Price Point Comparison Across Four Providers

Business Formation

Each of these companies offer business formation services, which means they’ll file your formation paperwork with the state department responsible for managing new business registrations. Here’s how that cost breaks down by company:

Registered Agents Inc provides you with a year of registered agent service and a template for your LLC’s operating agreement or your corporation’s bylaws. While an LLC’s operating agreement isn’t typically required by state law, most states do require corporations to maintain written bylaws—and either way, each is an integral part of operating your business.

Registered Agents Inc includes templates for these documents with their $100 formation processing fee. The other companies tend to either charge about the same price for a standalone document, or they roll the documents into their higher-tier options:

• LegalZoom includes an operating agreement with their $249 Pro business formation package, or a la carte for $99.
• ZenBusiness includes an operating agreement or corporate bylaws with the Pro business formation package for $199 per year plus state fees. A standalone operating agreement costs $99.
• Bizee includes an operating agreement with the Standard business formation package for $199. Just an operating agreement costs $99. Corporate bylaws are a $30 add-on to their Basic formation package.

Bottom line, it’s roughly $100 no matter where you go to form a company and get your operating agreement or corporate bylaws done.

LegalZoom, ZenBusiness, and Bizee each offer higher tiers of service where Registered Agents Inc only has a single formation package. These costlier tiers and subscription-based services include additional products to make the packages more appealing. For example, obtaining an EIN for your newly-formed company is a common perk of those $199-$249 formation packages. It’s something you could do easily for yourself for free if you’re a U.S. citizen with a social security number, but it can also be a relief to have one less piece of paperwork to track in an already complex process. Only you can decide what’s right for your business needs.

Registered Agent & Compliance

A registered agent is a required official point-of-contact between the state and a business entity registered in that state. Sometimes called statutory agents, resident agents, or agents for service of process, these are the folks who receive your official legal notices, reminders, and service of process. Pricing for registered agent service by provider follows:

Assuming you form your business with any given company and stick with their registered agent for your first five years, you’ll have paid at least:

• $900 to Registered Agents Inc
• $1245 to LegalZoom
• $895 to ZenBusiness
• $476 to Bizee

The states prescribe a registered agent’s duties and qualifications in their statutes, so “registered agent service” tends to be the same across the board. To get a more realistic picture of how these services actually compare, we need to look at one more detail: compliance services.

Each of these companies uses compliance services as a catch-all category for regulatory compliance—the documents you need to file with the state to maintain your business in good standing. Typically, this means an annual report, an annual statement of information, or something similar that keeps the state up to date with your company’s current contact and registered agent information.

Registered Agents Inc only files your annual report, while both LegalZoom and ZenBusiness offer amendment filings. Even Bizee more or less keeps up here; since you usually file an annual report every year, the effective cost for an annual report and an amendment with them is roughly equivalent to the pricing for LegalZoom and ZenBusiness. (You just have to remember to hire them to file it for you.)

On the other hand, not every state requires you to file an annual report. In some states the annual requirement varies by entity; in other states, businesses only file every other year; and some states don’t have any required filing beyond your initial formation documents. So depending on where you start your business, it may make less sense to pay for standard compliance.

Registered Agents Inc is the only company that includes compliance service free. LegalZoom and ZenBusiness will each charge you an additional $199 per year for their compliance services. After forming your business and five years of registered agent service with compliance filing service, you’ll have paid at least:

• $900 to Registered Agents Inc
• $2240 to LegalZoom
• $1691 to ZenBusiness
• $971 to Bizee

It’s also important to note that these costs do not include state filing fees, which can vary from as little as $10 to hundreds for your annual report (or state equivalent). That’s the same fee you’d pay to the state to file the document yourself, so you pay it to the company for them to pass to the state when they file on your behalf.

Business Identity

Your brand, your business identity—whatever you call the public face of your business, you’ll need the communication channels to establish it. This section looks at the service offerings for a branded domain, custom website, professional email, and business phone line by company.

These services can be more complicated to compare directly, but here’s how the five-year cost breaks down by company:

• $1005 to Registered Agents Inc gets you:
  • a custom domain with SSL and domain privacy (assuming $4.95 first year and $25/year for market value domains);
  • a website built with open-source software;
  • up to ten email addresses; and
  • a business phone line.
• $249 plus state fees and unspecified ongoing costs to LegalZoom gets you:
  • Pro business formation services (standard filing, operating agreement and EIN); and
  • a website built with Wix, a proprietary website builder.
• $1495 to ZenBusiness gets you:
  • Premium business formation services (expedited filing, operating agreement, EIN, etc.);
  • compliance services (annual report filing and up to two amendment filings per year);
  • a custom domain with domain privacy
  • a website; and
  • one business email address.
• $1136 plus state fees to Bizee gets you:
  • Premium business formation services (expedited filing, operating agreement, EIN);
  • free first year registered agent ($119/year after trial—add $476 to keep this service);
  • free first month virtual address ($29/month after trial—add $1711 to keep this service);
  • a custom domain (free first year, then $36/year with email);
  • one business email address;
  • one free first year business phone line ($15/month after trial).

Notably, Registered Agents Inc is the only company on this list from whom you can purchase these products without first purchasing a business formation package. This is ideal for small business owners who have already registered their company with the state and are ready to make the leap from social media platforms to their own branded communication channels.

Total five-year cost calculations here are impacted by a lack of available information. LegalZoom refuses to release details related to ongoing costs for their Wix-based website service until you’ve purchased a business formation package, so getting a more complete picture of the total year-over-year cost for their service is not possible. However, if we assume that it’ll cost about $25/year for a domain + $30/month for a website—which is roughly equivalent to market value—that puts LegalZoom’s total five-year cost at $2174 plus state fees. A more conservative calculation of $15/year for a domain + $15/month for a website adds up to $1224 plus state fees. You’d still need a second provider for professional email addresses and a business phone line.

ZenBusiness doesn’t provide a business phone line, although their package otherwise is fairly robust.

Bizee’s package doesn’t include a website. You’ll need to hire a website builder and/or web hosting provider, and using that same conservative estimate of $15/month for a website adds $900 over five years to your budget.

Bottom Line

[Editorialize here. Use your brand’s voice to analyze the cost comparisons provided above and make a recommendation for Registered Agents Inc as an all-in-one service provider.]