Michigan Registered Agent
When you choose Northwest as your Michigan Registered Agent, you get instant service, Privacy by Default®, and a business address. And if you want more, you can get a domain name, website, email, and phone number for free.
Want to learn more about what a registered agent does in Michigan? We'll explain the Michigan Secretary of State's requirements, what your registered agent should do for you, and how to change your registered agent in Michigan.
When You Want More
$125 a Year Every Year
Northwest is the choice of professionals for registered agent service.
- Same-Day Scans, Instant Notifications
- Privacy by Default®
- Business Address & Free Mail Forwarding
- Free Domain, Website, Email & Business Phone
What Is a Michigan Registered Agent?
A Michigan registered agent is a person or company that you designate to receive legal mail (like service of process) on behalf of your business. Registered agents exist to provide an official and reliable way to contact your business.
If your business is ever served with a lawsuit, the process server will deliver the paperwork directly to your registered agent. At that point, your business is legally considered “served.” The registered agent should then forward you your mail, quickly and securely.
In accordance with Michigan Law § 450.1241 (for corporations) and Michigan Law § 450.4207 (for LLCs) your registered agent must:
- Have to be a resident or companies that provide registered agent services.
- Have a registered office address that is a physical address located within the State of Michigan.
- Be available to accept legal documents.
Note: In documents and legislation in Michigan, registered agents are sometimes referred to as resident agents. These two terms mean the same thing and the names can be used interchangeably.
At a minimum, your registered agent must list a physical address on the public record and be present at that address during business hours. But ideally, your registered agent should do more.
How Do I Change My Michigan Registered Agent?
Changing your registered agent is a straightforward process:
- You’ll file a change of agent form with the Certificate of Change of Registered Agent form with the Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (LARA).
- If you place an order with us, the form will be available instantly. We’ll even pay and file the change of agent filing for you.
- It’s a simple change, but for more info, see our guide on how to change your registered agent in Michigan.
Why Northwest Is the Best Registered Agent in Michigan
Our Michigan Registered Agent Service includes the tools you need to keep your business running without a hitch. When you hire Northwest as your registered agent, you get:
- Same-Day Scans: We scan your legal docs the same day we receive them and reach out if your essential mail goes unread.
- Privacy by Default®: We list our business address on public docs to keep your personal info safe. And unlike those other guys, we never sell your data.
- Corporate Guides®: Have questions? We have answers. Our guides are business experts whose sole job is to provide support for all your business questions.
And if you want more? Add free trials of any of these options at checkout:
- Domain Name: Choose a domain name from a list of popular extensions (like .com and .net).
- Website: We provide a pre-built business website, customizable using an open source platform.
- Business Email Address: Create up to 10 business email addresses of your choosing. They’ll end in your domain name for branding ease.
- Phone Number: Keep your personal line private by using a business phone number for client communications.
How to Order Michigan Registered Agent Service
You sign up online, clicking on one of the buttons or links that says “HIRE US.”
We collect the first year’s fee for registered agent service up front.
For new businesses, once your business registration filing with the Michigan Secretary of State is complete, we’ll become your Michigan registered agent.
About a year later, we’ll send an invoice for another year of Michigan registered agent service. If you want to keep using us, great; if you don’t, you can easily cancel.
It’s easy to add registered agent services in other states if your business expands. We have offices in every state. We don’t farm out work (or your info) to other companies—wherever you are, WE are your registered agent.
We make your account a real go-to resource for you, not just for Michigan registered agent service or paying a bill but for keeping up with corporate paperwork formalities like the Michigan annual report.
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Michigan Registered Agent FAQs
Yes, you can be your own registered agent in Michigan. However, after considering the registered agent requirements most business owners elect to hire a registered agent service instead. Why? Well although being your own registered agent will cost you $0, an Michigan registered agent’s name and address becomes part of the public record. Additionally, the registered agent is required to be available to accept service of process during normal business hours 5 days a week.
You should hire us first and then do your business registration filing because you can’t form an LLC or corporation without a Michigan registered agent service. You find all the forms and instructions you need to complete your filing instantly after you place an order.
- To become a legitimate, registered Michigan business, the state forces you to appoint a Michigan registered agent. Sorry.
- The Department of Licensing and Regulatory affairs will reject your filing if you don’t appoint a Michigan resident agent.
- Basically, so the general public will have a reliable way to send important mail or legal notices to every registered Michigan business.
First, if you never get sued, congratulations! But don’t think of fees paid for a registered agent service as wasted money. Your Michigan registered agent should also keep you updated on any business reports owed to the state. And if you hire Northwest Registered Agent, we’ll provide you with any form you could file in Michigan, along with helpful tips for filing forms and paying the state with no markup, as well as amazing customer service. If you end up with multiple states with us, you’ll be able to easily see your annual report dates in every state in your account.
Northwest Registered Agent doesn’t charge more for high volume clients. If you know you’re going to get served hundreds of times a year, we should create a custom price for you that makes sense to both parties. Our typical clients get fewer than 15 lawsuits a year and never pay additional fees.
We provide a commercial registered office location in Okemos, MI in Ingham County.
Absolutely! We’re the only national registered agent service that allows our clients to list our addresses for everything when you’re doing a filing to keep your private addresses off of public records.
We don’t want ALL of your business mail. It’s not what we do. And it wouldn’t serve you well. You wouldn’t have unique address or suite number. Any mail we receive on your behalf would come to to Northwest Registered Agent, care of you.
But we understand that businesses and clients sometimes reach out to you through your registered agent. Through us. That’s why we give you 5 FREE scans of regular business mail a year. You can request any additional documents to be forwarded at a per document rate of $15.
You should hire us first and then do your business registration filing because you can’t form an LLC or corporation without a Michigan registered agent service. You find all the forms and instructions you need to complete your filing instantly after you place an order.
Service on your registered agent is legal proof that you were notified. Regardless of whether you actually receive the documents your Michigan registered agent signs for, once they accept the documents, you’ve been notified. This is a serious responsibility that we do not take lightly. This is how it works:
- A process server, the county sheriff, or any third party will walk into our office and hand us the documents (service of process), which we sign for.
- The process server then gives an affidavit (a receipt of service) to the court as confirmation that they “served” us.
Note: If you’ve hired Northwest, you’ve received your documents long before the process server hands in their affidavit to the court, because we scanned them to your online account within minutes of having been served.
You can do a Michigan business name search.
- Type in the name of the company you’re searching for.
- In the results, you’ll find the registered agent’s name and registered office street address.
If you want to legally notify a business through their Michigan registered agent service, just send a certified letter directly to the registered agent name and registered office address.
In Michigan, to resign as a registered agent, you need to submit a Resignation of Resident Agent form to the Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (LARA). For a more detailed walkthrough, you can refer to our guide on how to resign as a registered agent in Michigan.