Updated September 3, 2026. Quick answer: West Virginia does not let a West Virginia LLC convert into another state’s LLC while remaining the same legal entity. There is no domestication section and no outbound-reaching conversion route anywhere in W. Va. Code ch. 31B: Article 9 has no ‘transfer,’ ‘continuance,’ or outbound-domestication section, and Article 10 only addresses foreign LLCs doing business in West Virginia, never a West Virginia LLC leaving. The substitute is a merger into a newly formed out-of-state LLC, under W. Va. Code § 31B-9-904.
Why the answer is no
W. Va. Code ch. 31B, Articles 9 and 10, was read for any section using ‘domesticat-,’ ‘redomesticat-,’ or ‘transfer of domicile’ language: none appear anywhere in the chapter. Article 9’s only entity-type-change provision is § 31B-9-902 (‘conversion’), and its own text limits that route to a partnership or limited partnership converting into an LLC, an entity-type change, not a jurisdiction change, and it does not reach an existing LLC moving states at all. The section directly re-fetched and confirmed this session, § 31B-9-904, governs merger only and does not use the word ‘domestication’ anywhere in its text.
The route that does work
The substitute is merger, not domestication: W. Va. Code § 31B-9-904 authorizes a West Virginia LLC to merge ‘with or into one or more limited liability companies, foreign limited liability companies, corporations, foreign corporations, partnerships, foreign partnerships, limited partnerships, foreign limited partnerships or other domestic or foreign entities,’ confirmed verbatim on re-fetch. Articles of merger are then filed under § 31B-9-905. In practice: form a new LLC in the destination state and merge the West Virginia LLC into it as the surviving entity. The caveat that matters: merger is not equivalent to domestication. If a new out-of-state LLC is the surviving entity, the reader gets a legally different entity (a new formation date), and EIN, bank-account, and contract continuity depend on IRS and counterparty rules rather than on this West Virginia statute, so continuity is not guaranteed the way true domestication guarantees it. West Virginia’s merger filing fee was not independently confirmed this session and is not asserted here. A non-domicile-changing alternative also exists: simple foreign qualification under Article 10 (§ 31B-10-1002) while remaining organized in West Virginia.
Check both ends of the move, not just the destination
A move needs two things to be true: your destination has to let the entity in, and your current state has to let it out. Nine states have no statutory route out, so an LLC formed in one of them cannot domesticate anywhere, however welcoming the destination is. That is where most published advice goes wrong; it checks one end.
| State you would be leaving | Why there is no route out | What the code offers instead |
|---|---|---|
| Delaware | the statute affirmatively limits it | 6 Del. C. § 18-209 |
| Kentucky | nothing in the code permits it | KRS 275.345 to 275.365 |
| Massachusetts | the statute affirmatively limits it | Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 156C, § 59(b) |
| Missouri | nothing in the code permits it | Mo. Rev. Stat. §§ 347.127 to 347.135 |
| New Mexico | nothing in the code permits it | NMSA 1978 § 53-19-62 |
| New York | nothing in the code permits it | NY LLC Law § 1001(b), certificate of merger under § 1003 |
| South Carolina | the statute affirmatively limits it | S.C. Code Ann. § 33-44-904 |
| Washington | the statute affirmatively limits it | RCW 25.15.416 to 25.15.431 |
| West Virginia | nothing in the code permits it | W. Va. Code § 31B-9-904, articles of merger under § 31B-9-905 |
Delaware is the surprise on that list and it is not a mistake; see the move-to-another-state guide, which covers Delaware’s route directly. For the other eight, the substitute is a merger, not a dissolution: form the new entity in the destination state and merge the old one into it. Merger produces a surviving entity rather than a continuation, so it is genuinely not the same thing as domestication, but it keeps far more alive than dissolving does.
This page sells nothing and links to no filing service. Moving an LLC is a filing-desk task with a statutory answer, and the answer is either in your two states’ codes or it is not.
The full 51-jurisdiction table is on the domestication states list.
Sources
Every row on this page is statutory text. No formation service, no registered-agent marketing page and no aggregator is cited anywhere in this cluster; those are the only publishers of the competing versions.
- West Virginia: https://code.wvlegislature.gov/31B-9-904/. Statutory text, independently re-verified 2026-09-03, matches dataset.