CorpClean: Automated Multi-State Corporate Dissolution for Inactive Startups

How to dissolve Delaware corp without paying a ton of fees? My company never did any actual business...I will not promote

How to dissolve Delaware corp without paying a ton of fees? My company never did any actual business...I will not promote

You have already worked out the main thing. The six figure number is the Authorized Shares Method, which Delaware applies by default because it is the only calculation they can run without your data. Recalculate in their portal using the Assumed Par Value Capital Method, where you enter total gross assets and issued shares, and with no assets and no activity it lands on the 400 dollar minimum plus the 50 dollar annual report fee. You can do that yourself in a few minutes, and nobody at CSC will do it for you. What you cannot do is get to zero. Delaware's franchise tax is a tax on the entity existing, not on income or activity, so never did business does not reduce it. You have to be current through the year in which you dissolve. The 70 dollar figure you were quoted on the phone sounds like the pre business dissolution route under DGCL 274, which has a nominal fee but is only available if the corporation never commenced business and never issued any shares. If you issued founder shares to yourself, that door is shut and you are on a standard dissolution, where the certificate filing fee is around 204 dollars. Whoever you spoke to probably quoted 274 before knowing shares had been issued. The thing I would stop doing immediately is ignoring the notices. Delaware does not dissolve you for non payment, it marks the entity void and keeps assessing the tax every year, with a 200 dollar penalty and 1.5 percent monthly interest on top, while CSC keeps billing their agent fee regardless. Every year you wait raises the number you eventually have to pay to close it, which makes abandonment strictly the most expensive option on the table. The part that is probably larger than your Delaware bill: you registered in California. California charges an 800 dollar minimum franchise tax annually on registered foreign corporations whether or not they trade, and it keeps accruing until you formally surrender. That means a Certificate of Surrender with the Secretary of State and a final Form 100 with the FTB. California is considerably more persistent about collecting than Delaware is. Worth checking whether any first year relief applies to your situation, but the surrender filing is what stops that clock and it is entirely separate from anything you do in Delaware. Given two states are involved this is worth an hour with a small business CPA, but the sequence is: recalculate Delaware, pay the minimum, file the dissolution, surrender in California, then final returns in both.