Your Business Law Partners

We offer three tiers of retainer programs for general corporate legal services that are suitable for companies of any level.

The first tier (Bronze Tier) is a monthly flat fee of $2,500, payable in two installment payments for one calendar year. Under this Bronze Tier, our firm is available to attend any calls and provide legal advising and consulting with unlimited time. However, any type of deliverables or drafting is excluded from this first tier program.

The second tier (Silver Tier) program is a flat fee payment of $4,000 a month, payable quarterly. Under this Silver Tier, our firm provides up to 20 billable hours of general corporate work on a monthly basis within the ordinary course of our client’s business. If a client exceeds 20 billable hours within one calendar month, they will automatically be charged based on our hourly rates with a 20% discount as long as they remain enrolled in the program.

The third tier program (Gold or VIP tier) is a flat fee of $6,000 for up to 30 billable hours a month within the client’s ordinary course of business. Under the Gold Tier, our firm includes communications with third parties, drafting and issuing demand letters, engaging in written correspondence and negotiations with third parties. In the event any tasks are outside of the scope of our client’s ordinary course of business, we will bill on hourly rates with a discount of 20%.

Generally, all three tiers of the general corporate retainer only include legal services within the scope of your ordinary course of business. For instance, generally speaking, we exclude certain specialized areas of legal practice, such as advising on tax, immigration, commercial leasing, mergers & acquisitions, alternative financing transactions (e.g., venture capital financing or private equity) and securities law. These areas of law are billed on an hourly rate with a 20% discount for our general corporate retainer clients.

Within a task is included within our client’s ordinary scope of business varies from client to client. For instance, if our client’s business is involved in commercial leasing as its primary business, then although we generally exclude commercial lease review from our retainer program, we would include it as within the general course of ordinary business for this specific client.

The type of matters included within our general corporate retainer program is review and drafting of internal corporate governance documents, such as board resolutions, shareholder resolutions, and other resolutions to properly approve corporate actions by the company pursuant to state law, drafting labor and employment related documents, such as labor agreements, independent contractor agreements with vendors, hiring and discharging employees and advising on the legal practice thereof, reviewing contracts from vendors within the course of ordinary business, advising the executive leadership team from time-to-time on legal issues that arise, analyzing the corporate structuring of the company and proposing a more efficient business structure for legal and tax compliance, advising on preliminary disputes. The above are simply a shortlist of a few matters, but the value of our general corporate retainer program is indispensable.

A CPA is not licensed to render legal advice. Typically, a CPA charges a flat fee between $500 – $700 for simply filing articles of formation, however, a comprehensive company formation includes much more than filing articles of formation. We charge a flat fee of $3,000.

As part of our flat fee service, our firm analyzes the appropriate legal entity for your business needs, e.g., a corporation or a limited liability company. If you select a corporation, for example, our flat fee service includes filing of the articles of incorporation, but it also includes other legal documents that a CPA cannot draft, such as board and shareholder resolutions, formally appointing officers and directors pursuant to state law, bylaws, preparation of share certificates, evaluating of classes of shares, e.g., preferred or common shares, to protect the founder from dilution. If your company is a California state limited liability company, Section 206 of the California State Limited Liability Company Law requires that within 120 days after the e􀋞ectiveness of the initial articles of organization.

Our flat fee does not include shareholders agreement, which lays out the rights and obligations of shareholders.

A CPA is not legally authorized to prepare such legal documents or render legal advice. This is why their fee is so much lower. In conclusion, we strongly recommend founders hire a licensed attorney to complete their company formation in compliance with state laws to protect the possibility that a third party sues the founders in their personal capacity, bypassing the corporate protection that a properly formed company should provide its founders.