Hacker News Reader

Comment by mixdup | Hacker News Reader

That's easy to mitigate, though, if you have money. Like the parent comment said all you have to do is buy all your property through a shell LLC (or Canadian equivalent), put all the utilities in the name of that LLC, and have your lawyer's lawyer file all the incorporation papers and it's very, very difficult to trace back the actual owner

View on HN

Good luck getting a mortgage for your shell LLC - won't happen.

Chase offered me one.

Chased offered to loan your shell LLC business hundreds of thousands of dollars without collateral or any credit history? Why don't I believe you?

The house is of course the collateral on the mortgage, and the offer was contingent upon my personal guarantee of the LLC’s mortgage. Of course, that would have been between me and Chase, which would keep my name off the public records - the goal of the whole holding company exercise.

Go explore ownership records on zillow and such in major american cities, you will see a lot of houses owned by RandomName LLC

Those are almost certainly not primary residences, they are likely not mortgaged by their owners (without a substantial rental business providing collateral, for example), and most states LLC records are completely public.

The records of the LLC’s managers are public, but not usually their beneficial owners (unless they are the same people).

The way to do it is to have your attorneys be the managers of your holding companies, then you can direct them (under privilege, afaik) to sign what you like. This is how I do it. Alternately if you have staff you trust and expect to have a long time (I don’t), they can be your holding company’s manager(s).

Reply on news.ycombinator.com