What Happens to my Check Book IRA if I Move?
By Alisha Bennett
What happens to your Check Book IRA if life knocks on your door and you end up moving to another state? Besides making sure that your Custodian has your new address, you’ll have a few other housekeeping issues to address.
For the sake of explanation, let’s say you move from the state of Washington to the state of Florida.
Updating the LLC:
- You can handle this a couple different ways.
You can open an LLC in Florida, transfer your assets from Washington and close the Washington LLC. If you own property in Washington, however, this isn’t your best option unless you plan to sell the property; as you’ll still need a Washington LLC for the property ownership.
- The better option is to register the Washington LLC in Florida as a foreign entity. This can be done online, and allows the Washington LLC to do business in the State of Florida. So you have one LLC that was created in Washington but can also do business in Florida. Although this isn’t always ideal since now you have two states that you need to worry about in regards to annual reporting and fee requirements; if you own property in Washington it’s your best option. You will need to appoint someone to serve as your Registered Agent in Washington since you are no longer living there.
Updating the Operating Agreement:
After you’ve updated the LLC filing, it’s time to update the Operating Agreement. You’ll need to update the address of the LLC, the Registered Agent information and the Manager/Successor Manager address. If you haven’t listed a Successor Manager, now is a good time to add one. You can find out how to update your Operating Agreement here.
Make sure to send a copy of your updated LLC documents, new address and Operating Agreement to your Custodian for their records. All of these documents will be helpful if you decide to open a new bank account in your new state.
Once you’ve taken care of these two fundamental updates, you can enjoy the flexibility of the Check Book IRA in your new home.
If your LLC was set up in Nevada and you live in Alabama but move to another state does anything have to be done other than notifying your custodian?
Hi Mary,
You’d need to update your Operating Agreement to show the new business address for the LLC, though other than that you shouldn’t need to do anything. If the Nevada LLC is “doing business” in the other State you’ve moved to, then it’s a good idea to register the NV LLC with the other State as a foreign entity.
Hope that helps.
I misspoke. The LLC is in New Mexico. It is actually my husbands. He took it out while working in California. When the job there was finished we moved back to Alabama where we currently live. To date, it’s only used as a precious metals IRA. Mine is OK as it has the Alabama address. How do we go about updating the Operating Agreement for his LLC?
Hey Mary,
I just pulled your Operating Agreement, and I see the business address for the LLC in New Mexico is your address in Alabama, so you shouldn’t need to change anything with the Operating Agreement, as it already shows your AL address.
Check my husbands, Ronald G.
Yes, Mary. I did check Ronald’s LLC. The address for the LLC is Alabama. He should look at his copy of the Operating Agreement to confirm this.