Customer Reviews

Own Your Own Corporation: Why the Rich Own Their Own Companies and Everyone Else Works for Them (Rich Dad's Advisors)

5 star:		(31)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Almost everyone will either start-up a new business or invest in one at some point. Almost all of these investments will be unsuccessful. Most people will think that they merely have their investment sums at risk. Take the wrong approach to structuring the investment legally, however, and your whole career and life savings can be at risk. If you carefully follow this book's advice, none of these investments will cost you anything more than you planned to lose in the worst case.

When Robert Kiyosaki was a youngster, he loved to read about the early explorers like Columbus and Magellan. His Rich Dad encouraged him to also study those who financed the explorers, to learn about how they managed their risk and reward to expand and protect their wealth. "Don't climb the corporate ladder, why not own the corporate ladder?" was other advice that Rich Dad gave. To do this, Mr. Kiyosaki advises you to "find a good attorney and use him or her as your advisor on this important subject."

Own Your Own Corporation does an excellent job of explaining the various advantages and disadvantages of C and S Corporations, Limited Liability Companies, and Limited Partnerships from the legal perspective of how to save money on taxes and protect yourself from successful attacks on your personal assets. I particularly liked the way that the usual legal gobbledegook was avoided, and the ideas expressed in clear, simple language.

As a lawyer, I felt that the work was highly accurate and well presented for a layperson. I was especially impressed with the very long appendix that outlined the legal circumstances in each state. On the other hand, the book makes it clear that you should get some legal and accounting help to make sure that you do things properly.

My complaint about the book comes from the lack of describing the other methods that can be used to protect an individual and a family from liability. Setting up the right business structure is just part of what needs to be done. Other assets need to be protected using other techniques such as trusts, and insurance can also play a helpful role in protecting you from mistakes.

In picking a legal advisor, I will also mention that many perfectly capable practitioners will not be familiar with this particular area of legal practice. So choose well, or you will not necessarily end up with the business structure you need. A good use of this book is to arm you with questions and background knowledge to help you test how current and experienced your potential legal advisor is. In fact, you may need more than one legal advisor to help you set up the optimum structures for your personal assets and your business activities.

Taking time to eliminate risks and taxes in advance is well worth your focus and investment!

As a owner of various companies, I look for books that will provide insight on limiting liabilities while maximizing profits. The author has suceeded with this book because it's written with a straight forward approach that breaks down difficult corporate terms into terms that anyone can understand. This was achieved by showing examples of certain situations and unknown facts that can happen to any individual or company.

I really like how the book explains all aspects of different types of corporations to establish depending on each individuals goal to keep their company private or go public. At the same time, the book teaches you various ways to protect your personal assets from your business assets. Just this section alone will eventually save you thousands in personal asset protection.

Most importantly, I've read hundreds of books about corporations, asset protection, public or private, etc. with the majority being very boring with fancy terms that's hard to understand. This book was so enjoyable with simple terms and exciting case situations, I read the entire book without putting it down. I'm now re-reading it and underlining many facts that will be shared with my corporate paid professionals on various situations that my company needs to be protected against. I had no idea but thanks to your book, I do now.

Finally, This book is a "MUST" read for anyone starting a corporation and a "MANDATORY" read for any owner of an existing corporation.

Thanks to the author, Garrett Sutton, I'm now working smarter, counting more net profit and sleeping comfortably in my personally protected home.

I have read several books on setting up a corporation and still found many useful nuggets of information in here.Garrett Sutton is a legitimate authority and knows what he is talking about unlike some of the other books that are creeping up on the market place today...

Only one-third of the book covers what a typical Rich Dad Poor Dad reader would expect: how to use corporations to protect one's assets. The information in this section is really helpful and interesting, especially for beginners. The author provided great examples to illustrate key points. The writing overall, however, could be improved by having better summaries of each chapter and by defining every new legal term used in the book (for example, the book never defined "indemnification" but it used it frequently).

Another one-third of the book covers how to start a company and take it public (have it listed as a public stock). I don't think any typical Rick Dad Poor Dad reader has this purpose in mind for their businesses or real estate purchases, so this second part of the book is utterly useless and irrelevant to most readers. The last one-third of the book basically lists the laws for incorporation for each state, which is useful, but I'm sure the author could have provided a webpage to list all this information.

Another thing to consider is that this book might be outdated. It was published in 2001, and laws may have changed by now (this review is written in early 2006). For example, the double-taxation policy of dividends was changed after the publication of this book. I think the author might have overcome this by providing updates to important relevant laws through a website or something similar.

For all these reasons, I'd recommend the interested reader to explore other sources first. Unfortunately, I can't recommend other books yet. If there doesn't seem to be any other good sources, then consider reading this book only if you can buy it used or borrow it from the library.

I have been teaching business management for thirty years, and every once in a while I come across a book that stands out from the rest. This is one of those books. One of the biggest mistakes new entrepreneurs can make is in thinking that owning your own business is quick and simple and anyone can do it. Well, many people have opened their doors for business, but statistics prove that many will also fall by the wayside in a very short time. In Canada, 35% of new businesses fail within the first year, 70% fail in the first five years and after ten years, the failure rate jumps to 85%. Three of the main reasons are lack of business management skills, an insufficient need and demand for the product/service, and insufficient financial resources for start-up and working capital. There is no question three of a businesses best resources are going to be your lawyer, accountant and banker. As this book will point out, entrepreneurs need a clear understanding of basic business principles and how to best credit-proof themselves to prevent loss of assets.

Through the pages of the book, readers will come to understand that owning your own business can be truly rewarding if you have the know-how, commitment and financial resources to not only get the business off the ground but to keep the doors open and make a profit. There are so many aspects of owning a business that an inexperienced entrepreneur does not even considered, and this book will definitely warn one of the potential pitfalls before they happen. If you are considering starting your own business and have little experience in managing a business, this book is for you. Even those who are already in business for themselves will benefit. Like anything else in life, we can never know it all and anything we learn will benefit us down the road. Overall, this is a great book, highly recommended and most deserving of a five-star rating.

Garret Sutton does an excellent job explaining various corporations to meet particular needs.

C, S and LLC corporations are covered thoroughly. I was talking to a friend the other day who is in the process of srting his own business. He didn't realize (many don't) the different corporations that are available.

Own your Own Corporation will give you the knowledge to take to your attorney and start your own corporation properly. You'll be in control.

Taxes and lawsuits are two of the biggest deterrents to building and keeping wealth. Sutton explains how to substantially reduce taxes (even FICA!) and insulate yourself from the something for nothing crowd that love to sue successful business people.

Own Your Own Corporation is a must read for anyone in business or anyone who is contemplating forming a corporation and laucnhing a business.

A lot of the other reviewers of this book are people who are already "in the know", meaning that they already know something about the subject matter. -I don't! The most I know about business is that you create a product, sell it, and the price you sell it for should be greater than the cost of producing it in order to make a profit. Of course, I also realize that there are much more complicated peripheral issues involved and that's why I bought the book.
The problem that I have with this book therefore, is that I think that a lot of it is written in "Lawyerspeak". I have gotten the impression from reading the other "Rich Dad" books that the target audience is the layman and the idea is to educate him to enable him to make the jump from the "rat race" to the "fast track". This book untangles only some of the knots of the comprehension barriers involved in setting up a legal and profitable business. I found that there are far too many un-and-under-explained references that for my entry level of understanding only served to lose me and ultimately to put the book down until I may one day find another book that can explain some of the terminology.
It is my understanding that the average reader of a book such as this would be someone who is interested in turning a "E" or "S" quadrant skill into a "B" quadrant business. It would be more helpful if the book were written to address the first-timer's concerns and potential problems. While this is mildly addressed throughout the book by providing fictional stories of various business situations, there are a definitely large areas where the neophyte reader can easily be as lost as I have been in reading this book. Mr. Kiyosaki's skills in relating to the outsider are sorely missing in the text of this book.

Garrett has done a great job of making a complex topic - corporate law - understandable. It's not the secret "how to" book that has all the secrets of the wealthy. It is a book that gives you the background and language to talk intelligently to your own advisors.

As a fairly well-off business owner, I had to learn through years of experience how to take advantage of corporations for liability protection and tax savings. Read this book to speed up the process for you. I only wish it had been written a decade ago! Thank you Garrett for such a well-written and understandable book.

The single greatest point of this book is the explanation of the difference between the employee and the employer. As an employee, you'll go to work, contribute to your 401K and hope your investments in that 401k work out and you have a comfortable retirement. However, Uncle Sam will take their bite out of any income that doesn't go into that 401k. And who's to say they won't come after your 401k in the future? Do you see a pattern here? The system, while being the greatest in the world, is still set up to limit your upward mobility. Keeping you on the low savings, highly taxed, debt treadmill is in the best interests of the corporations and the government. How do you get off? Become the corporation. This book teaches you the tax advantages of forming your own corporation and all the necessary legal procedures you'll need to get started. It's not that hard! What you do need, is a decent business plan and good idea you can make a profit on. This book fits in well with the other Rich Dad books. Before reading this book, I would recommend the Cash Flow Quadrant and Guide to Investing so you can develop a big picture view of your roll in the socio-economic system and what you are going to do to elevate your status. These books have inspired me to form my own PT business, incorporated of course!

To Blayne Rush who just reviewed this book-Are you sure you read the same book I did? I felt this book provided very valuable information and excellent case studies with real situations. I may not have a MHP or MBA but I know for a fact that the chapter on showing you how to raise millions of dollars through private placements alone is worth it. I had no idea how easy it is to raise money for any venture. I've always wanted to start a new business but my credit wasn't strong enough. Now I'm raising enough capital to turn my life long dream of being an entrepreneur into reality with my very own company. Hats off to the author Mr. Sutton for making it so simple that even my wife is now thinking about raising money to buy a restaurant. 2002 will be the Storeys year-Thank You Sir!