Tool
What your tax residency actually costs you
Two numbers — annual sales and where you live — and you get the whole picture: corporate tax, the tax on taking money out, and what your accountant, your annual accounts and your audit cost on top. Then the same business run from a territorial or zero-tax residency with a US LLC.
63 home countries, 31 residencies, every rate visible and editable. If the move doesn’t pay at your size, it says so.
The country you are tax resident in, running a local company.
Revenue for a full year, in US dollars, before any costs.
What is left after your real costs — staff, software, ads — but before company admin and tax. If you don’t know, leave it: 40% is a reasonable working figure for a services or software business.
Today you run a GmbH. The comparison assumes you take all the profit out each year — leaving it in the company defers personal tax in most countries and would flatter the left-hand column.
Where would you move?
A residency that does not tax foreign-source income, paired with a US LLC. These five are the ones Founders 8 handles; every other territorial and zero-tax option is in the dropdown and in the full comparison below.
Paraguay
TerritorialThe cheapest permanent residency in the world that comes with a territorial tax system and a ten-year ID card. Foreign-source income is taxed at 0%; Paraguayan-source income at 10%.
- How you qualify
- Permanent residency. No investment, no income test, no property purchase.
- How much you have to be there
- One entry every three years keeps permanent residency alive. Paraguay has no statutory day count for tax residency — the 120 days people quote is a domicile rule, not a tax rule.
The difference
You’d keep $50,213 more a year
On $250,000 of sales at a 40% margin, Germany and your GmbH take $51,615 a year in tax and company costs. Paraguay plus a US LLC on Founders 8 takes $1,402.
Today
Germany + GmbH
You keep
$48,385
51.6% of profit goes to tax and running the structure
- Company admin, bookkeeping and filings
- $6,250
- Corporate tax at 29.9%
- $28,031
- Personal tax on the payout at 26.4%
- $17,333
- Total cost of the structure
- $51,615
With Founders 8
Paraguay + US LLC
You keep
$98,598
1.4% of profit goes to tax and running the structure
- Founders 8 Start, Wyoming state fee, residency upkeep
- $1,402
- US federal tax on non-US income
- $0
- Personal tax at 0%
- $0
- Total cost of the structure
- $1,402
One-off cost to move
$3,250
Residency fees, agents and documents for Paraguay. Mid-point of $2,000–$4,500.
Pays for itself in
Under a month
Setup cost divided by the annual saving.
Over five years
$247,813
Five years of saving, less the one-off cost. No growth assumed.
Every zero-tax and territorial option, on your numbers
The same revenue and margin, run against all 31 residencies, each paired with a US LLC. Ranked on what you are ahead by after five years, so the cost of getting the residency counts — which is what puts the $250,000 passports where they belong. Lump-sum regimes look absurd at small numbers and start winning at very large ones; that is the point of showing them.
| Residency | Regime | You keep a year | One-off cost | Payback | 5 years vs Germany |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Territorial | $98,448 | $1,750 | <1 mo | +$248,563 | |
| Territorial | $98,598 | $3,250 | <1 mo | +$247,813 | |
| Territorial | $97,798 | $4,000 | <1 mo | +$243,063 | |
| Territorial | $97,998 | $6,000 | 2 mo | +$242,063 | |
| Territorial | $97,448 | $6,000 | 2 mo | +$239,313 | |
| Territorial | $97,598 | $7,000 | 2 mo | +$239,063 | |
| Territorial | $98,448 | $11,500 | 3 mo | +$238,813 | |
| Remittance basis | $97,248 | $7,500 | 2 mo | +$236,813 | |
| No income tax | $96,248 | $3,500 | <1 mo | +$235,813 | |
| No income tax | $96,498 | $5,000 | 2 mo | +$235,563 | |
| No income tax | $97,498 | $10,000 | 3 mo | +$235,563 | |
| Territorial | $97,248 | $10,500 | 3 mo | +$233,813 | |
| No income tax | $96,248 | $7,500 | 2 mo | +$231,813 | |
| Remittance basis | $96,498 | $9,000 | 3 mo | +$231,563 | |
| Territorial | $97,598 | $16,500 | 5 mo | +$229,563 | |
| No income tax | $95,498 | $7,000 | 2 mo | +$228,563 | |
| No income tax | $95,498 | $9,000 | 3 mo | +$226,563 | |
| Territorial | $96,248 | $13,500 | 4 mo | +$225,813 | |
| No income tax | $93,998 | $9,500 | 3 mo | +$218,563 | |
| Territorial | $91,898 | $6,000 | 2 mo | +$211,563 | |
| Remittance basis | $90,098 | $9,500 | 3 mo | +$199,063 | |
| No income tax | $93,748 | $30,000 | 8 mo | +$196,813 | |
| Low flat rate | $87,498 | $4,500 | 2 mo | +$191,063 | |
| No income tax | $94,748 | $42,500 | 12 mo | +$189,313 | |
| Low flat rate | $82,348 | $6,000 | 3 mo | +$163,813 | |
| Low flat rate | $85,498 | $23,500 | 8 mo | +$162,063 | |
| No income tax | $98,498 | $275,000 | 66 mo | −$24,437 | |
| No income tax | $98,498 | $300,000 | 72 mo | −$49,437 | |
| No income tax | $21,748 | $16,500 | — | −$149,687 | |
| Lump-sum regime | -$13,502 | $9,000 | — | −$318,437 | |
| Lump-sum regime | -$234,502 | $11,500 | — | −$1,425,937 |
Territorial and zero-tax systems not modelled here
These are real regimes, left out because the residency route is impractical, undocumented, or closed to founders. Listed so the picture is complete rather than tidy.
- Nicaragua — Territorial. Residency is obtainable but political risk is material.
- Guatemala — Territorial, with a pensionado route that requires proof of foreign income.
- Bolivia — Territorial, but banking and capital movement are difficult.
- Seychelles — Territorial with no personal income tax on foreign income; residency is expensive and slow.
- Namibia — Source-based taxation. Residency is tied to employment or investment.
- Botswana — Source-based. Practical mainly for people with a business reason to be there.
- Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia — No personal income tax, but residency is sponsor-tied and not portable.
- Brunei — No personal income tax; residency is effectively closed to outsiders.
- Turks and Caicos, Anguilla's neighbours, Nauru — No income tax, but immigration routes are narrow or undocumented.
- Singapore — Foreign income not remitted is exempt, but local income is taxed and residency requires an employment or entrepreneur pass.
- Portugal (IFICI) — The successor to NHR is far narrower — 20% on eligible Portuguese activity, with limited foreign-income relief.
- Switzerland (forfait) — Lump-sum taxation by canton, negotiated on deemed living expenses. Not zero, and not available to Swiss nationals.
What the number doesn’t tell you
A saving on a calculator is not a saving until the facts underneath it are true. These are the things that decide whether the left-hand column actually goes away.
You have to actually move
Every number above assumes you stop being tax resident in Germany and become tax resident in Paraguay. Keeping a home, a spouse, a car and a golf club membership behind while holding a second country's ID card is not a tax plan — it is how people end up assessed in both places. Most countries look at your centre of vital interests, not just a day count.
Controlled foreign company rules
If you remain tax resident anywhere with CFC rules, profits sitting in a foreign company can be attributed back to you personally whether or not you distribute them. This is the single most common reason a paper structure fails. It is also why the residency comes first and the company second.
Leaving Germany may itself be taxable
Germany's Wegzugsbesteuerung taxes unrealised gains on substantial shareholdings when you move out. It is assessed on shares in corporations, so a GmbH stake is squarely in scope. Take advice before you file a deregistration.
Paraguay: the thing that catches people
Cheap and easy to get is not the same as easy to defend. If you keep a home, a family and a life in your old country, its tax authority will not care what your cédula says. Paraguay works when you actually leave.
A US LLC is not tax-free — it is tax-transparent
A foreign-owned single-member LLC pays no US federal income tax on non-US income, but it must file Form 5472 with a pro forma 1120 every year. The penalty for not filing is $25,000, and it applies whether or not the LLC earned anything. If you have US employees, a US office or US-source effectively connected income, the analysis changes entirely.
Read the guideThe company's own tax residence can follow you
Several countries treat a foreign company managed from their territory as their own tax resident. If you run the LLC from your new home, some jurisdictions — the UAE among them — can tax it locally. Where you press send matters as much as where the company is registered.
Read the guideBanking, treaties and the boring parts
Payment processors, banks and clients all react differently to different addresses. A US LLC with a US bank account and a Paraguayan owner is routine; the same LLC with a Vanuatu address is not. Treaty access also disappears when you move to a country with no treaty network — which usually does not matter for a US LLC, but does matter if you have withholding on inbound royalties.
Read the guideFind out whether $50,213 a year is real for you
A calculator can compare rates. It cannot tell you whether your old country will let you go, whether your clients will accept a new invoicing entity, or whether Paraguay fits the life you actually want. Thirty minutes with a specialist will.
Founders 8 sets up and runs the US company — formation, EIN, banking introductions, address, mail, bookkeeping and the federal filings — and coordinates licensed partners for the residency itself. Paraguay is live today; the UAE, Panama, Georgia and Costa Rica are next.
General information, not tax, legal or immigration advice. Rates are headline rates for the 2026 tax year as at August 2026 and exclude allowances, reliefs, small-company bands and imputation credits — your effective rate will differ. Residency programme costs and terms change frequently. Founders 8 coordinates licensed partners; it does not itself provide tax or legal advice. Verify every figure against the primary source, and take advice on your own facts before you move anything.