Sarah McAllister, 14, with members of the band, Black Moon Groove, at the Biker Block Party in DeLand, Florida, Sunday, March 4, 2007. Sarah drummed for the band...she also owns a local welding shop. (Daytona Beach News-Journal/DAVID MASSEY).

Sarah McAllister is a 14-year-old high school cheerleader in Florida who likes to surf and play the drums. And she owns a business that builds steel fences and metal railing.

Sarah inherited AAA Welding & Security Inc. in DeLand, Florida, after her father, Dan McAllister, died almost two years ago of a massive heart attack at age 39. Her parents were amicably divorced six years before Dan's death, and her mother, Billie McAllister, had stayed on as an employee for another three years. Since she knew the business, Billie runs the company's operations for her daughter, and will at least until Sarah is 18.

"I'm working for my 14-year-old daughter. It is too cute," Billie said.

After Dan McAllister's death, Billie discovered the business was failing. The lawyers and accountants advised she walk away from it "while the walking was good," she said.

But Sarah begged her mother to hang on, saying it was all they had ever known. Sarah had grown up in the welding shop.

"As a baby, she would be walking around in her little walker in that dirty old welding shop," Billie said. So, Billie stepped in and asked the 40 employees to stick it out with her.

Today, AAA Welding & Security Inc. has 83 employees. The business still struggles, however — most of the company's work is in welded decorative balcony rails on condos, and the condo market has taken a downturn in recent months. The company still put on its annual charity biker block party and poker run in late February, at which Sarah played the drums with a band from New York during the party.

Children can end up owning businesses in a variety of ways. In the McAllisters' case, Dan McAllister died without a will. Sarah was his only child, so his estate, including his business, passed "intestate" to her. The estate is under the supervision of the probate court until Sarah turns 18.

In other cases, a parent may leave a business to a child in a will and trust. The assets are held in the trust until the child becomes an adult. The will would designate an executor of the estate, a guardian for the minor child and a trustee for the trust.

Bernadette Britz-Parker, a partner at Floridabased CPA firm James Moore & Co., said that business owners who want their companies to go to their children need to have estate and business plans in place.

"If the intent is to have the business go to that child, you need to plan appropriately," she said. "You need to have an estate plan and a succession plan to make sure the right person runs the business until the child comes of age or at least hold on to it for awhile so it isn't sold at a fire sale."

Sarah said she doesn't plan to begin running the business until after she attends Stetson University to study business administration and accounting.

"I think it is pretty cool," said Sarah, who wears braces and cut-out jeans. "No one besides me at school owns their own business. No one even believes it when I tell them."

Sarah knows 14 is pretty young for someone to have her future set for her. What if she wants to do something else — like be a professional musician?

"I think about it all of the time," she said. "But I wouldn't be able to let the business go. My family has worked too hard to build it up. I have no problem following it through."