Las Vegas Accountant - Tax Planning
As a Las Vegas accountant, one of the things that I get asked a lot is, "What should you ask an accountant in Las Vegas if you are considering hiring one?". One of the most important things is there licensing (their credentials, exactly what they have other licenses in). You should contact their state board of CPAs and the American Institute of accountants to see whether or not there has been any disciplinary actions put against them, and also check out their licenses - they usually do have them posted in their offices.
One of the other things that you should ask a Las Vegas accountant about is their fees: how do they charge you, is it an hourly billing, is it a value billing, what exactly will they charge you for phone calls, what type of meetings can you have with them on a regular basis? You want to make sure that you understand that before you hire an accountant. Additionally, you want to ask them how you could reduce your fees. Do you charge me less or more if I bring in a box of receipts? Could I possibly do some of the work and keep my fees at a minimum? One of the last things that I would consider asking them is 'what their strategies are with their financial statements and their tax returns?'. Are they aggressive, or are they conservative? You want to hire someone who is exactly like yourself. If you're aggressive and you like to take an aggressive strategy on your tax return, you want to make sure that an accountant is willing to look at that without disobeying the laws.
Quite often, while doing tax preparation in Las Vegas, I get asked the question by small business owners, "How can I reduce my taxes?". Almost always, the most important thing that they forget is that they don't keep their receipts so that they can deduct all the expenses that they pay. It's important, for tax preparation, that the Las Vegas business owner keeps track, even if you just take an envelope and put the receipts that you paid for (whether cash, or by credit card) in that envelope every single day, and at the end of the year, or at the end of the month you just add those up and put those on the expense sheet - that's a huge way you can save, and quite often, small business owners will just throw away the receipts (or they can't find them when it comes time to do their tax return)
Some of the most common areas where people forget their expenses are in the materials or the supplies that they might pay for. If they're a contractor for instance - they may run to a local hardware store and pick up some small supplies they need for a job, but they forget to keep the receipt, or forget to put it in that box or envelope at the end of the day. As well, there are office expenses, or meal and entertainment expenses. If they take employees out to lunch, or pay for a dinner with current clients or customers, and then they forget that, "Oh, that was something that I need to go ahead and deduct on my tax return".
Therefore, if you want to save on taxes, one of the key tax preparation methods in Las Vegas is to keep track of the expenses that you pay.
One of the things my Las Vegas clients ask me often is, "How can you help me more with my tax planning?", and I think the best answer to that is "I need to talk to you". Whoever your Las Vegas CPA is, if you let them know what you're doing before March of the next year, they can often do a lot of things with entity structure, or just planning the deal to make it more tax efficient. Communication is the key with Las Vegas tax planning, but if you only talk to your CPA once a year, in March, you're missing the boat, and he or she isn't able to help you as much as they could.
For example: I had a client come to me once that was doing a land deal; they owned some land and they were going to build a building on it. And by talking with us, and letting us understand their particular tax situation, we were able to structure another entity, take the advantages between a partnership and a corporation, and capture most of that gain as long-term capital gain, instead of all as ordinary income. But it's one of those things that we couldn't have done if they had started construction and talked to us after the fact.
Make sure that your CPA understands your business and tax situation as early as possible. Give them any information that they might be able to use during the tax planning process, and make sure your Las Vegas accountant really gets to know your and your business.
One of the other things that you should ask a Las Vegas accountant about is their fees: how do they charge you, is it an hourly billing, is it a value billing, what exactly will they charge you for phone calls, what type of meetings can you have with them on a regular basis? You want to make sure that you understand that before you hire an accountant. Additionally, you want to ask them how you could reduce your fees. Do you charge me less or more if I bring in a box of receipts? Could I possibly do some of the work and keep my fees at a minimum? One of the last things that I would consider asking them is 'what their strategies are with their financial statements and their tax returns?'. Are they aggressive, or are they conservative? You want to hire someone who is exactly like yourself. If you're aggressive and you like to take an aggressive strategy on your tax return, you want to make sure that an accountant is willing to look at that without disobeying the laws.
Quite often, while doing tax preparation in Las Vegas, I get asked the question by small business owners, "How can I reduce my taxes?". Almost always, the most important thing that they forget is that they don't keep their receipts so that they can deduct all the expenses that they pay. It's important, for tax preparation, that the Las Vegas business owner keeps track, even if you just take an envelope and put the receipts that you paid for (whether cash, or by credit card) in that envelope every single day, and at the end of the year, or at the end of the month you just add those up and put those on the expense sheet - that's a huge way you can save, and quite often, small business owners will just throw away the receipts (or they can't find them when it comes time to do their tax return)
Some of the most common areas where people forget their expenses are in the materials or the supplies that they might pay for. If they're a contractor for instance - they may run to a local hardware store and pick up some small supplies they need for a job, but they forget to keep the receipt, or forget to put it in that box or envelope at the end of the day. As well, there are office expenses, or meal and entertainment expenses. If they take employees out to lunch, or pay for a dinner with current clients or customers, and then they forget that, "Oh, that was something that I need to go ahead and deduct on my tax return".
Therefore, if you want to save on taxes, one of the key tax preparation methods in Las Vegas is to keep track of the expenses that you pay.
One of the things my Las Vegas clients ask me often is, "How can you help me more with my tax planning?", and I think the best answer to that is "I need to talk to you". Whoever your Las Vegas CPA is, if you let them know what you're doing before March of the next year, they can often do a lot of things with entity structure, or just planning the deal to make it more tax efficient. Communication is the key with Las Vegas tax planning, but if you only talk to your CPA once a year, in March, you're missing the boat, and he or she isn't able to help you as much as they could.
For example: I had a client come to me once that was doing a land deal; they owned some land and they were going to build a building on it. And by talking with us, and letting us understand their particular tax situation, we were able to structure another entity, take the advantages between a partnership and a corporation, and capture most of that gain as long-term capital gain, instead of all as ordinary income. But it's one of those things that we couldn't have done if they had started construction and talked to us after the fact.
Make sure that your CPA understands your business and tax situation as early as possible. Give them any information that they might be able to use during the tax planning process, and make sure your Las Vegas accountant really gets to know your and your business.
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