mungojerie

My business partner and I are both designer/developers launching a small devshop (or "agency", if you're feeling spinny).

We've talked to CPAs, hit up Avvo.com, and two lawyers, and remain confused.

We anticipate assets (code and products) that we want to co-own. But we also anticipate contributing different time and talents to projects. We can't predict, but we don't expect to split dev time 50/50. And we expect that one of us will bring in more business than the other.

We need a legal entity that will allow us to do this: - split ownership of assets evenly

- split decision-making evenly

- pay each person for time worked on a project, based on hours and a reasonable hourly rate

- pay commission/bonus/something for bringing in business (so if ! deliver a client and he does all work, I still get 10% of that project fee)

Can we form as an LLC, take the S-Corp election, and then pay ourselves an hourly rate (1099?) for work we do and recognize that as a cost-of-business? And then any remaining profits would be either held in the company or paid out as dividends?

Thanks.