I Formed a New York LLC in One Evening. Here's the Northwest Registered Agent Verdict.

Part 1 of a short series on formalizing my consulting business. Part 0 was the research phase.

Last night Clarent Consulting LLC went from a name in a document to a company with a filing number and an EIN. Start to finish, one evening. Here's what I decided, what it cost, and where I'd push back on the conventional advice.

New York, not Delaware

Every startup guide says Delaware. Every startup guide is written for companies raising venture money. I'm one person in Manhattan billing clients for AI implementation work.

If I'd formed in Delaware I'd still have to register in New York as a foreign LLC (because that's where I actually work), pay both states' fees every year, keep a Delaware registered agent and satisfy New York's publication requirement anyway. Two states of paperwork for zero benefit. Delaware's advantages — Chancery Court, investor familiarity — are worth nothing to a consultancy that's never going to raise.

Form where you actually operate. Delaware is a tool for a specific job, and that job isn't a one-person services business.

The publication requirement is the real New York tax

New York makes new LLCs publish a notice in two newspapers for six consecutive weeks in the county of the LLC's office. In Manhattan that runs $1,000–2,000 because the designated papers know they have you.

The workaround is legal and common: your "office" for filing purposes is your registered agent's address. Northwest's is in Albany. Albany County publication is a few hundred dollars. That single decision paid for the whole formation package.

What Northwest actually charged

• Formation service: $39 (discounted from $100)
• NY state filing fee: $205
• EIN filing: $50
• NY publication service: $375
• Registered agent, year one: $0 (then $125/yr)
• Total: $669

They filed with the state, got the EIN issued the same day, and are handling publication. They also threw in a free business phone line with a 332 area code — capped at 10 calls or texts a month on the free tier, which is fine for a number that exists so my cell stays off the website.

Pros

• Speed. Filed and formed same day. EIN same day. I expected a week.
• The Albany address. Saves four figures on publication and keeps my home address off the public record.
• The document pack. Single-member operating agreement, initial resolutions, bank resolution, membership certificate — all templated. The bank will want these, so having them ready mattered.
• Publication handled. The step I was most likely to forget or botch is someone else's job.

Cons

• The EIN fee is a convenience charge. The IRS issues EINs free online in ten minutes. $50 to skip a form is a choice, not a necessity.
• The operating agreement defaults to the agent's address as your "residential address." That's their privacy setting, and it's fine in the OA — but don't copy it anywhere that asks where you actually live.
• Upsells. Mail forwarding, compliance packages, premium phone tier. None of it necessary on day one.
• Publication is still your deadline. They run it, but the 120-day clock is yours. Calendar it.

Before any of this: name clearance

I spent an hour before I filed anything checking "Clarent" against the NY entity database, live USPTO applications, and domain availability — at the same time, so I wasn't rationalizing a name I'd already fallen for. Result: fine as a business name in New York, weak as a federal trademark of the bare word (two pending applications sit close), and clarentconsulting.com was available for eleven dollars. Good enough. If a trademark ever matters, the logo plus name is the route.

What's next

Sign the operating agreement, fund a bank account, stop paying anything business-related from a personal card. That's the next post.

If you're forming in New York and the publication requirement is scaring you, ask me — it's the part where the most money gets wasted. And if you went a different route (Delaware, a lawyer, DIY at the DOS), I want to hear how it went.