Business Attorney and CPA for Chicago-Area Small Businesses

At Khatib Law LLC that work is done by Hani H. Khatib, Attorney at Law · CPA · LL.M. (Taxation), from the firm's office in Palos Heights. Most of what goes wrong for small companies in Cook County is not dramatic: an LLC formed without an operating agreement, so the Illinois Limited Liability Company Act's default rules decide who can bind the company and how profits split; a corporation that skips its annual report and is administratively dissolved without the owner noticing; a buyer who signs an asset purchase agreement with no price allocation and learns at tax time that the seller reported the sale differently. Each is cheaper to prevent than to repair, and each has a tax dimension that is easier to see when the person drafting the document also reads the return.

The documents below are the ones most small businesses in the southwest suburbs end up needing. Each row links to the page that covers it; if you want the filing procedure itself — name check, registered agent, Form LLC-5.5, fees, annual report — start with the step-by-step guide to starting an LLC in Illinois.

Not every business needs every row. A single-owner LLC with no employees may need the first two and the annual report; a company with partners, a building or a sale in view needs most of them. Day to day, the firm also reviews and drafts the contracts a small company lives on — vendor and customer agreements, commercial leases, independent-contractor agreements, non-disclosure agreements and restrictive covenants. Illinois limits non-compete and non-solicitation covenants for employees under the Illinois Freedom to Work Act (820 ILCS 90), with earnings thresholds and a required notice period, so a covenant that was enforceable several years ago may not be today. If your company owns its building, a Cook County reassessment can change the occupancy cost materially; appeals are handled through the firm's sister company, Cook County Tax Appeals LLC — see the property tax appeal page.

1. Privilege

   Advice an accountant gives about your taxes is not protected the way advice from your lawyer is (a CPA's own privilege under IRC §7525 is limited to non-criminal federal tax matters). When the tax analysis is part of the legal engagement with an attorney who is also a CPA, it sits inside the attorney-client relationship. Privilege covers what you tell the firm to get legal advice and the advice you get back. It does not cover preparing a tax return or keeping books — even when a lawyer does them — and it does not cover the forms and documents actually filed with the IRS, the Illinois Department of Revenue or the Secretary of State.

2. One engagement, one analysis

   The purchase agreement and its price allocation, the operating agreement and the tax election — each is designed as one piece of work rather than handed between two offices. Whether to elect S-corp status depends on the owner's salary, the profit, the Illinois replacement tax and payroll costs; how to split the price in a business sale depends on depreciation recapture for the seller and the write-off schedule for the buyer. The attorney-CPA page explains the arrangement; for tax disputes and planning see the tax attorney and business tax attorney pages.

3. Representation that can reach a hearing room

   When a disagreement with a taxing authority or a counterparty cannot be settled by letter, an attorney can carry it further.

• Forming an LLC

  Articles of Organization (Form LLC-5.5) cost $150 to file with the Illinois Secretary of State, or $400 for an LLC that can establish series, and the annual report costs $75 a year. 805 ILCS 180/50-10

• The annual report

  Every LLC files its annual report, with the $75 fee, within the 60 days before the first day of its anniversary month. A report still missing before the first day of the second month after that costs $100, plus $100 for each later year, and an uncured delinquency ends in administrative dissolution. 805 ILCS 180/50-1, 50-15 and 35-25

• No written operating agreement required

  The Act recognizes an operating agreement whether it is oral, in a record or implied, so an LLC without a signed one is governed by the statute's default rules on votes, profits and a member's exit. 805 ILCS 180/1-5 and 15-5

• The liability shield

  A member or manager is not personally liable for the company's debts solely by reason of that role, and the company's failure to observe internal formalities is not by itself a ground for personal liability. 805 ILCS 180/10-10

• When a member dies

  A member is dissociated from the LLC on death; the estate or heir becomes a transferee entitled to distributions, with no vote or management right unless the operating agreement or all other members admit it as a member. 805 ILCS 180/35-45 and 30-10

• Corporate meetings and minutes

  Every Illinois corporation must hold an annual shareholder meeting and keep minutes of shareholder and board proceedings and a record of its shareholders, whether or not it has elected S status. 805 ILCS 5/7.05 and 7.75

• Corporate annual report and franchise tax

  A corporation files its annual report on the same anniversary-month schedule for $75 and pays its franchise tax with it; the first $10,000 of franchise-tax liability is exempt for reports due on or after January 1, 2025. 805 ILCS 5/14.05 and 15.35

• Illinois replacement tax

  Partnerships and S corporations pay the personal property replacement tax at 1.5 percent of net income; other corporations pay 2.5 percent, in addition to the 7 percent corporate income tax. 35 ILCS 5/201

• The S-corp election deadline

  Form 2553 must be filed within two months and 15 days after the start of the tax year it is to cover, March 15 for a calendar-year company; a later filing generally takes effect the following year unless late-election relief applies. 26 U.S.C. §1362(b)

• Non-competes and non-solicits

  An employer may not bind an employee to a non-compete unless the employee earns more than $75,000 a year ($45,000 for a non-solicit), and the covenant is void unless the employee was told in writing to consult a lawyer and given 14 days to review it. 820 ILCS 90/10 and 90/20

• Buying business assets

  A buyer of the major part of a business's stock in trade, fixtures, equipment or real property must file a notice with the Illinois Department of Revenue at least 10 business days before the sale, or become personally liable for the seller's unpaid Illinois taxes up to the value of the assets acquired. 35 ILCS 5/902(d)

• Beneficial ownership reports

  As of October 2026 a company formed in the United States files no federal beneficial ownership (BOI) report; FinCEN's final rule effective August 14, 2026 exempts domestic entities, and only foreign-formed companies registered here still report. 31 CFR 1010.380

Khatib Law LLC is at 6600 W College Dr, Ste 207, Palos Heights, IL 60463. Business clients come from across the southwest suburbs — Palos Park, Palos Hills, Orland Park, Orland Hills, Tinley Park, Oak Lawn, Oak Forest, Frankfort, Mokena, Homer Glen, Lemont, Evergreen Park, Burbank, Bridgeview, Hickory Hills, Chicago Ridge, Worth, Alsip and Crestwood — and from Chicago, especially the Southwest Side, and the rest of Cook County. A business operating inside the City of Chicago needs a license from the Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection before it opens, and most suburbs have their own license or registration; a sole proprietor or general partnership trading under another name files an assumed-name certificate with the Cook County Clerk ($50), while an LLC or corporation registers its assumed name with the Secretary of State. The annual report article covers the one filing every Illinois entity has in common.