Massachusetts LLC annual reports cost $500 — that bill is not the resident-agent job

What Massachusetts actually requires

G.L. c. 156C § 5 is who must keep an agent. Each limited liability company shall have and maintain in the commonwealth: (1) an office, which may but need not be a place of its business in the commonwealth, at which the records required by section 9 shall be kept; and (2) a resident agent for service of process on the limited liability company. The agent must be an individual resident of the commonwealth, a domestic corporation, or a foreign corporation authorized to do business in the commonwealth. That is the statute’s list. 950 CMR 112.13 then prints a longer list: an individual, a domestic corporation, a domestic not-for-profit corporation, a domestic other business entity authorized by law, a foreign corporation qualified to do business in the commonwealth, or a foreign other business entity authorized by law and qualified to do business in the commonwealth. We print both. We do not pretend the regulation and the statute are the same sentence.

G.L. c. 156D § 5.01 is why this page still says registered agent. Each corporation shall continuously maintain a registered office and a registered agent in the commonwealth. The agent’s business office is also the registered office. The agent may be an individual, including an officer of the corporation; a domestic corporation or not-for-profit domestic corporation; or a foreign corporation or not-for-profit foreign corporation qualified to do business here. G.L. c. 156D § 5.02 is how a corporation changes that line. This page is the LLC job. Indiana’s live filing uses registered agent and keeps resident agent as the old name. Massachusetts’s LLC filing uses resident agent and keeps registered agent as the corporation name. We print both. We do not treat a corporation form as today’s LLC form.

G.L. c. 156C § 12 is the certificate of organization and the annual report. The certificate names the office required by section 5 and the name and address of the resident agent. The agent’s written consent to the appointment shall be either in the certificate or attached to it. All limited liability companies formed under this chapter shall also file an annual report with the state secretary setting forth the information required in that certificate. The fee for the certificate of organization is five hundred dollars. The fee for the annual report is five hundred dollars. Those dollars are paid to the state secretary when the paper is filed. Section 12 does not print the due date. 950 CMR 112.14 does. Each limited liability company shall file an annual report with the Division on or before the anniversary date of the filing of its original certificate of organization. The report is titled “Annual Report.” It may amend any information in the certificate, except that any change pertaining to registered agent or office must be made as provided in 950 CMR 112.13. That mixed wording is the regulation’s. The LLC statute says resident agent. The annual-report rule says registered agent. The job is the same. The $500 bill cannot change it. Foreign LLCs file the same $500 report on the anniversary of their registration under 950 CMR 112.27, with the same bar on changing the agent line.

950 CMR 112.13 is the street rule this page is built on. Each domestic and foreign limited liability company authorized to transact business in the commonwealth must continuously maintain a resident agent and office in the commonwealth. The office address of the resident agent must be a street address. A post office address is not sufficient. The Limited Liability Company Information page is the office’s own gloss on changing that line. A later fetch of that page was blocked. The text we retrieved says a limited liability company may change its resident agent or the street address of the resident agent by filing a Certificate of Statement of Change of Resident Agent/Resident Office. The fee is twenty-five dollars ($25.00) if filed by paper or fax, and no fee if filed electronically. 950 CMR 112.29 lists the $500 certificate, the $500 annual report, and a $100 amendment. It does not list that change fee. We print the statute, the rule, and the office page. We do not invent a fourth number that makes them agree.

G.L. c. 156C § 5A is how an LLC changes the line. The company files a certificate of change of agent or address with the state secretary. The statement names the company, the name and street address of the current resident agent, and, if the agent is changing, the name and street address of the new resident agent and the new agent’s written consent, either on the statement or attached to it. If only the street is changing, the statement gives the new street of the resident agent’s business office. A resident agent who moves may change the street for each company the agent represents by notifying the company in writing and filing one statement. The official Statement of Change of Resident Agent/Resident Office cites G.L. c. 156C § 5A and § 51. The mailing line on that form is William Francis Galvin, Secretary of the Commonwealth, One Ashburton Place, Room 1717, Boston, Massachusetts 02108-1512. Those lines are the Secretary of the Commonwealth, not a commercial resident agent.

The same section is how an agent steps down. Any resident agent may resign by signing and delivering to the state secretary a certificate of resignation. The agent shall furnish a copy to the limited liability company. The agency appointment shall be terminated on the thirty-first day following the date on which the statement was filed. 950 CMR 112.13 repeats that 31st-day clock. We print the thirty-first day. We do not invent a 30-day clock from a vendor FAQ that rounded down.

Miss the agent and the office can start a dissolution. 950 CMR 112.20 says a limited liability company may be considered inactive, and its dissolution in the public interest, if it fails to appoint a resident agent within 60 days after notice from the Division of the requirement to maintain a resident agent and office in the commonwealth. The notice goes by mail to the office required by section 5(1). If the company does not fix the ground within 90 days after the date of the notice, the Division shall administratively dissolve it. Two consecutive years of missed annual reports is a separate ground. Those clocks are office clocks. They are not the resident-agent job.

The Corporations Division sits at One Ashburton Place, 17th Floor / Room 1717, Boston, MA 02108-1512. 950 CMR 112.05 posts Division hours: filing and certificate rooms Monday through Friday 8:45 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.; public search room and phone room Monday through Friday 8:45 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Those hours are the Division’s. They are not a resident-agent clock. Massachusetts does not post Florida-style 10–noon / 2–4 windows. We do not treat a company 9-to-5 line as G.L. c. 156C § 5.

Confirm the live name and street on the Corporations Division search before you treat a marketing city as current. Headquarters is not the resident office. The Secretary of the Commonwealth desk is not a vendor suite. That search returned a live lookup form on retrieval. A later fetch of some Corporations Division information pages was blocked. We do not invent a row we could not open.

Cited prices, retrieved September 12, 2026

We print what the company’s official registered-agent page said on the retrieval date. No company publishes a different Massachusetts resident-agent price from the national card, except where we note a Massachusetts-page renewal line. We do not invent a renewal.

• Northwest Registered Agent: official page: “$125 Per Year.” Same price in year two on the national card. Five or more states is $100 a year per state. Retrieved September 12, 2026 from northwestregisteredagent.com/registered-agent and the Massachusetts product page. First year free only if you form through them; we do not treat that bundle as the standalone price.
• Bizee: official registered-agent page: free first year with formation; standalone $149/year; year two $149/year. Retrieved September 12, 2026 from bizee.com/business-management/registered-agent. A bizee.com/llc/massachusetts-registered-agent URL returned 404 the same day. The live Massachusetts page is bizee.com/llc/massachusetts/registered-agent. We do not invent a Massachusetts-only price from a missing hyphenated URL.
• LegalZoom: official overview retrieved September 12, 2026: “Get registered agent services for $249/year.” Product card: $249/year. Footnote: auto-renews at the purchase rate; “The renewal rate is subject to change.” Retrieved from legalzoom.com/…/registered-agent-overview.html. The Massachusetts registered-agent article, updated May 15, 2026 and retrieved the same day, also prints $249 per year. A legalzoom.com/articles/registered-agent-in-massachusetts URL returned 404 the same day. We do not invent a higher year-two number.
• ZenBusiness: official Massachusetts page: first-year and renewal dollars are the national card. The national page says $99 + state fees for the first year and renews at $199/yr, subject to change. The Massachusetts page says starts at $99 + MA state fees and renews at $199/yr, subject to change. It was last updated August 26, 2025. A zenbusiness.com/massachusetts-registered-agent/ URL redirected to /massachusetts-resident-agent/ the same day. The same national page says they currently do not offer registered-agent service to PLLCs or nonprofits. That is their national exclusion, not a Massachusetts statute. Retrieved September 12, 2026 from zenbusiness.com/registered-agent and the Massachusetts resident-agent page.

A change of resident agent is a separate Secretary of the Commonwealth filing. We cite G.L. c. 156C § 5A, 950 CMR 112.13, and the office’s $25 paper / no-fee electronic split, not company blogs. The $500 annual report is still not the resident-agent job.

Who publishes a Massachusetts street

A city is not a resident office. We print only the streets the companies publish for resident-agent use. We do not invent the rest. Confirm the live name and street on the Corporations Division search before you file. Headquarters is not the resident office. The Secretary of the Commonwealth’s Boston contacts are not vendor suites.

• Northwest. The Massachusetts product page says they accept and scan documents on-site at their registered office in Pittsfield, MA, Berkshire County. The office-locations page lists Pittsfield, MA 01201, Berkshire County, and says they leave the street off this list. No street is published. The two city lines match. Those city lines are vendor-claimed. We have not been to a Pittsfield office.
• Bizee. Claims owned offices in all 50 states. The official registered-agent page names no Massachusetts street. The live Massachusetts product page names no Massachusetts street. The hyphenated Massachusetts URL we tried returned 404 on September 12, 2026. The contact page lists 17350 State Highway 249, Suite 220, Houston, TX 77064 as headquarters. That address is not a Massachusetts resident-agent street.
• LegalZoom. The official registered-agent overview does not publish a Massachusetts street. The Massachusetts article, updated May 15, 2026, names no LegalZoom Massachusetts city. It prints One Ashburton Place, Room 1717, Boston, MA 02108-1512 as the mailing line for a $25 paper change. That is a published street. It is the Secretary of the Commonwealth, not LegalZoom. We do not invent a suite. We do not treat a LegalZoom virtual-mail street as the resident-agent street.
• ZenBusiness. The Massachusetts resident-agent page publishes no ZenBusiness street or city. It prints a Secretary of the Commonwealth contact at One Ashburton Place, Boston, MA 02108, telephone 617-727-7030, hours Monday–Friday 8:45 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. That is a published street. It is the Secretary of the Commonwealth, not ZenBusiness. The change form lists Room 1717 at the same building. We do not treat either Boston line as their suite.

If you are your own resident agent, the street on the public record is often your home. If you hire a commercial resident agent, the agent line is that organization’s name. Northwest names Pittsfield, ZIP 01201, Berkshire County, on both the product page and the office list, and no street on either. LegalZoom’s Massachusetts article names no LegalZoom city. Bizee publishes no Massachusetts street. ZenBusiness publishes the Secretary of the Commonwealth’s Ashburton Place contacts. We label every published city vendor-claimed. Use the Corporations Division search.

In-state office, the post-office ban, and the $500 report

Massachusetts wants an in-state person or an authorized company, a street address in this commonwealth, and someone who can take court papers at that street. A post office address is not that street. The certificate and a later change statement need the new agent’s written consent on the filing or attached to it. Change the agent on the Statement of Change of Resident Agent/Resident Office at $25 paper or fax, or at no fee electronically, on the office page we retrieved. Resignation is effective on the 31st day. The annual report is $500 and due on or before the anniversary of the certificate of organization. That report cannot change the resident agent. Massachusetts does not post a Florida-style 10–noon / 2–4 clock, and it does not run a Nevada-style ten-company commercial-agent register. Northwest claims Pittsfield, ZIP 01201, Berkshire County. LegalZoom’s Massachusetts article names no LegalZoom city. ZenBusiness publishes One Ashburton Place — the Secretary of the Commonwealth. Bizee names no Massachusetts street. Process Score has not been to those offices. We do not treat a company 9-to-5 line as G.L. c. 156C § 5.

Service of process, not marketing mail

We grade scan-and-forward of service of process and official notices:

• Bizee: notifications by text and email; court papers mailed via FedEx with tracking; portal upload by employees. Contact-page support hours are Monday–Friday 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. CST. Those are support hours, not resident-office hours.
• Northwest: “We scan every document you receive right where you receive it—in our office.” The Massachusetts page adds on-site scans from Pittsfield. Their mail-scanning extras are a different product. We do not grade those extras as a mailbox.
• LegalZoom: upload, email, and a postcard for urgent legal mail; they say they shred junk mail. The Massachusetts article adds document scanning and forwarding. Junk-mail shredding is not the job we score.
• ZenBusiness: scan and upload to a dashboard; email; overnight the original for urgent legal notices. Their own FAQ says you cannot use the agent address as your business address. Their national product currently excludes PLLCs and nonprofits; that is their exclusion, not a Massachusetts statute. The Massachusetts page prints Secretary of the Commonwealth hours of 8:45 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. That is office copy for the Secretary of the Commonwealth, not G.L. c. 156C § 5.

Home-address privacy

A commercial resident agent is how most Massachusetts owners keep a home off the agent line. The Secretary of the Commonwealth still publishes whatever other addresses you put on a formation filing or an annual report. Privacy of the agent line is not privacy of every field. Confirm the live line on the Corporations Division search.

Scorecards

What this page does not do

• It does not rank mailbox networks or virtual offices.
• It does not publish combined star ratings or a fake 4.8.
• It does not treat a company 9-to-5 line as G.L. c. 156C § 5.
• It does not treat the $500 annual report as the resident-agent job.
• It does not treat a Houston headquarters as a Massachusetts street.
• It does not treat One Ashburton Place, Room 1717, as a vendor suite. Those contacts are the Secretary of the Commonwealth.
• It does not invent a Massachusetts-only price a company did not print.
• It does not invent a LegalZoom Massachusetts city the article did not name.
• It does not treat a P.O. Box as the street because a mailing line may sit next to it.
• It does not invent a ten-company commercial-agent bar. Massachusetts does not run that register.
• It does not treat registered agent as the live LLC form name. G.L. c. 156C § 5 uses resident agent. G.L. c. 156D § 5.01 uses registered agent for corporations.
• It does not invent a single change-of-agent dollar that makes 950 CMR 112.29 and the office’s $25 paper / no-fee electronic split agree.
• It does not pretend 950 CMR 112.13’s longer who-may-serve list is the same sentence as G.L. c. 156C § 5.

Choosing among being the agent yourself, asking a lawyer, or hiring a commercial agent: DIY vs lawyer vs commercial. California’s scorecard is a different statute: California scorecard. Texas keeps the written consent with the company: Texas scorecard. Florida files the acceptance and posts a 10–noon / 2–4 clock: Florida scorecard. Delaware bans a virtual-only agent and sets the commercial bar above 50: Delaware scorecard. New York starts with the Secretary of State already on the agent line: New York scorecard. Nevada makes a commercial agent register at ten companies: Nevada scorecard. Wyoming bans UPS stores and virtual addresses as the registered office: Wyoming scorecard. Arizona makes the statutory-agent appointment wait on a signed acceptance: Arizona scorecard. Illinois gives you 60 days after your agent resigns, then you are not in good standing: Illinois scorecard. Ohio cancels the articles if you miss the 30-day statutory-agent notice: Ohio scorecard. Georgia wants the registered office at the same street as the agent: Georgia scorecard. Pennsylvania files a registered office, not a registered agent: Pennsylvania scorecard. New Jersey wants a street for your registered agent and will not take a P.O. Box alone: New Jersey scorecard. Colorado will not take a commercial mailbox or a P.O. Box as the registered-agent street: Colorado scorecard. North Carolina’s LLC annual report is $200 paper or $203 online by April 15. That filing is not the registered-agent job: North Carolina scorecard. Virginia’s LLC pays a $50 annual registration fee and files no annual report: Virginia scorecard. Washington files the agent’s prior consent and will not take a P.O. Box or a PMB as the street: Washington scorecard. Michigan’s statute names a resident agent and sends the filing to LARA: Michigan scorecard. Indiana’s live statute names a registered agent. Older Indiana law called the same job resident agent: Indiana scorecard.