Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Probably a limited-liability company (LLC) would be a good choice. Non-resident aliens cannot be shareholders of corporations that otherwise qualify for preferential income-tax treatment as so-called "S" corporations, but the tax treatment of LLCs is even more favorable for real estate (often, at least) than that of "S" corporations. An LLC is not a corporation, but has some similar characteristics.

A general partnership would probably pay the least in taxes, but is somewhat risky from the standpoint of personal liability, and also a partnership must have at least two partners, which may cause management and control issues.

An LLC would pay a minimum annual tax of $800 plus a small tax on gross revenues to California; when it had profits, its owners would be required to pay California and Federal income tax on the LLC's profits, but the LLC itself would not pay tax on its profits (income).

I could form a simple LLC for a client for a fee of US$1,000 to $2,000, but I would need more information to give a definite price quotation. Annual maintenance is difficult to predict, because it depends so much on the level of activity, whether the owner or owners does his own bookkeeping and prepares his own financial statements and reports, and so forth, The range of annual costs starts in the $800 area, for the annual tax, when the LLC does little business and the owner takes care of the books, and goes up from there, especially if there are several co-owners and the financial statements need to be audited.

Another factor in the cost and complexity of starting and running a business from abroad is the "language barrier." Your English seems to be good. In many cases, however, setting up and assisting in running a business for a non-English-speaking person, family or group can become rather complicated because of, not only language barriers, but also explaining differences in business practices.