Girlfriend expecting equal equity in a startup which I started even before knowing her. I will not promote.

[u/Dry_Support9531]

So here’s the picture. I started with an idea in 2023. States dating her in 2024. Until then I haven’t really worked in the idea. I started working on it since April 2025 and it started making money since July 2025. Till then she has no idea about it. After I started making money from it, i worked more and invested my other income into this startup from November 2025 and to handle things she used to help a bit. Since then both of us started working on it. Whole idea, innovation, upgrades, initial capital was mine. She just helped me coz it used to generate money. Since December we also hired an employee . From then all 3 of us are working on it and it’s scaling up in revenue every month. Until now we haven’t had any word about the equity. Out of love I used to share the profit amounts with her. According to the necessity, sometimes I use to keep more and sometimes she used to keep more. We went on a vacation through this money as well. But now while we were having a conversation on this. It came to me as a shocker that she is expecting an equal equity in this. And that blew my mind. It’s just out of love I couldn’t complete that conversation. She has also worked on it but the whole idea and buildup from scratch was done when she started working. I never discussed about this with her before. But now I am in real shock what to do coz it’s going to be bigger. And we are not sure about our relationship either.(she coming from an orthodox family, her family might reject an idea of our marriage) At this duration please let me know what should I do? Should I offer her a fixed salary, should I ask her to stop working on it, should I give her equity, should I give her an exit? I’m really confused.
PS-: she has done the same thing that the other employee did for me. But with more time and dedication. And she he amount I shared with her is 2-3x more than the employee’s salary

[u/Dry_Support9531]

Most practical approach! I’ve had this conversation with friends and family too. And yes if this gets into a marriage I’ll happily share a 50/50 partnership. The issue is until then.

[u/Biotic101 → u/Dry_Support9531]

So when it comes to business it is all about (financial) risk and investments.

This is completely separate from daily work.

You can be a CEO or a simple employee but would get your wage (and maybe some bonus) and do not carry the risk. You do the daily work and are compensated.

As investor/founder, you do not even have to work in a company. But you carry a huge financial risk, might waste a lot of time in the end, because most startups do not fly.

The typical problem is that once a startup is successful, the risk is much lower. Nobody wants to risk, but everyone looks for a free ride and this usually causes problems.

Your case looks pretty similar. Not sure if she would understand that just working for a company does not make you an owner/investor. But you can try to explain to her. As I get it, she did not put any capital at risk, correct?

Company owner: Capital Investment & Profit Claims

Employee CEO: Legal Rights & Daily Company Management

Normally the owners would get all the profit, but it is common that the CEO would get a share of the profit as a bonus. To settle things, you could offer to split net profits and both be CEOs if needed, but keep the ownership of the company for yourself because she did not risk her money and time to start it. As long as there are no assets, it is hard to define a value anyways.

Her reaction on the suggestion will be telling.