Yes, it's common. They'll say that it's because they don't want unapproved investors on their cap table, which I guess is reasonable, but obviously the main reason is "because they can".
The problem is that "unicorns" in general or companies exploding in market cap are a relatively recent (i.e. dotcom era and afterwards) phenomenon, and the rules of the finance world didn't keep up with developments. At the same time, it affects only relatively few people, so the political incentive for fixing the situation in an increasingly grid-locked Congress is not very high.
1. You exercise your options, for a paper gain of millions of dollars
2. However, you can't actually sell the shares (there are likely contractual restrictions on selling them, and even if not, there's not a liquid market)
3. So you have to pay millions of dollars of taxes even though your cash flow is zero.
And before you say "but they're ISOs", there's no such thing as ISO's under AMT so it doesn't help at all.
which is why this part should never have been taxed. Until there's a sale of those shares, the price is merely an estimate and thus is not and should not be considered the FMV.
Not sure what you mean by "should" here, but the IRS definitely considers it to be a gain that you have to pay taxes on, regardless of whether you can sell the shares.
Yes that's exactly the problem. Why does it seem okay for the IRS to demand a million dollars from someone who has no way to pay that? Like, doesn't that seem like something is wrong/broken somewhere? There's a cottage industry of loan sharks who will lend people money so they can pay, but how about instead the IRS not take money from people who don't yet, and may not ever, actually have the money to pay, until they, y'know, have the ability to pay off that tax bill.
Would I own tax then on the classic car I bought 20 years ago which is now worth 10x the buying price and I can actually sell it for that, even though if I won't sell it?
> I can take any financial gain and turn it into a "paper profit"
if you did, you would not have access to make use of those "paper profits" for consumption - it would remain an investment. This makes taxing it egregious imho.
I work at Scale - I've met a bunch of people that work on our platform, and seeing the impact that it's had on their lives is actually a huge source of inspiration to me. There's a writeup highlighting some of their stories at https://scale.com/blog/positive-externalities - based on my personal experience, I can say that it's not bullshit.
Most Americans have spare bedrooms for when guests visit. You could have your guests stay at a hotel but typically that will be really far from your home which sucks for everybody. Having Sonder or Airbnb style short term rentals distributed throughout cities could allow people to live in smaller apartments, eliminating bedrooms that sit unused most nights creating more space for everybody.
To be clear I'm not talking about the model of renting out your spare bedroom on Airbnb because nobody actually wants to do that. I'm talking about full time airbnb studios / 1BR's obviating the need for guest bedrooms.
I often prefer to stay in this configuration, especially in a city where I don't know the local language. This way you have a host and a cozy, lived-in place to stay instead of some sterile suite that makes you feel like you never left your own city.
I've used Airbnb a lot, and in my experience at best it's 50% of the listings that are actually like that. Demonstrably false, yes, but also not as much like that as most people think.
> Most Americans have spare bedrooms for when guests visit.
I'd venture that most Americans living in the dense urban environments the OP was talking absolutely do not have a spare room kicking around for guests. Certainly, living in NYC, I don't and neither does anyone I know.
It's very common in suburban homes to have both an unused guest bedroom and an unused dining room solely for the two times a year the owner entertains. Since this wasn't really logical in the first place I doubt more short-term rentals would make much difference.
My parents have 3 spare rooms, because my siblings and I have moved out and they haven't downsized to a smaller house.
But I wouldn't expect a young family to have a spare room. When I was younger and we needed a spare room, I was always relegated to the couch to make room for guests.
I don't expect it's super common to have a dedicated guest bedroom in a house unless it's, as you say, a kid's room who has moved out. On the other hand, quite a few homeowners have a room they use as a part-time office, for hobbies, etc. that has a sofabed in it. That's more or less the case with me. I have a "spare" room that I use for various things but I can make up a bed if I have guests.
That's remarkably optimistic. But people also have guest bedrooms so that family members can stay with them, not away from them. And so that they can have part-time home offices. And simply to increase the overall value of their home investment.
I think expecting the presence of Sonder in the market to efficiently trade space with houses by obviating the need for guest rooms seems like a fundamental misunderstanding of how the housing market works, particularly why people buy houses larger than what they need or utilize.
> Most Americans have spare bedrooms for when guests visit.
No, they don't. Some Americans do, but it's a minority; most that have a room that loosely serves this purpose have another non-bedroom function for the room that is not significantly impaired by occasional use as a guest bedroom, and a large number, probably a majority, have no guest bedroom at all, putting guests up on a couch (possibly convertible, but maybe not) or temporary cot, etc. in a common room (or displacing a resident, likely a child, to such an arrangement to free up a bed) when hosting overnight guests.
I've never had a spare bedroom for guests. I've known people who did. I saw them as unusually well off.
I would like to know where you get this idea that a majority of Americans have such. Is this merely anecdotal observation or is there a study you can cite?
People pay 10-20 times that for cable. It surprises me when people commenting think no one will pay for multiple services. Sure you will, but which ones will make the cut?
Best are options with early exercise, but they're still not perfect (you have a possibly significant upfront cost to exercise them).
Really they should just change the AMT rules.