---
title: What is a registered address service in Taiwan? Legality, costs and choosing an address (2026 Taipei edition)
url: https://joelin.cc/en/p/9326
source: https://joelin.cc/en/p/9326
lang: en
pubDate: '2026-10-28'
date_modified: '2026-10-28'
description: Renting an address to register a Taiwan company is legal; sham businesses are not. Taipei fees run about NT$2,500–3,500 a month with mail handling.
schema_type: BlogPosting
author: joe
entity_ids:
author: https://me.joelin.cc/#joe
ai_role: ai_only
translation_assistant: caddy
ai_credit: 'AI-assisted translation and editing: Caddy (AI)'
faq:
- q: Is a registered address service legal in Taiwan?
a: Yes. Using a registered address service (borrowing only an address, without actually operating at it) is not prohibited by the Civil Code (民法), the Company Act (公司法) or the Business Entity Registration Act (商業登記法). The conditions are that the address is lawful, government mail can be received at any time, and the business actually operates and files taxes as required. What is illegal is not the registered address differing from the place of business, but a sham business (虛設行號) that has no real transactions and exists purely to sell invoices for profit.
- q: Can a one-person company use a registered address service?
a: Yes. One-person companies, startups, freelancers, e-commerce sellers and side businesses are all typical users. As long as your business activities are not a licensed or import/export type of business that by law or in practice requires a physical premises, a registered address service fully applies.
- q: Can I register the company at my own home?
a: |-
Yes, but at a cost. Residential zones allow only limited use; in Taipei's Residential Zones 3 and 4, a pure office (no foot traffic, no production) is mostly a conditionally permitted use. The cost is that at least one-sixth of the floor area is taxed for house tax at the business rate (3% in Taipei) instead of the 1.2% owner-occupied rate, and that share of land value tax rises from the 2‰ owner-occupied residential rate to the general rate, progressive from 10‰. If you rent, the landlord must also agree, and most landlords do not, because their taxes go up.
Businesses that sell purely online and have no physical business activity may be able to apply to keep the owner-occupied rates, but only after passing an on-site inspection.
- q: How is mail handled? Will I receive letters from the National Taxation Bureau?
a: 'This is the most important part of a registered address service. Choose a plan that includes mail handling: the provider receives National Taxation Bureau (國稅局) notices, tax bills and bank letters for you, and notifies you to collect them or forwards them. **Never choose a bare address with no mail service.** Once official letters come back as "addressee unknown" or go unsigned for long periods, the National Taxation Bureau can easily presume something is wrong, and you may even be selected for inspection.'
- q: Will the National Taxation Bureau inspect a company using a registered address?
a: |-
It may, but a legitimately run business has nothing to fear. The National Taxation Bureau sends staff for on-site inspections of businesses that are newly established, show anomalies or have not operated for a long time (not every case gets a visit).
If the inspection finds no sign of business at the address, the business tax returns have been zero for a long time, many companies share the same address and phone number, or the excess input tax credit is abnormally high, the business may be judged not to be actually operating and required to move or register properly, or even investigated as a sham business.
Note: **filing a zero return is not illegal, but it raises the chance of an inspection.** As long as you have real transactions, file truthfully and can receive official mail, an inspection is not a problem.
- q: What happens if a registered company does not start operating for a long time?
a: Under Article 10 of the Company Act, if a company **has not started business six months after incorporation** (without registering an extension), or **suspends business on its own for six months or more** after starting (without registering the suspension), the competent authority may order it dissolved. Under Article 397, if a dissolved company does not apply to register the dissolution, the authority may revoke its registration six months after giving notice. So once you have opened a company at a borrowed address, make sure it is genuinely active.
- q: How do I change the registered address, and how much does it cost?
a: Apply for a change of registration with the original registration authority (the Ministry of Economic Affairs or the city/county government), and change the tax registration address with the National Taxation Bureau at the same time. For a company, an address change requires a government filing fee (usually lower online than over the counter; the actual amount follows the fee schedule announced each year by the Ministry of Economic Affairs or the local government). If you hire a bookkeeping agent (記帳士) to handle it, there is an additional service fee, which varies by firm; go by the actual quote.
- q: Can a registration using a borrowed address be rejected or revoked?
a: At the registration stage, if the address does not meet the rules (for example, it fails Taipei's business premises pre-check, or the building is on a control list), the application may be returned for correction. After registration, if the address is false or there is no business activity, the authority usually first sets a deadline for correction; only if that is not met does it proceed to an order of dissolution (Company Act Article 10) or revocation of registration (Article 397). The standard path is "correction by a deadline first", not immediate revocation on discovery, but do not treat that as permission to let things slide.
translation_of: /p/9326
---
# What is a registered address service in Taiwan? Legality, costs and choosing an address (2026 Taipei edition)
> A **registered address service** (借址登記, literally "borrowing an address for registration") means a company or sole proprietorship that has no physical office rents an official street address from a business center or a bookkeeping firm in order to complete its business registration.
> If you are about to set up a one-person company, have just started freelancing, or run an online shop without a storefront, this article gives you the direct answer: a registered address service is **legal** in Taiwan. The core idea is that a company's registered address (its legal domicile) and its actual place of business can be different. What actually gets people into trouble is not that the two addresses differ, but "not having tax registration at that address" or "having no real transactions at all (a sham business)".
Below I lay out the definition, who needs it, the legal framework, current prices, how to choose an address and what to avoid, plus an FAQ. This is the version I put together after researching the subject thoroughly while evaluating this business myself.
In short, a registered address has to pass three separate gates: company registration (Ministry of Economic Affairs), tax registration (created by the National Taxation Bureau from the registration data and subject to later inspection), and land-use zoning (the local urban development department), with Taipei additionally requiring a pre-check of business premises.
---
## 1. What a registered address service is, and how it differs from renting an office, a virtual office or a business center
"Registered address service" is a colloquial term, not a legal one.
Its legal basis is **Article 3 of the Company Act (公司法)**: "The domicile of a company shall be the place where its head office is located." In plain terms, a company must have an address that serves as its legal domicile,
used for receiving served documents, determining court jurisdiction, and as the center for settling debts,
but the law **has never required** that actual business take place at this registered address.
So the registered address and the place of business were always allowed to differ. A registered address service solves exactly the "**company registered address**" problem: you need a legitimate street address to obtain a Unified Business Number (統一編號), issue invoices and file taxes, but you do not need to actually put a desk there and work.
Many people mix up several terms, so here is a table to sort them out (this table only clarifies terms; the full comparison of price and compliance is in section 4):
| Type | What you get | Office
space? |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **Registered address service / virtual office** | Only a rented street address for registration plus mail handling (some include call answering) | ❌ No permanent space |
| **Business center (serviced office)** | Address registration + usable physical space + meeting rooms + front-desk mail handling | ✅ Yes |
| **Renting your own office** | A full lease; registered address = place of business | ✅ Entirely yours |
| **Registering at your home or rented flat** | Registering with your home address | ✅ (your home, but with a tax cost) |
In practice, "registered address service" and "virtual office" are almost synonyms; the difference is only in wording.
A business center is the upgraded "address plus physical space" version. During on-site National Taxation Bureau inspections it is usually viewed more favorably than a bare address, because there really are people, a front desk and meeting rooms on site.
If you searched for the term "virtual office" and want to know what it actually buys you, how much it costs per month and how renting one works, I have written a separate article on that type of service: [What is a virtual office? Costs and how to rent one](/en/p/9424).
If what you want is a coworking space you can actually walk into and sit at (common coworking and business center locations in Taipei's Xinyi District fall into this category), that is a different need; this article focuses on registered address services, where you need only a legitimate street address. If you want a private space for one person with a door you can close, I have also covered [types, prices and how to choose a private office](/p/9606) (in Chinese).
As for how business centers, virtual offices and coworking spaces differ and who each one suits, I have a separate point-by-point comparison: [Business center vs virtual office vs coworking space](/en/p/9333).
---
## 2. Who needs a registered address service? Five types of people and their reasoning
The core audience for a registered address service is people who "need a legal business address, but do not yet want to pay rent for a whole office just to get an address".
I will use five concrete situations, pointing out for each why they need no physical space but do need a legal address:
### One-person companies
You want to upgrade from freelancing to a limited company, so you can issue invoices, take on jobs from corporate clients and book expenses as costs. But the actual work gets done at home, in cafés or at the client's site.
What you need is not an office, but a street address you can register and where letters from the National Taxation Bureau can be received.
This is a business form that I believe will keep growing in Taiwan.
Still undecided about whether to turn your freelance work into a company? I go through the signals, benefits and costs here: [Should you open a one-person company for your freelance work?](/p/9331) (in Chinese).
### Newly founded startups and small companies
My definition of a small company is an organization of up to four people.
I personally know quite a few business owners whose companies, owner included, have up to six people in total;
the company is profitable, the staff are better off than the Taiwanese job market average,
and the team keeps pushing to grow.
As for startups:
a team of three to five people in the cash-burning stage, where every dollar has to count.
Early on you may still be in a shared space or working remotely, and there is no need to sign a one-year office lease that ties up your cash. Use a borrowed address to get the company open and the product built first, and rent a physical space once you reach scale.
### Freelancers / SOHO workers
Design, copywriting, photography, consulting: in work where "the person is the capacity", there is simply no need for a place to go to work.
But to bid on government tenders, serve corporate clients, or issue invoices and file taxes, you need a legal registered address for a profit-seeking enterprise.
Quite often these are also one-person companies, ha,
opened purely to issue invoices.
### E-commerce sellers
You sell on Shopee, your own website or Instagram, your warehouse may be outsourced to a third-party logistics provider, and you have no physical storefront.
But platforms and payment integrations require business registration, and the invoicing system also needs a registered address. A registered address service fills exactly this gap of "registered, but no storefront".
That said, I find this category an extremely crowded red ocean.
As of 2026, my sense is that the boom period is over
and everyone is in the middle of transitioning.
### Side-business owners
You run a small business alongside your main job and want to make it legitimate and issue invoices, but you do not want to (and should not) register the company at your own home, for fear of tax inspections, higher house tax and bothering the neighbors.
Rather than using a live-work rental or registering the company at home, borrowing an address is the cleanest way to separate a side business from your private life.
The one-person companies and freelancers above are actually quite similar to this group.
What these five have in common: **their productive capacity is not tied to a fixed place, but the status of a profit-seeking enterprise requires a legal street address.** A registered address service buys that address at the lowest cost.
---
## 3. Legality and regulations, explained in plain language
This section is the key part, because most articles on the market treat it too lightly.
A registered address service involves **tax and legal liability**. I researched it thoroughly and have tried to write it in words you can follow.
First, remember one overarching principle:
> **"Registration" and "doing business" are two different things, and they must pass three different gates, each with a different competent authority.**
### 3-1 Three kinds of "registration": where your company's registered address comes from
The most common confusion in Taiwan is treating the following three as one thing:
| Type of registration | Legal basis | Competent authority | What it governs |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| **Company registration** | Company Act (公司法) | Ministry of Economic Affairs (經濟部, Department of Commerce 商業司); handled by the city governments in the six special municipalities | Incorporation, articles, capital, directors and supervisors of the corporate entity |
| **Business registration (sole proprietorship/partnership, 行號)** | Business Entity Registration Act (商業登記法) | Special municipality / city or county government | Sole proprietorships or partnerships ("行號" or "studio") with no legal personality |
| **Tax registration (稅籍登記)** | Article 28 of the Value-added and Non-value-added Business Tax Act (加值型及非加值型營業稅法) | National Taxation Bureau (國稅局) / tax collection authority | Bringing the business into tax administration (issuing invoices, filing taxes) |
I have spelled out the statutory basis for tax registration because it is the one most often confused and most often penalized: **Article 28 of the Business Tax Act** states that "the head office and other fixed places of business of a business entity shall each apply to the competent tax collection authority for tax registration before commencing business." This is the provision that the Article 45 penalty discussed later corresponds to. For companies and sole proprietorships, however, the tax registration is created by the National Taxation Bureau from the company or business registration data and is deemed to have been applied for, so no separate filing is needed (Article 3 of the Regulations Governing Tax Registration, 稅籍登記規則). What you must apply for yourself is any additional fixed place of business, outside the registered address, that deals with the public.
Two frequently asked historical points, settled here:
* **"Tax registration" (稅籍登記) is the former "business registration" (營業登記); they are the same thing.** A 2016 amendment (ROC year 105) renamed "營業登記" to "稅籍登記" to avoid confusion.
* **The "profit-seeking enterprise registration certificate" (營利事業登記證) was abolished back in 2009 (ROC year 98)** and replaced by a registration approval letter. So stop thinking you need to obtain one; it no longer exists.
The standard sequence is: first obtain the **company or business registration approval letter (and with it a Unified Business Number)** from the Ministry of Economic Affairs or the local government; the National Taxation Bureau then creates your tax registration from the registration data and notifies you in writing; only after that can you legally issue invoices, file taxes and operate.
A registered address service usually involves both company registration and tax registration: the rented address must be registrable as the company's domicile, and it also directly becomes your tax registration address. From then on, National Taxation Bureau inspections and official mail are all based on this address.
### 3-2 "Can be registered" is not the same as "can do business": three gates
This is where the gap is widest and where most people get caught. Whether an address can legally be used for business depends on passing three separate gates. Here is a minimal outline first, then the details:
> **① Can a company or sole proprietorship be "registered" there?** → Ministry of Economic Affairs / city or county government (traditionally does not review zoning)
> **② Can you "file taxes and issue invoices" at that address?** → National Taxation Bureau tax registration (created from the registration data) plus inspections
> **③ Does the building's "zoning use" allow your kind of business?** → Local urban development department / building administration
```mermaid
flowchart TD
A[The address] --> B[① Company / business
registration
MOEA / local government]
B --> C[② Tax registration
and inspections
National Taxation Bureau]
C --> D[③ Zoning and building use
urban development /
building dept.]
D --> E[Pass all three
to operate legally]
T[Taipei since 2023:
premises pre-check
before registering] -.-> B
```
1. **Company or business incorporation registration** (Ministry of Economic Affairs / city or county government): traditionally, the registration stage does **not** treat land-use zoning or building use as a mandatory review item, so even when the zoning does not match, registration often goes through. This is the institutional cause of the gap between "can be registered" and "cannot do business".
2. **Tax registration** (National Taxation Bureau): the gate that really tests "actual business". Tax registrations for companies and sole proprietorships are created by the National Taxation Bureau from the registration data with no separate filing, but the bureau conducts tax registration audits and may send staff to inspect on site to see whether there are signs of business at the registered address.
3. **Land-use zoning and building administration** (local urban development department / building administration): whether the zoning use of the building at this address allows your kind of business.
⚠️ **Taipei City is a major exception; remember it separately:** since **1 January 2023 (ROC year 112)**, Taipei City has **fully implemented a land-use zoning and building administration "pre-check"** for the "place of business" in company and business registrations. Applicants must first use Taipei's **business premises pre-check system (營業場所預先查詢系統)** to check whether the premises and business activities comply with zoning and building rules, and attach the pre-check result to the registration application. If the building is under earthquake red/yellow-tag control or is a sea-sand building (海砂屋), registering an address there is restricted. **So "zoning is not reviewed at registration" is the general rule nationwide, but it does not hold in Taipei.**
### 3-3 Can a company be registered in a residential zone?
Yes, with conditions.
Residential zones are not completely closed to business; they allow "**limited permitted use**": usually restricted to low floors, specific low-disturbance business types and limited scale, without disturbing residents' peace. Taking **Article 15 of the Enforcement Rules of the Urban Planning Act for Taiwan Province (都市計畫法臺灣省施行細則)** as an example, shops in residential zones are limited to the first floor and the first basement level of a building, and restaurants to the first and second floors and the first basement level; Article 16 further caps the floor area (500㎡ for shops, 300㎡ for restaurants). **But this is the Taiwan Province enforcement rules' example and applies only to the counties and cities covered by those rules. Taipei and the other special municipalities follow their own land-use zoning control ordinances, which differ, so the provincial rules cannot be extended to Taipei.**
Under Taipei's practice (**Taipei City Land Use Zoning Control Self-Government Ordinance (臺北市土地使用分區管制自治條例)** plus the practice of Taipei's Department of Urban Development), a "general office (pure office work, no foot traffic)" in Residential Zones 3 and 4 is a "**conditionally permitted use**", not banned outright. Three common situations in which it is allowed in practice (still subject to case-by-case approval):
① the building's use permit matches the business activities;
② the use does not match, but the zone is Residential 3 or 4 or a commercial zone and the building faces a road 8 meters wide or more;
③ the same address previously had a profit-seeking enterprise registration, interrupted for less than two years, with comparable business activities. **A pure office (no production, no foot traffic) passes more easily than food service or retail.**
> Note: each county and city's "Urban Planning Act enforcement rules" or "land-use zoning control ordinance" differs. Which business types are allowed in residential zones, the floor-area ratio (the commonly cited one-fifth or one-sixth) and floor restrictions all vary by location. **Do not treat any single ratio as a nationwide rule**; check the exact provisions with the local urban development department.
### 3-4 A normal borrowed address vs a sham business: where criminal liability begins
This line matters most: **a registered address service itself is legal; what is illegal is a "sham business" (虛設行號). The difference lies in whether there are real transactions, not in the address.**
The Ministry of Finance's official definition of a sham business is: a company or business that "on the surface has completed tax registration as required, but in reality has no genuine sale of goods or provision of services, and exists purely to profit by selling invoices."
A legitimate borrowed address rests on three conditions; if any one is missing, problems can follow:
* **The address must be lawful and reachable at all times for sending and receiving government mail** (no "addressee unknown", no official letters left unsigned for long periods);
* **There must be real business and taxes filed as required** (not a name-only registration with no transactions);
* **It must not be a private home used without consent** (leading to mail being refused).
Once there are no real transactions and false uniform invoices are issued (commonly called a sham business), the responsible person and accomplices may be liable under:
* **Article 41 of the Tax Collection Act (稅捐稽徵法)** (evading tax by fraud or other improper means): under the current text, up to 5 years' imprisonment, plus a fine of up to NT$10 million; where the evaded amount is substantial, up to 7 years and a fine of up to NT$100 million.
* **Article 43 of the Tax Collection Act** (inciting or aiding tax evasion): a sham business itself has no operations and evades no tax of its own, so when it issues fake invoices for "others" to deduct, courts usually apply Article 43 for "aiding" others' tax evasion.
* **Article 71 of the Business Entity Accounting Act (商業會計法)** (knowingly preparing false accounting vouchers): up to 5 years' imprisonment or detention, and/or a fine of up to NT$600,000.
* Plus possible **forgery of documents and fraud under the Criminal Code (刑法)**.
As for the lighter violation of "**not completing tax registration**": tax registrations for companies and sole proprietorships are created by the National Taxation Bureau from the registration data, so simply borrowing an address generally will not trigger it. What you really need to watch is any additional fixed place of business outside the registered address that deals with the public, such as a shop or branch office. That location must apply for its own tax registration before it starts operating; failing to do so under **Article 45 of the Business Tax Act** leads, in addition to an order to register by a deadline, to a fine of **at least NT$3,000 and up to NT$30,000**, and if the deadline is missed, fines may be imposed repeatedly. Article 46 (failure to register changes, false registration, etc.) carries a fine of at least NT$1,500 and up to NT$15,000, for example when you move out of a borrowed address without changing the tax registration address.
That is where the law draws the line. In practice, the more common question is "will I actually be inspected, and what happens if I am": how tax collection offices carry out on-site inspections, and which office covers each of Taipei's 12 districts, I wrote up as a separate article: [Is a registered address service illegal? Will the National Taxation Bureau inspect you?](/en/p/9554).
### 3-5 Do you have to issue invoices and pay 5% business tax as soon as you register? Small-scale vs regular business entities
Many people panic at the words "tax registration", assuming that once registered they must issue invoices and pay 5% business tax. In fact there are two kinds of business entity, taxed very differently:
* **Regular business entities**: issue uniform invoices (統一發票), output tax rate 5%, input tax can be credited, returns filed every two months.
* **Small-scale business entities (assessed taxation, 查定課徵)**: small in scale, with sales "assessed" by the National Taxation Bureau; the business tax rate is only **1%**, uniform invoices are usually **not required**, and the bureau issues a tax bill each quarter.
Two thresholds that are often confused are actually **two different concepts**:
* **Monthly taxable threshold**: about **NT$100,000** per month for sales of goods and about **NT$50,000** per month for sales of services; below the threshold, no business tax is levied.
* **Invoice exemption standard**: businesses whose average monthly turnover is below a certain amount (commonly cited as about **NT$200,000**) may be exempt from issuing uniform invoices and instead be taxed under small-scale assessment.
⚠️ The figures above **follow the Ministry of Finance's announcement for the year**, and the "taxable threshold" and "invoice exemption standard" are two different things; do not conflate them. A simple rule of thumb: **the smaller the scale, the more likely you fall under small-scale status (1%, no invoices); as you grow, you become a regular business entity (5%, issuing invoices).** Before opening, ask a bookkeeping agent which tier a one-person company, online shop or SOHO business like yours falls into.
For how bookkeeping works, how to issue invoices and whether to go with 1% or 5%, I wrote an introductory guide: [Bookkeeping and tax filing basics for one-person companies](/p/100081) (in Chinese).
### 3-6 Registering a company in a residential zone raises the landlord's taxes: differential house tax and land value tax rates
This section is often overlooked, but it is the key to whether a landlord will lend you the address, because once your company is registered there, **the landlord's taxes go up**.
**House tax (differential rates):**
| Use | Legal range
(nationwide) | Taipei rate |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Owner-occupied residence | 1.2% (1% for a sole nationwide owner-occupied home below the value threshold) | 1.2% |
| Non-owner-occupied residential use ("housing hoarding tax 2.0", 囤房稅 2.0) | 2%–4.8% | Up to 2 units 3.2% / 3–4 units 3.8% / 5–6 units 4.2% / 7 units or more 4.8% |
| **Non-residential use (business, clinic, office)** | **3%–5%** | **3%** |
Working it out: **in Taipei, the 3% business rate is about 2.5 times the 1.2% owner-occupied rate**; if another county or city applies the 5% maximum for business use, the gap is even larger. (Note: the "1% for a sole nationwide owner-occupied home" in the table is a separate preferential case; when calculating the multiple, use the general 1.2% owner-occupied rate as the base, not 1%.)
There is also a key legal provision to remember, **Article 5, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 3 of the House Tax Act (房屋稅條例)**: when a building is used both as a residence and for non-residential purposes, tax is levied separately according to the area actually used, but **the taxable area for non-residential (business) use may not be less than one-sixth of the total area**. This means that even if you actually use only a small corner as an office, at least one-sixth of the area is subject to house tax at the business rate. This is a nationwide statutory rule.
**Land value tax:** the rate for owner-occupied residential land is 2‰ (two per thousand); general land (including business use) is progressive from 10‰ to 55‰. Once a building is registered for business, **the land for the business-use portion loses the 2‰ owner-occupied residential preference and is taxed at the general rate, progressive from 10‰**. In practice, tax authorities often split it using the same area ratio as house tax. But note: the house tax "one-sixth" is a **statutory minimum written into the House Tax Act**, whereas land value tax has no equivalent statutory "one-sixth" ratio; it is **determined by the actual business-use area**, and the exact ratio and whether the whole area is reclassified are as determined by the local tax collection office.
**There is also a hidden risk for the landlord:** under Article 14 of the Income Tax Act (所得稅法), if a landlord lets a building be used for company registration and business by a third party other than the landlord, their spouse or direct relatives, **the National Taxation Bureau may impute (estimate) rental income and levy individual consolidated income tax even if no rent was actually collected.** That is why a legitimate landlord will usually ask you to sign a lease and report the rent truthfully, to avoid an imputed assessment.
> Exception (a practical approach, not spelled out in the statutes): if a one-person company or sole proprietorship **sells purely online with no physical business activity**, and meets a series of conditions (the National Taxation Bureau has assigned an online-sales industry code, the registered premises are owned by the responsible person, their spouse or direct relatives, the property was previously entirely owner-occupied, there are no employees, and the home is not used as an office or to store business equipment), it may apply to keep the full owner-occupied rates for house tax and land value tax. But the tax office will inspect on site, and if the conditions are not met, at least one-sixth is taxed at the business rate.
⚠️ The rates above use **Taipei** as the example. The 3%–5% business rate and the 2%–4.8% non-owner-occupied rate are "statutory ranges" (uniform nationwide), but **each county and city sets its own actual rates and brackets**, which may differ; the "progressive starting land value" for land value tax is also adjusted by each county and city every two years. Actual rates and case determinations follow the local tax collection office where the property is located and the National Taxation Bureau.
For the full calculation of house tax, land value tax and the landlord's risk of "being taxed on imputed rent even without collecting rent", I wrote a more detailed article: [Should you register your company at home? The tax cost of a home address vs a registered address service](/p/100079) (in Chinese).
---
## 4. Prices: how much per year, what is included, and which tier each of the five types should choose
Before talking money, here is my own view: **do not look only at the monthly fee; look at what is and is not included, and whether that price hides compliance risks.** I divide Taipei's 2025–2026 market into three tiers (monthly fees in NT$):
| Service tier | Monthly fee range (Taipei) | What's included | Who it suits |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| **Bare address (basic / low-price tier)** | About 1,000–1,500 | Only an address for registration; mail handling may not be included | Those on a very tight budget who can accept the risk |
| **Standard address + mail handling** | About 2,500–3,150 | Address registration + receiving letters and parcels (some include a forwarding allowance) | Most one-person companies and SOHO workers |
| **Address + mail + bookable meeting rooms / branded frontage** | About 3,000–3,500+ | All of the above + meeting room hours + common areas + prestige locations in Xinyi or Da'an | Those who meet clients and want a professional image |
Annualized: plans with services run about **NT$30,000–38,000 a year**; the low-price tier for basic address registration can go as low as about **NT$19,000–24,000 a year** (paying annually is usually cheaper than monthly).
### 4-1 Five types of people × recommended plan × annual budget
Section 2 listed five types of people and the table above lists three price tiers. Here the two are stitched together so you can find your match directly:
| Who you are | Recommended plan | Annual budget (Taipei, NT$) | What to confirm |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| **One-person company** | Standard address + mail handling | About 30,000–37,800/year | Mail handling must be included so you receive National Taxation Bureau letters |
| **Startup (early stage)** | Standard address + mail; upgrade later | About 30,000–37,800/year | Do not sign too long a contract; you should be able to move to a physical office once you scale |
| **Freelancer / SOHO** | Standard address + mail (the minimum) | About 30,000–37,800/year | Confirm the plan includes mail "notification", not just receipt |
| **E-commerce seller** | Standard address + mail | About 30,000–37,800/year | Check first that your payment provider and platforms accept a virtual address |
| **Consultant who meets clients** | Address + mail + bookable meeting rooms | About 36,000–42,000+/year | You need a prestige location plus meeting room hours |
The basic low-price tier (about NT$24,000 a year) has become quite hard to find in Taipei.
If you find one, it is a treasure; hold on to it :)
### 4-2 An overall comparison with renting your own space and branded business centers
| Option | Approximate cost | Physical space | Compliance certainty | In one line |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Registered address / virtual office | About NT$1,500–3,500/month | ❌ | Medium | Buy only the address; cheapest |
| Local business center | About NT$2,000–6,000/month | Optional in some cases | Fairly high | Address + meeting rooms + frontage |
| International brand center (Regus / TEC 德事 / WeWork / JustCo) | NT$6,000 or more/month | Optional | High | Prime Xinyi locations; you pay for location and image |
| Renting your own office | Depends on size; highest | ✅ | Highest | Registered address = place of business; least disputable |
If you are comparing with renting your own space, see the rental market in [Taipei office rentals / Xinyi District office rentals](/p/9329) (in Chinese): Grade A offices can rent for NT$3,000–4,500 or more per ping per month, and a whole floor costs dozens of times the monthly fee of a registered address. That is exactly why registered address services exist.
⚠️ **Be especially careful with "register for NT$1,000".** Low-price plans do exist (some providers start at NT$999 a month), but accountants and the industry consistently warn that abnormally low prices often come with risks such as **overselling seats or cramming too many companies into one address, non-compliant land-use zoning, and long lock-in contracts with high early-termination penalties**.
Bare address registration at Taipei business centers mostly starts from about NT$2,000–2,500 a month.
The NT$1,500–2,000 range is not nonexistent, but it takes some luck.
**Do not equate "cheap" with "legal".**
Also remember to ask about several common "hidden costs": deposits, lock-in periods and early-termination penalties, excess fees for mail forwarding, extra charges for meeting room overtime, and, if you later change your registered address, the government filing fee paid to the competent authority (this is an official fee, separate from the business center's monthly fee).
For a breakdown of what makes up the monthly fee in the business center tier, what each provider actually charges for, and which columns to compare, see my separate analysis: [How business center address registration fees are calculated](/p/9591) (in Chinese).
> All prices are market rates with no statutory fee schedule, and they vary with location, contract length and add-on services. Read the figures above as "approximate, starting from, and based on the current year (2025–2026)".
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## 5. How to choose a registered address: the leverage of an address's image, and a checklist of pitfalls
Choosing an address is essentially a form of "**location image arbitrage**". Let me explain with a scenario I have actually been looking at.
### 5-1 The arbitrage view: "borrow the address, pay secondary-building rent"
The Xinyi Planning District is one of Taipei's most expensive office clusters, where Grade A offices can rent for NT$3,000–4,500 or more per ping per month (1 ping ≈ 3.3 m²). But with the same "Xinyi District" address, the ring of secondary office buildings just outside the planning district, old buildings over 30 years old, actually rents for only about NT$1,000–1,200 per ping per month. **Within the same administrative district, the internal price gap can be several times over.**
Laying out this cost ladder makes it clearer:
| Same district, three kinds of location | Monthly rent per ping (approx., NT$) | What you get | Suits |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| **Core Grade A offices** | About 3,000–4,500+ | Top-tier image + a full physical floor | Large companies that need both image and space |
| **B+ / secondary offices** | About 1,500–2,500 | Same district address + usable space | Small and medium businesses renting their own space |
| **Older secondary buildings (30+ years)** | About 1,000–1,200 | Same district address, low rent | Space that address providers buy in and sublet for arbitrage |
This is one of the smartest uses of a registered address service: **what you want is a respectable "Xinyi District" address on your business card, website and invoices, without carrying the rent of an entire Grade A office.**
The address provider pays the low rent of an older secondary building (its wholesale cost) and divides it into individual registration slots to sell to you (at about NT$2,500–3,500 a month).
What you pay is a small share of the secondary-building rent, and what you get is the credibility of a prime-district address.
The several-fold price gap within the district is the arbitrage structure of this business.
It is worth noting that in these secondary office belts, **large units are actually easier to rent than small ones**: large units commonly go for about NT$1,013 per ping, while small units of around 36 ping are scarcer. The low rent of old buildings leaves just the right room for "buying in large units and splitting them into small registration slots".
And this is **both legal and common** in these secondary office belts.
I checked the public business registration records for the same street: at a single address of one business center alone, the public business registration search already shows **16 or more** companies registered, mainly in consulting, trading, culture, management and capital, many of them newly established in recent years.
**A dozen or more companies registered at one address is normal for this industry, not an anomaly.**
But a caveat is needed here, so you do not conclude that "the more companies at one address, the safer": **multiple companies at the same address is legal in itself, but if several companies at that address have gone bankrupt, owe taxes or have filed zero returns for long periods, the National Taxation Bureau will step up inspections of all companies at that address. What matters is not how many there are, but whether they all genuinely operate.**
### 5-2 Checklist of pitfalls (read before renting an office or a registered address)
Before you choose, check against this list:
* **Has this address had registrations revoked?** If several companies at the same address have gone bankrupt or owe taxes, the National Taxation Bureau will "step up inspections of all companies at that address", and you will be dragged into stricter audits.
* **Are too many companies crammed into one address, and will that draw attention?** A high number of registrations is not illegal in itself, but combined with "obvious overselling + low price + no mail service", the chance of being flagged as abnormal rises. Choosing a provider with a physical frontage and a front desk that handles mail is safer than a name-only address.
* **Could the application be rejected?** Confirm that the address's land-use zoning and building use allow your business activities; **in Taipei it must also pass the business premises pre-check**.
* **Does the service include mail handling?** National Taxation Bureau letters, tax bills and bank notices all go to the registered address. Without someone receiving mail, official letters coming back as "addressee unknown" is the most common way a registered address fails. Confirm the plan includes mail handling, ideally with notification.
* **How long is the contract, and how large is the early-termination penalty?** Low monthly fees often come with long contracts and heavy penalties for early termination.
* **How many registrations does the local tax office allow at this address?** How many companies can in practice be registered at one address varies greatly between tax collection offices, and this is often the invisible ceiling on whether an address registration will succeed. Before you commit, ask the provider "how many registrations does the local office allow at this address"; it saves trouble compared with being rejected later.
* **Does the provider verify identities?** A reputable business center checks the responsible person's identity and keeps a lease on file. A provider that "asks nothing and accepts name-only registrations" is a warning sign, because its client pool is likely to be messy.
To see which business centers in each Taipei district state that they handle company registration, you can start from the [list of Taipei business centers](https://flexspace.joelin.cc/address-registration/taipei/) (in Chinese) on the Taiwan business center information site (a business center directory I run); for the address documents a new company needs to prepare, see [How to choose a company registration address](/p/9913) (in Chinese). The list is only a starting point; you still need to go through the checklist above with each provider.
> If you later upgrade from a registered address to a **one-person office, small office, micro office unit or private office rental**, remember to move "registered address = place of business" over as well, and change your tax registration and registered address at the same time (for the process, see [How to change a company address](/en/p/9571)).
---
## 6. FAQ: common questions about registered address services
### Is a registered address service legal in Taiwan?
Yes. Using a registered address service (borrowing only an address, without actually operating at it) is not prohibited by the Civil Code (民法), the Company Act (公司法) or the Business Entity Registration Act (商業登記法). The conditions are that the address is lawful, government mail can be received at any time, and the business actually operates and files taxes as required. What is illegal is not the registered address differing from the place of business, but a sham business (虛設行號) that has no real transactions and exists purely to sell invoices for profit.
### Can a one-person company use a registered address service?
Yes. One-person companies, startups, freelancers, e-commerce sellers and side businesses are all typical users. As long as your business activities are not a licensed or import/export type of business that by law or in practice requires a physical premises, a registered address service fully applies.
### Can I register the company at my own home?
Yes, but at a cost. Residential zones allow only limited use; in Taipei's Residential Zones 3 and 4, a pure office (no foot traffic, no production) is mostly a conditionally permitted use. The cost is that at least one-sixth of the floor area is taxed for house tax at the business rate (3% in Taipei) instead of the 1.2% owner-occupied rate, and that share of land value tax rises from the 2‰ owner-occupied residential rate to the general rate, progressive from 10‰. If you rent, the landlord must also agree, and most landlords do not, because their taxes go up.
Businesses that sell purely online and have no physical business activity may be able to apply to keep the owner-occupied rates, but only after passing an on-site inspection.
### How is mail handled? Will I receive letters from the National Taxation Bureau?
This is the most important part of a registered address service. Choose a plan that includes mail handling: the provider receives National Taxation Bureau (國稅局) notices, tax bills and bank letters for you, and notifies you to collect them or forwards them. **Never choose a bare address with no mail service.** Once official letters come back as "addressee unknown" or go unsigned for long periods, the National Taxation Bureau can easily presume something is wrong, and you may even be selected for inspection.
### Will the National Taxation Bureau inspect a company using a registered address?
It may, but a legitimately run business has nothing to fear. The National Taxation Bureau sends staff for on-site inspections of businesses that are newly established, show anomalies or have not operated for a long time (not every case gets a visit).
If the inspection finds no sign of business at the address, the business tax returns have been zero for a long time, many companies share the same address and phone number, or the excess input tax credit is abnormally high, the business may be judged not to be actually operating and required to move or register properly, or even investigated as a sham business.
Note: **filing a zero return is not illegal, but it raises the chance of an inspection.** As long as you have real transactions, file truthfully and can receive official mail, an inspection is not a problem.
### What happens if a registered company does not start operating for a long time?
Under Article 10 of the Company Act, if a company **has not started business six months after incorporation** (without registering an extension), or **suspends business on its own for six months or more** after starting (without registering the suspension), the competent authority may order it dissolved. Under Article 397, if a dissolved company does not apply to register the dissolution, the authority may revoke its registration six months after giving notice. So once you have opened a company at a borrowed address, make sure it is genuinely active.
### How do I change the registered address, and how much does it cost?
Apply for a change of registration with the original registration authority (the Ministry of Economic Affairs or the city/county government), and change the tax registration address with the National Taxation Bureau at the same time. For a company, an address change requires a government filing fee (usually lower online than over the counter; the actual amount follows the fee schedule announced each year by the Ministry of Economic Affairs or the local government). If you hire a bookkeeping agent (記帳士) to handle it, there is an additional service fee, which varies by firm; go by the actual quote.
### Can a registration using a borrowed address be rejected or revoked?
At the registration stage, if the address does not meet the rules (for example, it fails Taipei's business premises pre-check, or the building is on a control list), the application may be returned for correction. After registration, if the address is false or there is no business activity, the authority usually first sets a deadline for correction; only if that is not met does it proceed to an order of dissolution (Company Act Article 10) or revocation of registration (Article 397). The standard path is "correction by a deadline first", not immediate revocation on discovery, but do not treat that as permission to let things slide.
## Further reading: the full tax and finance path for creators and one-person companies (Joe's research site)
* [Home address vs registered address service: how much difference in tax?](/p/100079) (in Chinese)
* [How to set up a one-person company or studio (a 6-step process)](/p/100080) (in Chinese)
* [Bookkeeping and tax filing basics for one-person companies (small-scale 1% vs regular 5%)](/p/100081) (in Chinese)
* [How influencer income is taxed: YouTubers, sponsored posts and live streams](/p/100082) (in Chinese)
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## Conclusion: get three things right and a registered address works
In summary, a registered address service is a legal, mature and widely used practice. The key is not that the registered address and place of business differ, but whether you get three things right: **operate a real business, be able to receive official mail (with correct tax registration data), and choose a compliant address whose zoning fits.** Take care of these three, and a registered address service is the most cost-effective way for one-person companies, SOHO workers, online sellers and micro-businesses to obtain a legal **company registered address** at the lowest cost and formally get their business started.
---
_Disclaimer: this article is compiled from public laws and regulations and industry price data. Statutory provisions, penalty amounts, tax rates and filing fees may change with amendments, and rules and case-by-case determinations vary between counties and cities. For actual tax rates, registration conditions and compliance judgments, follow the determinations of the local tax collection office where the property is located, the National Taxation Bureau and the local urban development department, or consult a professional bookkeeping agent or accountant. For statutory text and penalty amounts, refer to the latest version on the Laws & Regulations Database of the Republic of China (全國法規資料庫). This article is a knowledge summary, not investment advice and not legal advice._
Sources: Chinese original first published 2026-06-29; original last updated 2026-10-14. Laws, tax rates and market prices are as researched for Taiwan, with Taipei City as the main example; prices reflect 2025–2026 Taipei market rates.
AI-assisted translation and editing: Caddy (AI)
[Original article](/p/9326)