Postal Service regulates them:

• You sign PS Form 1583, the application for delivery of mail through an agent, and show a primary and a secondary form of identification.
• You sign in the physical presence of the CMRA's staff or a notary public commissioned in the United States, or in their virtual presence by real-time audio and video. That is what makes the setup possible from Europe.
• Your address must carry "PMB" (private mailbox) or the "#" sign before the box number.
• The CMRA itself must be registered with the post office that delivers to it.

A virtual office is a good mailing address. It is not a registered office in Texas, because the registered office may not be solely a mailbox service. And it is not automatically accepted everywhere else: every bank sets its own rules for which addresses it takes as the company's legal or physical address, so ask the bank before you open the account. Our US bank account opening service deals with exactly that question.

One more thing a virtual office does not change: where your company is taxed. That depends on where the work is actually done and managed, which is a question of its own; our guide to the LLC and the permanent establishment covers it.

What the IRS wants on Form SS-4

When you apply for the company's EIN, Form SS-4 asks for two addresses. The mailing address may be outside the United States; you then write the city, province or state, postal code and the country name in full. The street address is asked for only if it differs from the mailing address, may also be foreign, and must never be a PO box. The IRS does not force you to have a US address to get an EIN. Our guide to the Texas tax ID number walks through the application.

When you need a real desk

For a company run from Europe, a real office in the United States is the exception, not the starting point. It becomes necessary when:

• You open a new US office under an L-1 visa. For a manager, executive or specialized-knowledge employee coming to open a new office, the petition must show that sufficient physical premises to house the new office have been secured. A mailbox does not meet that test; see our L-1 visa guide.
• You hire people in the US who need somewhere to work.
• Customers or partners visit you, or your business needs storage, a showroom or a workshop.

Until then, a lease is a cost without a function.

A personal US address is a different question

Everything above is about the company. Sometimes you need an address for yourself, for example for an application that asks for a residential address and does not accept a PO box or a mailbox. For that case our ITIN Express with a US residential address includes a real residential address in Austin with its own phone line, not a PO box, with mail forwarding, for six months.

What we recommend

For most European owners the right setup is simple: a registered agent and registered office as the law requires, plus a US mailing address that is staffed and forwards your mail, so that letters from the IRS, the Comptroller and your bank do not land in a void. Add a real office when the business, a visa or your staff actually need one.

When we form your Texas LLC, the registered agent, our address in Austin and a US phone number are part of the formation package, and from the second year part of the annual package, which also handles your mail.