You know it’s time to think about planning for the transition of your funeral home to its next owner. In an earlier post, we discussed how to go about planning that transition. Now that you’re in that planning stage, you need to think about exactly how you are going to pass your valued business on, whether it be to someone in your family or to an entirely new owner. What follows is a list of several different ways you can transfer your business:

1. Sell the stock
2. Gift the stock
3. Give the stock as additional compensation
4. Give the stock and cash as additional compensation
5. Shareholders’, members’, or partners’ agreements
6. Clauses in compensation agreements
7. Setting up a new business
8. Clauses in a will
9. Stock redemption
10. Installment sale
11. S-Corp Election
12. Family limited partnership
13. Leveraged buy-out

Many of these methods can, and often are, used in some combination. And most of them can be done either before or after death. The important part is that the contractual agreements need to be in place.

While some of these methods are quite simple and others very technical, provisions of the Internal Revenue Code must be strictly adhered to.

Any of these are possible for your funeral home business. It is advisable to reach out to your financial and legal advisors to be sure all are being done according to codes and regulations.

{{cta(‘6a6eecb0-09b8-405a-ac0a-04b3163db552’)}}