Earning with AI in Vietnam
A deep map of every realistic way a Vietnamese person who has just learned AI coding ("vibe coding" with Claude Code, Cursor, Lovable, Bolt, v0, Replit) can turn it into money in 2026: selling to Vietnamese businesses, to foreign clients, and building your own products.
Exchange rate used: 1 USD ≈ 26,000 VND. 1 million VND ≈ $38. All figures carry a source at the end; some prices come from agency blogs and aggregators and should be treated as ranges, not facts.
Seven things to remember
- Do not sell "a website". Sell a money result. Direct bookings without the 15–20% Booking/Agoda fee, fewer no-shows thanks to VietQR deposits, a chatbot that answers customers at 2 a.m. A beautiful site sells badly; a site that brings orders sells well.
- Zalo is the main road. 79.6 million people use it every month, but only about 3,500 Mini Apps are active. Mini Apps are just web apps (React), the perfect format for AI coding.
- E-commerce sellers are the richest and most digital customers. ~470,000 active sellers on TikTok Shop and Shopee need product descriptions, AI photos, livestream scripts and auto-replies every week — that is a subscription, not a one-off job.
- Do not build accounting, e-invoice or POS software. MISA, Viettel, KiotViet and Sapo give it away free or for 99–250k VND/month, and the state subsidises it (Decree 20/2026). Build the customer-facing layer on top of it.
- Taking payments is solved. PayOS and SePay confirm VietQR bank transfers automatically through a webhook, with 0% fee and even on a personal bank account. You can sell "automatic payment confirmation" as its own service.
- Foreign clients pay 5–10× more, but competition is harder. AI integration and automation work on Upwork grew by more than 90% in a year; n8n automation pays $40–100/hour. You need English, a portfolio and Payoneer (Wise and Stripe do not work for Vietnam residents).
- The window is 6–18 months. Vibe-coding courses (FUNiX, VietIS, Cole, NOHI) are producing new competitors every month. Pick one niche now and become "the person" for it.
Six shifts that opened the door
1. The 2026 tax reform
Resolution 198/2025/QH15 abolished lump-sum tax (thuế khoán) and the licence fee for household businesses from 1 Jan 2026. Everyone now declares real revenue. Household businesses with more than 1 billion VND a year must issue e-invoices from a cash register (Decree 70/2025). Millions of small owners are being pushed into digital tools for the first time — they need help, and they now think about software.
2. A huge digital gap
Only about 25% of ~900,000 enterprises had a .vn domain (end of 2023); in the EU 70–90% of firms have a website. For household businesses the "website" is usually a Facebook page, a Zalo account and a Shopee shop. Fewer than 40% of SMEs can afford medium or advanced digitalisation.
3. AI made custom work cheap
The market already has a 5–10× gap between a "template site for 2 million" and a "custom site for 20 million VND". With AI tools one person can deliver custom quality at template cost, in days instead of weeks.
4. Money moves by QR
About 90 million bank app accounts use VietQR; NAPAS processes 32+ million transactions a day; QR payments grew 107% in 2024. Cross-border QR with China, Thailand, Cambodia and Laos already works — useful for tourist businesses.
5. Global demand for AI builders
Upwork: demand for AI skills +109% in 2025, AI integration +178%, AI work above $300M a year. Fiverr 2026: searches for "Claude Code" +938%, n8n automation +125%, "vibe coding" +61%. Clients pay for someone who plugs AI into their business, not for generated pictures.
6. Laws that help
The Digital Technology Industry Law (in force 1 Jan 2026) can reimburse startups up to 50% of technology and prototype costs and created a National AI Development Fund. The new tax threshold means most beginners pay 0 tax on business income.
What it costs to start: about $40–45 a month
| Tool | Price (2026) | Use it for |
|---|---|---|
| Claude Pro / Max | $20 / $100 / $200 per month | Claude Code — writing whole apps, fixing bugs, writing Vietnamese copy |
| Cursor | Free; Pro $20 | AI code editor |
| Lovable / Bolt / v0 / Replit | Free tiers; paid $20–25 | Fast prototypes and demos (real cost on credits is often 2–3× the plan) |
| Cloudflare Pages / Workers | Free, commercial use allowed | Best free hosting for client sites |
| Vercel Hobby | Free, non-commercial only | Personal projects; paid work needs Pro $20 |
| Supabase | Free (pauses after 7 idle days); Pro $25 | Database, login, file storage |
| n8n / Make | n8n self-hosted free; cloud from ~$20 | Automations, AI agents, integrations |
| Domain .vn / .com.vn | .vn ~350k VND/yr; .com.vn 250k VND/yr; .com ~$10/yr | Registrars often give 2 years free to young people and businesses |
One landing page sold for 3 million VND pays for two months of tools.
Ten local business ideas
Each idea: who pays, the price the market accepts, how long it takes with AI, and how to sell it. Prices in VND.
Landing pages for real-estate agents
★★★★Who pays: 300–400k practising property brokers (only ~40,000 licensed). Every new project (dự án) needs its own landing page for Facebook Ads — an agent may order 5–20 a year.
Price: 2–4 million per page. Time with AI: 3–6 hours. Stack: static page on Cloudflare + lead form → Google Sheets + Zalo button + PDPL consent checkbox.
How to sell: build one template, then change photos, prices and location per project. Offer "a landing page in 24 hours". Find agents in district property groups on Facebook.
Business websites that bring orders
★★★★Who pays: formal SMEs and household businesses over the 1 billion VND threshold (cafés, shops, spas with 83+ million VND monthly revenue).
Market prices: template site 2–7M; SME site 8–20M; online store 15–50M; premium corporate 20–50M. Sweet spot for you: a custom 5–8 page, 2-language site with booking or ordering for 6–12M in 1–2 days, plus 300–700k/month support.
Competitors: Haravan (from 299k/month) and Sapo (from 170–249k/month) for stores; LadiPage for landing pages. Beat them on custom design, Vietnamese copywriting and personal service.
Zalo Mini Apps: booking, loyalty, catalogue
★★★★★Why: 79.6M monthly Zalo users; Mini Apps have 13M+ monthly users but only ~3,500 active apps. The platform is free; customers log in with one tap by phone number and pay by ZaloPay or VietQR.
Price: simple app 10–20M; standard business package 15–30M; your offer 8–20M + 500k/month. Time: 3–7 days.
Best combos: booking + ZNS reminders for spas, salons, dentists, English centres (ZNS costs from 200 VND per message vs 600–1,000 VND for SMS); loyalty points for cafés and F&B chains; product catalogue and ordering for sellers who today take orders by hand in Zalo groups.
AI chatbots for Zalo OA, Messenger and websites
★★★★★The gap: Zalo OA only offers scripted bots, with no large language model inside. A bot that actually knows the menu, prices, schedule and policies — built on Claude or GPT with the business's own knowledge base — is new for most small businesses.
Price: setup 2–5M + 500k–1.5M per month (tokens + support). Scripted bots sell for ~3M a year, so position yours as "a staff member who never sleeps". Client value: bots handle 70–80% of routine questions.
Watch: collect consent, never let the bot promise prices it does not know, hand over to a human for complaints.
Seller toolkit for Shopee & TikTok Shop
★★★★★Market: top-4 platforms sold $16.4B in 2025 and $11B in H1 2026 (+44%). Shopee ~54.5%, TikTok Shop ~43.4% — a duopoly. 266k+ TikTok sellers and 209k+ Shopee sellers with revenue (H1 2025).
What to sell: a private web tool per seller — upload a product photo, get a title, SEO description, hashtags, a 60-second video script and a livestream script in Vietnamese; bulk descriptions for 200 SKUs (1–3M); AI product photos instead of a studio; auto-replies to reviews; a multi-platform orders dashboard.
Model: 1–3M setup + 500k–2M per month. Livestream agencies charge 5–20M per package, so AI scripts are cheap in comparison. Note: TikTok's own basic AI assistant is free — sell custom tools tuned to the shop's brand and products.
"Automatic payment confirmation" with VietQR
★★★★How it works: the site creates an order with a unique code, shows a dynamic VietQR with the amount; PayOS or SePay sends a webhook when money arrives; the order turns "paid" and a Zalo ZNS or email goes out. 0% fee, no acquiring contract, works on a personal account.
Price: 1–3M, 2–4 hours of work. VNPay charges 0.88–1.1% per payment, so the client saves money forever. Also sell sync of payments into Google Sheets or the POS.
Multilingual sites for dental clinics & medical tourism
★★★★★Market: 12,000–15,000 licensed dental clinics; dental services $2.35B (2025); dental tourism estimated up to $5.5B by 2030. Clinics need EN/KO sites, price calculators, quote-request forms, WhatsApp and Zalo buttons.
Price: 10–30M per site + monthly SEO content. The highest ticket among small businesses: one implant is worth $500–1,000, so one lead pays for the site.
Direct-booking sites for homestays & tours
★★★Market: record 21.2M international arrivals in 2025 (+20%): China 5.28M, Korea 4.33M. Da Nang alone lists 580+ homestays and villas on one aggregator.
Sell: a direct-booking site in EN/KO/ZH that saves the 15–20% OTA commission, VietQR Global for Chinese guests, an AI concierge on WhatsApp/KakaoTalk/Zalo, tour pages. Price: 5–15M. Pitch: "one direct booking a month pays for the site".
Mini-LMS and AI tools for English & education centres
★★★★Market: already ~900 English centres in Hanoi and ~600 in HCMC in 2019, many more today, plus IELTS classes; EdTech domains +25%.
Sell: centre website with trial-lesson form; schedule, homework and grades for parents in a Zalo Mini App; ZNS reminders; VietQR tuition payments; AI exercise generators and IELTS essay checkers. Price: 8–25M + subscription.
F&B: bilingual QR menus, online ordering, loyalty
★★★Market: ~300,000 F&B outlets, but 50,000+ closed in a year and POS systems with QR ordering are cheap (iPOS from 99k, Sapo FnB from 160k, CukCuk from 199k/month).
Sell the brand experience, not POS: a menu in VI/EN/KO/ZH with photos for tourist areas, a pickup-ordering site to avoid 20–30% Grab/ShopeeFood commissions, a loyalty Mini App. Price: 3–8M + 300–700k/month. Target survivors above the 1 billion threshold.
Bonus: "digital setup" for household businesses after the tax reform
★★★Do not compete with MISA or Viettel — connect to them. Turnkey onboarding of KiotViet/Sapo/MISA (500k–2M), a simple revenue dashboard for self-declaration, payment reconciliation, training. Accountants and POS resellers see every business that is going digital — pay them a referral fee.
Sector priority table
| Sector | Number of targets | Typical ticket (VND) | Recurring income | Difficulty to sell | Priority |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shopee / TikTok sellers | ~470k | 1–5M | High (tool subscription) | Low — already digital | ★★★★★ |
| Dental & clinics | 12–15k | 10–30M | High (SEO, content) | Medium | ★★★★★ |
| Real-estate agents | 300–400k | 2–4M × many | Medium | Low | ★★★★ |
| Spas & salons | tens of thousands | 5–12M | Medium | Medium | ★★★★ |
| English centres | thousands | 8–25M | High | Medium | ★★★★ |
| Homestays & tourism | thousands (Da Nang, Hoi An, Phu Quoc) | 5–15M | Medium | Medium | ★★★ |
| Cafés & restaurants | ~300k | 3–8M | Low–medium | High (free POS, closures) | ★★★ |
A ready-made service menu
| Package | What's inside | Price (VND) | Your time with AI |
|---|---|---|---|
| Landing "Nhanh" | 1 page, form, Zalo button, VietQR, PDPL consent | 2.5–4M | 3–6 h |
| Business website | 5–8 pages, 2 languages, booking or orders, SEO | 6–12M | 1–2 days |
| Payment automation | PayOS/SePay webhook → Sheets/POS + ZNS | 1–3M | 2–4 h |
| Zalo Mini App | Booking, loyalty or catalogue | 8–20M | 3–7 days |
| AI chatbot | LLM + business knowledge base, Zalo OA / Messenger / site | 2–5M + 0.5–1.5M/month | 1–2 days |
| Seller toolkit | AI descriptions, photos, live scripts for Shopee/TikTok | 1–3M + 0.5–2M/month | 1 day |
| Care plan | Edits, hosting, domain, monthly report | 300–700k/month | 1–2 h/month |
Selling AI skills abroad from Vietnam
Foreign clients pay 5–10× Vietnamese prices, but you compete with the whole world. The money is in integration and automation (+90% on Upwork) — simple generated content is getting cheaper (pay per contract −13%).
Platforms
| Platform | Fee to freelancer | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Upwork | 0–15% (usually ~10%) + Connects $0.15 each | Withholds 2% PIT + 5% VAT for Vietnam (Decree 117/2025). Response rate on AI/ML bids only 5–7%; ~12 bids per hire. |
| Fiverr | 20% flat | Good for beginners: fixed-price "gig" packages. |
| Contra | 0% commission | Portfolio-first; many Framer/Webflow projects. |
| Toptal | — | Accepts ~3%. Not for beginners. |
Gigs and rates in 2026
| Service | Rate / ticket |
|---|---|
| n8n / Make automation | $40–100/h; one workflow $400–1,200; AI multi-workflow system $1,500–4,500; retainer $1,200–8,000/month |
| AI chatbots | Junior $25–60/h; RAG + integrations $50–90/h; Fiverr fixed ~$216; local-business support bot $300–1,500 |
| Framer sites | $500–2,000 typical freelance site |
| Webflow | Junior $25–50/h; landing $1,500–3,500 |
| AI voice agents | $2,500–5,000 + $500–1,000/month (Vapi/Retell + n8n) |
Realistic path: months 1–3 at $15–30/h with small $100–500 fixes to collect 5–10 reviews; months 4–12 at $30–50/h with retainers; then a narrow niche ("AI automation for clinics / real estate / Shopify stores") at $50–80/h.
White-label subcontractor for Western agencies
★★★★Vietnamese developers through vendors cost $26–37/h; Western AI automation agencies charge $100–300/h or $5k–50k per project. An agency sells an n8n/AI project for $5–15k and can pay a Vietnamese subcontractor $1.5–4k. Sell a fixed price for a result, not hours — outsourcing rates are falling because of AI. Find partners on LinkedIn ("white-label n8n / Webflow partner"), Upwork agency tab, n8n/Webflow/Framer communities.
AI Automation Agency (AAA)
★★★SMB projects $2.5–15k + retainers $500–3,000/month. Suggested packages: Starter $500–900 (one workflow: form lead → AI enrichment → CRM → notification); Growth $1,500–3,000 + $300–600/month (3–5 workflows + RAG chatbot + monthly value report); Voice agent $2,500–5,000 + $500–1,000/month. Risks: it is a sales business, not passive income; clients churn when automation becomes "invisible" — send a monthly report of hours and money saved. Start after ~6 months of freelancing.
Micro-SaaS, extensions, templates, courses
| Channel | Economics |
|---|---|
| Chrome extensions | First sale usually after 3–6 months; side income $500–2,000 MRR after 6–12 months; full-time $5–15k MRR is rare. |
| Framer templates | Creator keeps 100% of marketplace sales; beginners $500–2,000 per template; good templates $200–3,000/month. |
| ThemeForest / Envato | Flat 50% author commission from July 2026 — channel got worse. |
| Gumroad | 10% + $0.50, merchant of record, payouts via PayPal. |
| App Store / Google Play | $99/year / $25 once; the store pays you, no Stripe needed. |
| Micro-SaaS | 100 customers × $100 = $10k MRR, 70–90% margin — but the median is close to zero without distribution. |
Getting paid without Stripe
Stripe is not available to Vietnam residents (not in its 46 countries) and neither is Wise. Use a "merchant of record": Lemon Squeezy (5% + $0.50, Vietnam in payout list) or Polar (Vietnam supported), or Paddle. Stripe Atlas ($500 + $100/year + US accounting) only makes sense after ~$10k MRR. Never fake your country in Stripe or Wise — accounts get frozen exactly when money arrives.
Teaching AI and vibe coding in Vietnamese
★★TikTok has 76.1M adult users in Vietnam, YouTube 62.1M. Unica pays authors up to 90%; Udemy 37% on organic sales. Mass courses sell for ~199k–999k VND, cohorts/bootcamps 3–15M. The Vietnamese ticket is 5–10× lower than Western, so use content mainly as a funnel: free TikTok/YouTube → Zalo/Facebook group → cheap course → clients and consulting. What sells: "AI for business without code", "n8n for SMEs", "build an app without a programmer", "freelance with AI".
Getting paid and staying legal
Receiving foreign money
- Payoneer — works; withdraw to Vietcombank, BIDV, Techcombank, ACB, VPBank. Real loss ~2.5–4.5% on $1,000.
- PayPal — works but more expensive (~3–4% FX spread + 60,000 VND withdrawal).
- SWIFT to a USD account — $10–30 bank fees; the bank may ask for a contract or invoice; transfers from $1,000 are reported to the State Bank.
- Wise, Stripe — not available to residents.
Taxes in 2026
- Lump-sum tax abolished; you declare real revenue.
- Individual business revenue below 1 billion VND/year (~$38k) — 0 PIT and 0 VAT (Decree 141/2026, applies from 1 Jan 2026).
- Above it: services pay 2% on the part above the threshold.
- Upwork still withholds 2% PIT + 5% VAT; whether it can be refunded under the new threshold — ask a tax adviser.
- Registering as a household business (hộ kinh doanh) gives you a tax ID and looks professional to bigger clients.
How clients are really found in Vietnam
- Show, don't tell. Message the owner with a ready demo: "I made a draft website for your spa, here is the link." With AI the demo takes 30–60 minutes — this is your biggest advantage.
- Zalo first, not email. Small businesses barely read email; Zalo messages get answered faster. Use a warm, simple Vietnamese tone, voice and video messages, no jargon.
- Go where the clients are, not the freelancers. Seller groups ("Cộng đồng nhà bán hàng Shopee", "Hội bán hàng TikTok Shop"), spa owners' groups ("Hội chủ spa"), café owners, district property groups, Da Nang/Hoi An homestay groups. Clients ask there "who can build a site or a bot?"
- Google Maps is a free lead list. Businesses with no website or an old one; homestays on Agoda/Booking with no direct site; restaurants on Foody/ShopeeFood.
- Partners who already see clients: POS resellers (Sapo, KiotViet, iPOS, MISA), accountants of household businesses, photographers, SMM agencies — pay a referral fee.
- Relationships and referrals (giới thiệu). The first meeting is coffee, not a sale. Do the first 3–5 clients at a discount for reviews and case studies.
- Payment terms that remove fear: 50% upfront / 50% on delivery, or "0 VND to start, 300–500k per month".
- Content: TikTok/Reels "I built a spa website in 2 hours with AI" with before/after. Freelance marketplaces vLance.vn and Fastlance.vn as a backup.
What can go wrong — and the fix
| Risk | Fact | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Insecure AI code | Veracode: 45% of AI-generated code has a vulnerability. Lovable CVE-2025-48757: 170 of 1,645 apps (10.3%) had an open database. Escape.tech: 58% of 1,400 vibe-coded apps had a critical issue. | Checklist on every project: database row-level security, secrets in environment variables, rate limits, CSRF, security headers; limitation-of-liability clause in the contract. |
| Personal data law | PDPL No. 91/2025 + Decree 356/2025 in force from 1 Jan 2026. Fines up to 3 billion VND or 5% of revenue. Small firms get a 5-year grace period for some duties. | Explicit consent checkbox (never pre-ticked) and a privacy policy on every form and bot. Note: Supabase/Vercel store data abroad = cross-border transfer. |
| AI law | Law No. 134/2025 in force 1 Mar 2026; labelling of AI audio, images and video; transition until 1 Mar 2027. | Label AI-generated media for clients early; it's a selling point. |
| Price dumping | Templates at 1.5–2M, free builders (LadiPage), thousands of new vibe coders. | Specialise in one vertical, sell results and subscriptions, not pages. |
| Poor mass segment | 81.5% of household businesses saw revenue fall in 2025. | Target businesses above 1 billion VND, e-commerce, dental, education, tourism. |
| Platform dependence | Zalo, TikTok and Shopee change APIs and prices (paid OA packages since 2025). | Keep client data in your own sheets/DB; charge a care plan that covers changes. |
The first 90 days and the first year
Pick one niche (e.g. spas in Da Nang or TikTok sellers). Build 3 demo projects for real local businesses without asking. Register a domain, set up Claude + Cloudflare + PayOS sandbox. Make a one-page portfolio.
Send 10 demos a day via Zalo/Facebook. Close 3–5 first clients at a discount in exchange for reviews. Post every project on TikTok/Facebook. Open Upwork, Contra and Fiverr profiles with one narrow offer ("n8n + AI for [niche]").
Turn one-off work into care plans (300–700k/month). Turn the best project into a template you can resell. Register as hộ kinh doanh; set up Payoneer.
Raise prices; add a second product (Mini App or chatbot). Look for 1–2 white-label agency partners abroad. Build in public in English on X/LinkedIn. Turn repeated client requests into a micro-SaaS sold via Lemon Squeezy or Polar.
A conservative income model
The month-12 figure is an extrapolation from the rate ranges above, not survey data.
Opportunity matrix
| Path | Time to first money | Realistic after 12 months | Risk | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Local services (sites, Mini Apps, bots) in one niche | 2–4 weeks | 35–60M VND/month | Medium | ★★★★★ start here |
| Freelance n8n / AI automation abroad | 1–2 months | $1,000–4,000/month | Medium | ★★★★★ in parallel |
| Framer/Webflow sites abroad | 1–2 months | $800–3,000/month | Medium | ★★★★ |
| White-label for Western agencies | 2–4 months | $1,500–5,000/month | Dependence on 1–2 partners | ★★★★ |
| Own AI agency | 3–6 months | $2,000–10,000/month | High | ★★★ after 6 months |
| Templates | 2–4 months | $200–3,000/month | Medium | ★★★ side stream |
| Micro-SaaS / extensions | 3–12 months | $0–2,000 MRR | High | ★★★ long-term bet |
| Courses in Vietnamese | 3–6 months | $300–2,000/month | Low ticket | ★★ as a funnel |
Main sources
Businesses & tax reform: VietnamNews (household businesses, 2025) · Baochinhphu & Bnews (Decree 141/2026, 1 billion VND threshold) · Ecovis, EY (Resolution 198/2025) · VOV2, MISA meInvoice (e-invoice rules) · Tuổi Trẻ/PLO (free software for 2M households) · Thời báo Tài chính (Decree 20/2026).
Digital adoption: PA Vietnam / VNNIC (.vn statistics 2025) · DataReportal Digital 2026 Vietnam · VECOM EBI 2025 · World Bank SME survey.
Prices: Cloud Hosting, BNG Agency, Mona Media, Haravan Academy, Sapo, Vietnix, CNV, Bytesoft, 123Website, MySpa, Bizfly, Vihat · ITviec IT Salary Report 2025–26.
Zalo: Vietnam.vn & Baomoi (79.6M MAU) · Zalo Cloud ZNS pricing · Zalo OA pricing · Mini for Business.
E-commerce: The Investor, VnEconomy (2025 GMV) · Fibre2Fashion / Metric (H1 2026) · VnExpress, Thesaigontimes (seller counts).
Payments: payOS · SePay pricing & developer docs · VietQR.io · VNPay fees · MoMo · NAPAS / Thanh Niên · State Bank of Vietnam.
Sectors: iPOS & Nestlé Professional F&B report H1 2025 · Picasso Dental research · Ken Research · GlobeNewswire (dental tourism) · VietnamNet & VietnamPlus (tourism 2025) · VietnamNews (brokers).
Global: Upwork In-Demand Skills 2026 & Monthly Hiring Report · Fiverr Business Trends Index 2026 · GigRadar Upwork Market Report 2026 · Upwork Help (Vietnam taxes) · Payoneer, PayPal VN fees · Stripe Global · Lemon Squeezy & Polar supported countries · Stripe Atlas · Tony Dinh newsletter, Starter Story · ExtensionPay · Framer Creator Program · Mordor Intelligence, Saigon Technology (IT outsourcing) · Unica, Udemy · Claude, Cursor, Lovable, Bolt, Replit, Vercel, Cloudflare, Supabase, VNNIC pricing pages.
Law & security: KPMG, Vietnam Briefing (PIT Law 109/2025) · DFDL, Tilleke (PDPL 91/2025) · Baker McKenzie (AI Law 134/2025) · Vietnam Briefing (Digital Technology Industry Law) · Veracode 2025 · Cloud Security Alliance / Escape.tech · Superblocks (CVE-2025-48757).
Limitations: there is no official share of household businesses with a website (25% refers to .vn domains among enterprises, end of 2023); no national count of English centres for 2025; how Upwork withholding interacts with the new threshold is unconfirmed; Envato and Polar fee changes come from secondary sources. This is research, not legal or tax advice.