How to Be Invisible

HIDDEN OWNERSHIP OF VEHICLES AND REAL ESTATE

Some years back, I swung my black Jaguar sedan down the ramp and into a twenty-four-hour “high security” parking garage at Seattle’s SeaTac airport, snatched the ticket stub from the attendant, raced for the shuttle bus, and just barely caught my flight to Phoenix. Eight days later I returned to SeaTac, caught the shuttle back to the garage, and joined the check-in line.

When I presented my ticket stub, the cashier hesitated.

“Sir,” he said, “please step to one side. The manager will be right out.”

The manager came out, introduced himself, and led me back to his office. I had visions of a scratch in the paint or a ding in a fender.

“The same day you left,” he said, “your car disappeared.”

“Disappeared? as in stolen?” (So much for the twenty-four-hour security.)

He explained that the same evening I left, one of the attendants parked a car in the stall where my car had been. When he turned the number into the cashier, the computer showed the stall was already occupied. They quickly searched the entire building to see if had been parked in another spot in error. When they failed to find it, they reported it stolen. The next morning the police spotted it, badly damaged, sitting at home plate on a baseball diamond in a Seattle park.

I have the King County Police Vehicle Impound Report before me and in the Narrative section, line 4, the officer writes, “Unable to contact owner.” Here’s why: The car was in the name of an LLC in State A. The address listed for this company was in faraway State B, and a reverse directory failed to show a telephone number at that address.

Although for many years I had been registering my vehicles in the name of limited liability companies, this was the first time my security precautions had been put to the test. No damage would have been done, of course, had the police been able to contact me in this particular case. However, a short time later my security precautions were to prove worthwhile. As soon as the insurance agent handed me a check for my Jaguar—it was too badly damaged to repair—I bought a year-old dark green Lexus (see the first question at the end of this chapter) and headed east.

A few days later I arrived in Minneapolis and spent Saturday afternoon visiting used bookstores. It was just getting dark that evening when I pulled out of a parking lot onto West Lake Street, in a hurry because I had to meet a friend from Madrid who was about to arrive at the airport. I failed to see an oncoming motorcycle and almost clipped a Harley being ridden by a 300-pound bearded bruiser. He screamed some obscenities, waved his fist, and made violent gestures to have me pull over. (If you’ve ever been on West Lake Street in South Minneapolis after dark, you know this is not a good neighborhood in which to pull over.)

It was too dark for the rider to see any “so-sorry” gestures—had I made them—so I fed more gas to the 290-horse engine under the hood. The overweight biker followed me right on to 35W going south, with all the time in the world to memorize my license number. Although I do not scare easily, this time I was seriously alarmed. Enough to set a new Minnesota speed record between West 35th and the I-494 junction, where I cut the lights and peeled off at the exit. Whether he memorized the number or not, and whether he was carrying a gun or not, once I lost the biker I was safe forever—the plates would lead him nowhere. But my heart was still thumping when I pulled into airport parking.

A few Saturdays later I was in Londonderry, New Hampshire, to meet Carl Prague, an old friend who used to live aboard the Raider, a 1912 wooden sailboat with Santa Cruz de Tenerife (Canary Islands) as a home base. A stiff wind was blowing when we stopped at the Country Market on Highway 102 to pick up some wine and snacks, and when we came out, a few abandoned shopping carts were starting to move. Just as we were putting the groceries in the car, a hard gust sent a cart racing past us and across the parking lot directly toward a parked Honda Civic with a man and a woman in it. There was no way to stop it, and we watched as it struck the driver’s door with a resounding clang and bounced back. As we continued to watch, we could see that the woman was obviously screaming at the man to do something, and the “something” turned out to be a trip over to see me. Assuming he wanted some help, I lowered my window halfway as he came around my side, and said hello.

“Your cart hit my car!”

“Excuse me? We didn’t have a cart.”

“Yes you did, and we saw it come from here.”

At least he didn’t weigh more than 140, and my friend Carl is an ex-wrestler, so this time I was just amused, not scared.

“I wrote down your license number,” the man muttered, brandishing a scrap of paper, “and you’ll hear from my lawyer.”

Well, best of luck, buddy, and have a nice day.

PURCHASING A VEHICLE IN THE NAME OF AN LLC

Everything I have to say in this section makes one assumption: You will pay cash. I paid cash for the first car I ever bought—a 1931 Chevrolet, and I’ve been paying cash ever since. As long as you do not finance your purchase, taking title is usually a simple process. Nevertheless, many of my readers have been reluctant to use an LLC simply because they’ve never done it before.

One such person was Jim in San Francisco, who asked me to help him purchase a used Lincoln Town Car with almost no miles on it. It was for sale by a private party in Washington and Jim wanted to title it in that state for personal reasons. He asked for my help because he was not sure he could handle the registration and yet keep his name out of it. The description below is how I handled this particular transaction, step-by-step.

1. Since Jim was in a hurry, I pulled a “shelf” LLC from my files that I’ll call Golden Gateway LLC. (A shelf LLC is one that has been formed in the past for future use, and just put “on the shelf” until needed. I recommend this procedure to all readers, and I personally keep shelf LLCs on hand at all times. The ones I have all show an address in Spain as their principal place of business.) We then flew to Seattle, rented a car, and drove out to Port Angeles to make the deal.

2. The seller, a ninety-seven-year-old (!) woman who had purchased the car in 1991 and then stored it, signed off on the title. She also signed the bill of sale I had prepared beforehand. We filled in “Golden Gateway LLC” as the buyer and gave a ghost address that Jim had already arranged for beforehand.

3. Rather than go to the Department of Motor Vehicles in Port Angeles, we went to a private licensing bureau. (They charge a small fee for handling the paperwork, but the lines are shorter and they are sometimes easier to deal with than clerks at the DMV.) Jim went through the line with me, but only as an observer. He wanted to see how I would answer the questions. (He had arranged for the LLC’s address to be a ghost address in Alaska.)

Clerk: What’s the UBI number for this company? (Washington requires an ID number for all legal entities doing business in their state.)

Me: Golden Gateway LLC doesn’t do business in this state, and Alaska doesn’t require a UBI number.

Clerk: Then why not license it in Alaska?

Me: For at least six months the car will be in this state, and the law requires we therefore license it here. (100 percent correct, in all states.)

She then pushed a computer printout over to me and showed me where to sign. I scrawled an illegible signature that matched the one on the bill of sale (although she didn’t ask to see it).

Clerk: Print your title after your signature, please.

Since I was neither a member nor a manager of Jim’s newly acquired company, I wrote in “Sales Mgr.” (Jim retroactively appointed me “Sales Manager for a Day.”) We paid the various license and transfer fees in cash and were on our way. The title arrived at Jim’s ghost address in Fairbanks and was sent on to him, as were all annual registration notifications.

Note: If you run into trouble, don’t make a scene. Stay calm and leave if necessary. So much has to do with the person you’re dealing with. Consider ways around the roadblock and try again another day at a different office or with a different clerk.

WHAT WAS ACCOMPLISHED?

First and foremost, total privacy. Suppose a private investigator sees Jim’s car parked in Las Vegas at what he considers a suspicious address, and obtains whatever information is on file with the DMV in Olympia, Washington. He will get the name “Golden Gateway LLC” and Jim’s ghost address in Alaska. If the PI then checks with the secretary of the commonwealth in Juneau, he will learn that it is not an Alaskan company. He’ll then check with Olympia. No, not a Washington company, either. That leaves him forty-eight states plus the District of Columbia to check out. The search usually ends right there.

However, assume the PI continues doggedly on and eventually does do a search of New Mexico’s database. All he will find there is an address in Spain.

INSURING YOUR VEHICLE

The easiest—and recommended—way to obtain insurance is to use your own name. This will keep your rates low, especially when you have multiple vehicles titled in separate LLCs. As far as I have been able to learn, this will not compromise your privacy because only the LLC name will show up on the registration.

CHOOSING A NAME

It’s often fun for the whole family when it comes to choosing suitable names for the various LLCs that will be used for future purposes.

North Dakota Sodbusters LLC		family home
Victoria’s Sea-Crate LLC		SeaSport cabin cruiser
King of the Road LLC		husband’s Dodge Ram 3500
Her Royal Majesty LLC		wife’s Toyota Highlander
One Cool Chick LLC		daughter’s Mazda Miata
Road Less Traveled LLC		son’s Jeep Wrangler

All of the above could, of course, be titled in a single limited liability company to keep costs down. The main problem to having everything in the same LLC is the protection you lose if a PI is on the trail of your assets. Let’s say that in the example above, everything is titled in King of the Road LLC.

If a PI comes up with the driver of any one of the vehicles and checks the plate, he’ll follow this with a search for anything owned by King of the Road LLC. What will he find? All the other vehicles, the boat, and the address of the family home.

HIDDEN OWNERSHIP OF YOUR HOME

What I had to say about paying cash for your car also applies to real estate. (By “cash,” I don’t mean paying in $100 bills, I mean not taking out a mortgage.) Give your attorney—or the title company—a copy of the Articles of Organization, along with clear instructions that your name is to appear only in their office files, and not on any public database.

However, if you plan to finance your home, then the mortgage company is going to demand that you guarantee the loan in your own name, which means using an LLC will not help. (Until I was sixty years old, we lacked the cash to buy a home outright, so we always rented … and saved some money as well. As talk show host Bruce Williams used to preach, “Renting is cheaper than buying.”)

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

You mentioned driving a Jaguar, but doesn’t that draw undue attention to yourself?

I confess that from an early age I’ve had a weakness for upscale cars—Packards in the old days, and in later years Mercedes, Jaguars, and Lexus. However … it’s never too late for common sense. Thus it was that just one month after the second edition of this book went to press, your humble servant stepped down to a used Toyota pickup. My wife followed suit by selling her Lincoln Continental and buying a used Camry. Now that we’ve finally set the right example (with four “vanilla” vehicles), here are some reasons why I suggest you follow suit.

• You’ll save some serious money. Less initial cost, less depreciation, less money at the gas pump, and a lower insurance rate.

• You’ll no longer be the subject of envy by your less-fortunate neighbors, relatives, and friends.

• You’ll no longer be a prime target for carjackers or burglars. (Burglars have been known to spot a luxury car and follow it home. Later, when the owner leaves, they break into the home, assuming that valuables must be there.)

• You’ll have more privacy as you travel about, blending in with hundreds of similar vehicles on the road.

What about long trips? In our case, we prefer a heavy car with lots of room when we’re going to be driving for many hours, so we rent a Lincoln from Hertz. Not only is this cheaper than owning the car, there is an additional advantage. If the car should break down or be involved in a fender-bender far from home, Hertz just delivers another Lincoln and away we go.

I just moved from Denver to Miami. Since I am keeping my Colorado driver’s license, should I also keep my Colorado license plates?

Not unless you also get Florida plates. Les L. is one of my clients. Les works for a well-known electronics company in California’s Silicon Valley. He also happens to live there, but he licensed his new Porsche in Texas (for the tax savings) and obtained a Texas driver’s license. He does have a ghost address in Texas, and he knows the area around Plano.

One day he was stopped and questioned by the California Highway Patrol. The officer did not accept his story of being from Texas. He was ordered to obtain California plates within thirty days or face a serious penalty. Rather than accept this, Les went to court.

“I’m a Texas resident,” he said. “The officer made a mistake. Here is my Texas driver’s license with my Texas home address.” The judge accepted this explanation and Les kept his Texas plates. Two months later, Les was in a commuter parking lot taking a nap in his car.

“A cop woke me up and was suspicious of the Texas plates despite my Texas driver’s license. He asked me a lot of questions about what I was doing and how long had I been out here. I simply said, ‘I’m a Texas resident working out here temporarily.’ He called it in and everything was okay, so he left me alone.”

However, here’s what happened later:

“I was pulled over by a traffic cop who was part of a special task force with access to a database that records license plates whenever exiting airport garages or crossing toll bridges. He was able to immediately determine that the car had been in California for longer than the allowed period of time. The car was immediately impounded and I was left standing on the curb looking for a taxi. Cost me eight hundred dollars to get the vehicle back.”

If one of the bad guys takes down your license plate number, what can you do?

I will not list the variety of legal reasons for which you may suddenly wish to change your license plate number. I will, however, cite a recent example that involved one of my consulting clients. (Names have been changed.)

David White spent a long evening at the home of Maria Flores, an attractive young Mexican widow who lives in a village nearby. His beige Camry was parked in her driveway. When the time came to leave, David opened Maria’s front door, snapped on the outside light, and spotted two men at the back of his car. One was holding a flashlight and the other had a pad and pencil in his hand. David yelled and reached into his jacket as if to withdraw a handgun. Both men fled. He called me at sunrise the next morning and asked me what to do.

“I need to keep using my car, but these guys have got my license plate number.”

“It can’t be traced, David.” (Following my instructions, the car had been titled in the name of a New Mexico LLC with a ghost address.)

“But these guys and their pals will be watching for it.”

“I’ll meet you down at the licensing bureau when they open,” I said. “You’ll get new plates that show you contribute to a law-enforcement memorial. You’ll pay an extra forty dollars a year, but you’ll have a new number and will get the vanity plates right away.”

I keep a drawer full of decals and bumper stickers for every occasion, and I selected one before heading out to meet David. His car now has a new license plate with a silhouette of some law-enforcement officers on the left side, and also a prominent decal in one corner of the rear window noting the following:

FRATERNAL ORDER OF POLICE ACTIVE SUPPORTER

Will having license plates that cannot be traced protect me from stalkers?

You mean, like, “guaranteed?” When it comes to privacy and security, there are few if any guarantees, but the precaution you mention will certainly balance the odds in your favor. However, if someone seems to be able to mysteriously track you down after a “foolproof” move, perhaps he followed your U-Haul trailer or truck when you moved. Some stalkers have trailed their victims from one coast to the other. Or perhaps:

• He found out where your children go to school, and followed them home.

• He followed you home from work, church, or a visit to a relative.

• He followed you home from the airport.

• He requested a hearing, forcing you to show up in court, then followed you home.

The only sure way to avoid being followed is to never be located in the first place. If you have to meet with the stalker for any reason whatsoever, he certainly may attempt to follow you. Then again, ask any private investigator who the toughest person is to follow, and he’ll tell you that it’s the target who is aware. Perhaps not conscious of any specific thing, but just alert in general. Looking around when walking, watching the mirrors when driving, etc.

Carjackers say the same thing—many crimes would have been avoided had the victims been aware of their approach. In my own case, I never allow any specific car to follow me for a period of time in rural areas (where our homes usually are). I drive a few miles over the speed limit, and if a car comes up behind me I turn on the right-turn signal, slow down, and force him to pass.

If you live in a city and think a certain car is following you, make four consecutive right or left turns, i.e., go around the block. If the car you’ve seen in your mirrors follows you, do not go home. Drive to the nearest police or fire station or to a well-lighted gas station with a number of cars filling up. Hopefully you will have your cell phone with you, in which case you can dial 911.

What precautions can be taken against carjackers?

Privacy and security go together. In the words of the Los Angeles Police department—referring to carjackings—“Don’t give up your privacy.” In other words, never get into your own car at gunpoint. Just pretend to faint (or maybe for real!) and fall down limp.

Here’s a scam I hear about from time to time. It’s an oldie, but it still works. The latest is a report about a BMW that was parked late at night outside an upscale restaurant in Marin County, California. Someone called the restaurant to report that there was a white BMW 740i in the parking lot and its lights were still on. When the owner showed up (and of course the lights were not on), he was robbed at gunpoint and his car was taken.

Female drivers, when alone, attract more attention than males. One solution is to tint your windows as dark—or darker—than the law allows. Then have a male mannequin in the passenger seat. In fact, with dark enough tinting you may even get by with one of those rubber masks from a costume store. Just slip it over the headrest—can’t hurt, might help. (Just don’t use this gag for the carpool lane, however. You may stumble across a cop with less than an adequate sense of humor.)

While on this subject, below is an article from the Skagit Valley Herald, titled “Accused Rapist Had Been Jailed.”

According to police, the man rammed his car into the woman’s vehicle about 7 p.m. Wednesday. The woman later told police she got out and the man then pushed her into his own car, climbed in, and drove south … he beat her up and raped her.

Hint to you, husbands: Note the words “she got out.” Might this be a good time to review security with your wife, and make sure she always keeps her car doors locked and has her cell phone with her?