You incorporate before your first sale! Depending on your state you can incorporate yourself for a few hundred dollars (CA for example only requires a one page declaration and filing fee of $145, first years tax to the state of $800 is waived). You do this for liability reasons. Secondly equity should be split based on contribution. If you plan to take on capital partners you will all be diluted at that time. This a complex question with many open ended issues. I advise speaking with someone in detail rather than making your decisions based on a few replies on this thread. Best of luck Damien

Don't try to hire like minded people! Hire the areas you are weak, know your financial position, your market, your customer and have a clear objective.

Congrats on your new business. Our company also has a software company located in Bangalore, India. This is a very interesting market and offers lots of opportunity for software companies. I see you have lots of great feedback already but I will toss in my opinion in hopes it helps. You have two ways to achieve your sales goals, which by they way is extremely aggressive even for a US based company let alone an India firm with a market conversion of 63 to 1INR. The first is by continuing to seek business for short life products via eLance or other lead sources. The other option is to create a product or service within a space that will allow you to gain recurring revenue from your client base. The later offers more stability as you continue to grow your business. The first and your current model is very risky as any change in lead providers, SEO or search engine ranking can quickly cause your monthly revenue to fall. Because your pushing on such an aggressive growth plan this will typically mean higher fixed cost that could be damaging. Best of luck, if I could be of further help please let me know. Damien Melle

When taking on employees you have to be mindful of state labor laws. If they are sales people working on commission only then you might get away with this form of payment. However if they are providing you skilled labor then you maybe required to pay them minimum wage. The bigger question should by, why would someone want to work for you with little or no pay? And who would trust the growth of their company with staff making little to no pay? It's the old saying, you get what you pay for. Without knowing too much about your company I would say that if you do not have revenue your not ready to hire. The free labor comes from founders (sweat equity). I would be glad to speak with you further on the topic. Best of luck.

Looks like you have some good replies and some gray answers on this thread. If you have a business model that will fill vacancies as an app or website then pricing can be structured to not violate state laws. However if you're trying to be the leasing agent then yes you might have some issues. I will warn you that property management and leasing are very much on the radar of state regulators in California. So understanding your services and how you will be paid is critical. I am the CEO of a large residential property management company in Southern California. I have extensive experience in this space and would be more than happy to share my experience. Best of luck!

This is a complicated question. Depending on your objectives, type of investment, and financial situation will determine the best answer. Owning investment property is a great way to invest. I have owned several properties and I am currently the CEO of a residential property management firm with more than $400 million in assets under management. So I know a few things on the topic :-) I would be more than happy to discuss your plans and help you better understand a potential investment.

To start off with, stop watching what your competitors are getting in terms of funding. Most start ups who get funded will fail, so this is not a worthy measurement. If your product has sales only consider funding that will help you grow your user base, ie new development, larger marketing area, etc.. The longer you bootstrap the more of the company you will retain. You also need to consider an exist plan before talking with investors as they will want to know how they will get their money back. I have a company currently working on fundraising for a series A that has been bootstrapped for 2 years. It's a challenge because it's easy to fall into the trap that money will solve all or most of your problems when in fact this is rarely true and often can make the problems worse. Finding that balance is critical, for all you know your competition is currently hating life... Or thinking they are can make you feel better. :-) Glad to share my experiences if that will help. Best of luck with your app.

Elance.com, however outsourcing development is much harder than just hiring a firm with a nice website. It requires very specific planning from your side.

Yes, however you must maintain separate accounting books for each. If you simply use them to shift money around you could create additional liability. It also depends on what your seeking to accomplish. Typically if the Corp had LLCs they have different partners in each or different sets of projects or products. For example a home builder might structure several LLCs (Home Sales Phase 1, LLC then Home Sales Phase 2, LLC) whereas each LLC will be funded by a different round of fund raising and build 20 homes each in a master community of 100 homes.

This is not a clear question. If you can share more details of what your attempting to build I can provide you some basic guidance. Some questions to consider: 1. What product or service do you want to offer? 2. Who is your target customer? 3. Partners or sole proprietor? 4. Startup capital, what is needed. Start by deciding on the most basic needed tools to reach your customer. Let's discuss and build a game plan. Damien