Tomorrow, whether you celebrate “all hallows eve” or not, is a great time for children to have fun and let their imaginations run wild.  Hopefully, it is safe for everyone!  Most of today’s youth don’t know that in the earlier days of our country “Halloween” was much more raw and “Trick or Treat” was more of a question than it is now.  If the homeowner didn’t deliver a treat they could experience a trick such as eggs being thrown at their house or other harmful mischief that only an adolescent could dismiss as OK.  Now, just 9 weeks away from the end of the fiscal year, you need to help your clients understand that the IRS has many “Trick or Treat” outcomes, such as line 13 of the 1040, and most investors get the trick instead of the treat.

What are we talking about?  Tax Lost and/or Tax Gain harvesting.

Advisors often complain that from Thanksgiving to Christmas it is more difficult to get clients and prospective clients to meet with them as the holidays take precedence.  Those same clients in February, March and April are complaining to their Advisors about their Tax Bill.  Now is the time to schedule a mandatory Tax Harvesting meeting with all of your clients and prospects, and yes during the Holiday season, as it must be done before the end of the year, and the holidays often remove productivity and days, so time is of the essence!  That urgency should help fill the advisor’s calendar as the Tax message carries slightly more weight than the Holidays in most peoples’ minds.

Gains that have been taken during the year can be offset by selling losers, and there are many strategies for not losing positive exposure of stock or bonds sold, such as weighted ETFs in the same sectors as the stock itself.

Harvesting Gains is often not even thought about by Advisors, which is a huge hole in our credibility as an industry (shame on us) and is especially brilliant for those clients who, because of the choice to own annuities, or because of their wealth being in pre-tax accounts, have very low income tax rates and can actually sell stocks now and re-buy them 3 seconds later to purposefully step up the cost basis; but even after “causing a reportable gain” on their own tax return, still pay zero additional tax, as the capital gains tax rate is still zero for people under the 15% tax rate.

How do you know who is who, and if they should make these moves???

By seeing them ALL, with all of their year to date income details, and doing “Tax What-Ifs” to determine who should sell and take a loss and who should sell to take a gain; and WHY!

You will be very busy if you adopt this theory with everyone in your database, client or not:  “Here is your mandatory Tax Planning time and date between Thanksgiving and Christmas.”

You`re Welcome.

The Tax What-If Doctor 😉

Please join us on October 5th-6th at the Boston Hyatt Regency at the

Private Wealth Magazine Event

We will be presenting at 9:15 am – 10:00 am about how to use the Cloud in Creating  Family Offices. We will Attempt to Define Family Offices and how to then Run them on Cloud Technology for Better ROI.

There Post:

Presenter: Speaker  Paul Dyer, United Cloud Partners Services We will Explore the Various definitions of a “Family Office” in the mind of Advisors and the Self-evaluation choices needed in making the transition with the end in mind. We will also offer insight to the components of offerings and examine the advisors choice to in source or outsource each and lastly how “Cloud Security” and Platforms now and in the future will look.

If you are a cloud member and would like to attend with us, please contact us so we can arrange free registration for a limited number!

You’re Welcome,

The Tax What if Dr;-)

Its hard to believe that we are in the 4th quarter of the year but with 3 months to go its time to take out that New Years resolution from January and brush it off and remember what you promised yourself as you signed your Tax Return, swallowing hard as you looked at the amount you had contributed to the pot!

Here are 3 things you can easily do before the end of the year to help the pain from returning in Jan of 2016. (100 days from now)

Tip #1

For those people with capital gains from sales of stock or from mutual fund distributions, many know that they can offset those gains with a loss, but few actually sit down and do the annual exercise. It is a good idea to meet with a Tax Planner to look at your losses or winnings. By selling those losing assets, you can offset your other investment gains and end up with an equivalent of no capital gains. Many people would rather not sell their under performing assets, because they believe they’re about to “come back” and wouldn’t dare wait the 31-day waiting period to repurchase the same asset as an allowable purchase but there are many legal “work a rounds” to that rule. The Market has been and is foretasted to continue to be volatile , you should be meeting and discussing a plan that can be executed on a set number during a Dip or Peak.

Tip #2

De-characterization of Roth rollovers pre market corrections. Many people have converted monies from an IRA to a Roth IRA on a high up to a few months ago, or have also inherited taxable IRAs from a relative who has passed away. This leaves them exposed to an unintentional tax bill. If you rolled money to a Roth during the year and now that stock account is worth much less, the IRS will allow you to “unroll” that Roth back to regular IRA under certain circumstances. Don’t feel that because you’ve converted money to a Roth IRA, and then had another tax anomaly take place, that you’re stuck with that conversion. Once a year, you can “Un-Roth” money back to an IRA to undo a taxable event.

Tip #3

One thing that almost everyone you speak to agrees on is the fact that in the future, 2015 and beyond, Tax Brackets and Tax Rules and Laws are going to be changing and becoming more and more of an issue. If your financial planner, insurance planner or other trusted advice giver is not giving you advise from a Tax Perspective than you may want to reconsider your choices. Also IRS “letter audits” are on the rise and the US is still in financial trouble. If your current Advisor says, “Don’t let the Tax tail wag the dog” as a response to tax planning questions …fire them! They are side stepping a major factor on your future financial security!

Call and Make a Tax Planning Appointment before Thanksgiving and lets pay more attention to controlling your outcome!

We will send a complementary copy of our Booklet “9 Easy Ways to reduce your Taxes” as a thank you and a starting line!

Everyone should be e-mailing, posting or even good old fashion mailing a letter like this, NOW!

You’re Welcome, The Tax What if Dr;-)

The deadline for both corporations on extension and personal 1040 filings are now in site, with back to school and labor day looming the finish line for the procrastinators marathon is at hand. This gives advisors that own Tax Offices another target window for attracting these folks if the messaging is right, so why do either companies or people wait until they have just a few weeks to go before they take action?

With small companies its often that the end K-1 that is going to be issued to the owners are not needed because their personal tax return is also on extension and the plan to deal with it in late summer is firmly in the mental game plan so has allowed that job to stay in the batter’s box. With larger companies it can be a great number of items from seasonality of cash flows to accounting or software changes that put them behind and putting off filing a tax return being right up there with putting off a proctologic exam, the taxes became the only thing that felt good to put off at the time they couldn’t get all the work done.

What does a Tax Office owner do to attract those prospects and more importantly do they want too?

The normal time frames needed for traditional print campaigns are no longer available so advisors that rely on the mail box would “be out” for attracting the business returns and would need to act by mid next week if they wanted to get personal 1040 messaging out. That leaves advisors that use more nimble means such as Radio, Social Media and at any Seminar or other Event scheduled in the next week where an “announcement” and extra coupon in the hand out package can be executed.

What’s the message that will attract the audience prospect?

“Don’t be regretful , embarrassed or reluctant to say, I still haven’t filed last year’s Taxes!”

Lots of good Americans for a large number of reasons haven’t filed their 2014 tax returns. This Announcement is simply to say, ” We WANT the JOB….Call US!”

We can get it done, and make it a painless and simple procedure, we cost much less that you think so let’s discuss it today!  Call, text or e mail us at _______________________________________________.

Now the question … do you want too? The answer depends on your calendar first, are you available to work every day until sept 15th? If the answer is, “my calendar is already pretty full”…..than don’t go after businesses!

The nature of business accounting is more complex and to get a new unknown set of books is often many hours or correcting accounting errors before you can tackle the return. Our cloud CPA`s are awesome but not magical and your setting yourself up for failure and stress with no end benefit or prospect conversion likely.

The personal 1040 is another story generally speaking. Often still complex but not in the same ways as a business return and with time still to get them done and done well, the opportunity to make the conversion from satisfied Tax Client to Financial Client is very high!!

Shorter version of this Blog: Check your calendar and if you have time to stop everything and work on the Tax Intakes, then get the word out now by Radio, Social Media and at Events and pass on Business returns but accept Personal ones! You`ll thank me as these clients almost often turn into too valuable Financial Planning Clients as well!

You`re Welcome,
The “Tax What if” Dr;_)

This post will quickly join the social media world today as one of the 87 other articles that attempts to lure in the advisor reader with a way to attract a prospect with the “Save on Taxes”, elevator pitch. Problem is the Tax topic works on almost anyone, after all whom does not want to reduce the burden of funding the overspending!

Problem is they are attracting everyone when with the right elevator pitch on Taxes they can attract the RIGHT prospect, instead of any prospect. The people that have the tax issues generally limited to successful investors do not catch the ear of the common man as the topic is foreign or not relative. For instance when given an opportunity in a group to let loose a business blurb in a small group setting you could simply say, “Well, I help people reduce their tax burdens” and have the 5 golfers at the tee all think…Hmmmmm I should call this guy! Even though two of them have less than 50K in income and no savings other than the spouse`s 401K, or you could say, “I help people reduce the capital gains Tax exposure on there stock portfolios that have been successfully grown but not properly harvested!” Then only two of the 5 golfers are going to Hmmmmmm  ..But the RIGHT TWO!

Two things to do…..

FIRST:Laser focus on word phrasing which is an Art that is sadly overlooked by most advisors. We challenge you to right down your elevator pitch and examine every word for waste and lack of an implied call to action.

Second: Learn how to reply when the right golfer asks for an example of “How” you work your capital gains magic, don’t say something they are already familiar with. You could say, “we harvest winners and then sell losers against them.” Then your golfer with think, I can do that myself…your putt has rolled by the pin:-(

Or you could say, “We have a review process to determine the correct method to use in each case but DAF`s, Nimcruts, Crats, One time pre payment of tax loads and Sale balancing with ETF sector matching are all considered!” You don’t need to be an expert in all these options you only need to understand they are all solid ways to get the job done.

An Example: Donor advised funds can be an important strategy for clients who have large capital-gains taxes in years they retire because they have to sell company stock and exercise stock options. A client can make a large contribution of Stock to a DAF in a year when the tax bill is particularly high and distribute the funds to Charity or Church over many tax years in line with what is the clients normal planned annual giving.

Another strategy is to pay state taxes before the end of a tax year because that creates a tax deduction for the following year. “It ends up being a Big Missed Tax Deduction” that many clients leave on the table by waiting until the following April.

One RIA in our cloud community phrased the issue the best, “A lot of people are straying from their strategic [asset] allocation, which is a terribly bad idea,” he says. “They are using capital gains taxes as a mental excuse to stay long in stocks.”

Point is if your self-employed than every conversation is an opportunity to harvest a good sale and more importantly for your time management to repel a bad prospect. It`s an art you need to learn and having your gun loaded with the right armor piercing ammunition is what you should spend time understanding and mastering.

You’re Welcome,

The Tax “What if” Dr 😉

It can be done in ways that are viral and so a small amount of work from you done at the start can give back free momentum! Like all things doing it correctly is the key!

The main and foremost advantage of viral marketing is that you get a lot of publicity and public awareness about your site and your company. You get to generate a flow of traffic that are potential customers. With a little ingenuity and imagination, plus some incentives or prizes, you can reach out to a great number of people and announce your existence.

Most every site and companies are catching on to the effective of Viral Marketing and Advertising. Not using it could kill your business. Along with other schemes and methods in promoting your site, like Search Engine Optimization and such, viral marketing could easily push you ahead in the rating games.

Viral Marketing could be a sneaky way to get people to know about you and your company. You get them to pass your advertisement along. They are also very low cost that not investing in it could be downright a business failing. Create a gossip or a buzz based on Tax News (which is everywhere) and get a scandal or Tax BUZZ started locally.
Many big companies have tried viral marketing and have had many success stories with it. A classic example is Microsoft’s Hotmail. They were the first known big company to utilize this scheme and it has worked wonders for them.

Now it’s your turn to use viral marketing to work wonders for you. Act now and reap the benefits Viral Marketing will provide for you and your sales figures, from the Tax Perspective it is easy to do and you don’t write the content, just report the releases from the source. www.irs.gov publishes news daily. Cut paste, exploit and enjoy.

Your`re welcome!

The “Tax What if “Dr;-)

May people will be filing there 2015 Tax Return in another 7 months with a recurring Moooooan and Grooooooan. Now is the time to take your preventative medicine and avoid the pain!

We all form habits, we are human. We try to develop good ones to replace the bad ones and often we are successful but most successes don’t come without a coach, cheerleader or some kind of support.

Tax Time is usually a time of regret over not being successful at last years promise to oneself, “I not going to pay this much again, I`m going to keep better records and search out a Tax plan or some professional help and get smarter about this!” Then summer comes and the golf clubs, fishing gear or other hobby peaks up its head and says to you…”what are you crazy, we are gonna spend this beautiful day at a Tax office planning next years outcome when we could be on the greens??”

Here is what you do to have your cake and eat it too! Watch the weather forecasted for the week on Monday. Figure out if there is an afternoon after 4pm looks like rain. Tell your boss your leaving early or if your retired don’t say yes when asked to tonight’s dinner gathering. Instead call your local Tax Planning office and get your last years return and your current financial statements and make an appointment.

With six months to change behavior, read and self-educate and take baby steps with your planner its not to late to have real success. Procrastinate and the summer will be gone and your chances of real success will be greatly diminished.

To quote a great American, “Get er done”

You`re Welcome, The Tax What if Doctor;-)

I being a professional in financial planning services and the owner of a Tax Office feel an obligation to educate my clients as well as the public at large about using proper legal tax strategies to help accomplish after tax estate and financial planning goals.

The tax preparation cycle repeats itself year after year in the same way, which is human but unfortunate and unhealthy. People start getting tax documents in late January after wrapping up their own books and accounting. They gather documents that reflect the year they just lived, in review, and a small or sometimes larger dread starts to form in their mind, “oh my taxes are going to be terrible.”

They get the last document they expected  after waiting daily for it and finally it arrives and they call us to come in…… “WE NEED to get this done ASAP!”  Why is it urgent? Because they are in a hurry to pay the IRS and State?  No of course not…it’s the uncomfortable feeling of the unknown!

People don’t generally feel in control of their tax bill, even though ultimately they are in more control than they think, so it’s that fear that the bill will be a much larger amount than even they expected. To make it even worse, somehow, it’s also because it’s a TAX BILL…… UGGGGGGGH!

Think about it, if you dropped your car off at a garage with a transmission hesitation you think the same way as you do your tax bill. “This could be bad, new transmission was not what I was planning on this week!” What will this cost me?  It could be just low fluid or a seal (a few hundred) or the big one, complete replacement $1800. Plus $2500 in labor?

It’s the same pain of the unknown and often in the same ballpark as folk’s tax bills, “will I owe another $500.00 or $2000.00????  But instead of ugggh it’s AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH” No sleep is loss over the transmission, just standard adult dread. When it’s Taxes however it’s ten times worse and over the same dollars, WHY? Don’t know just because its taxes!

Here’s our point, your taxes are in your control to a much greater degree than you think but you need education as to the tweaks you could make and you need that information in JUNE so you also have time to put the plan in place. For instance, perhaps you’re planning on replacing a porch on your home in the fall after golf winds down for the season. You are going to take the funds from a short bond you own that was  yielding 4% and now is up to 4.75% but is going to mature next February so the great rate is over soon anyway!  Tax planning might be that you should use a home equity line of credit instead for several reasons. The materials are on sale now and in the fall will be 15% higher and you should hire the contractor you want now as the good ones always get booked up in the fall rush. The interest is 2.75% on the home equity line and so even though you will pay interest on money for 5 months, you leave the bond paying 4.75% and the 2.75% the bank is charging is tax deductible. The bond when cashed is taxable and at below par you’d loose value that you will not lose in February by allowing it to mature.

It’s all just a matter of doing the math and discussing plans, from grandkids education contributions you might make this fall to if you should roll IRA to Roth before taking that part time consulting job you have been offered. NOW IS THE TIME TO COME IN AND TALK ABOUT 2015!  NOT late fall or next year.

We’ll be calling you in a few days, PLEASE come in for at least 30 mins. Let’s fix the IRS bill for 2016 when we can which is NOW! End the cycle, lets do this correctly and together!

This letter, email or post should be going out to every prospect, client or other persons in your CRM !

You are welcome!

The Tax “What if” Dr 😉

Now as most people whom have filed that want to, before late Aug. (the real tax deadline) the letter audits have started to bloom. We are seeing especially a lot of the old standards. Tax Due corrections where the clients return was accepted but the penalty are assessed for unbalanced 941 payments in ratio to the income in those quarters or simply being over the amount you can owe annually without giving them a little more, and the penalty for not being in on time. Now we are also seeing the first of the new letter of correction the request for irs form 8962 and a copy of the 1095-A for the health insurance tax credits.

The government wants to double check the forward foretasted guess they forced you to make last year about your income to see if you got it right and to adjust your refunds or to send you a tax due notice based on what they “loaned you last year” in health insurance discounts. This is going to become a new normal so every “Tax Office Owner”  should not just get comfortable with the letter being sent, what the IRS wants and what will happen when they are replied too…..but the SALE OPPORTUNITY that comes with IT!

This will be a huge wave of people whom may never had a letter from the IRS before. There are a large number of self prepares trying to avoid the costs of a professional or just people that have always done it themselves and could ,before the new health credit system made it twice as complex, whatever the reason it is a opportunity for you!

If your doing radio, twitter, FB or any other media its a chance to open those new doors with a free offer to help, “Hey and if you just got your first IRS letter about them wanting you to send your 1095A forms detail and file a form 8962, come on in and let us do it for you and respond. We also show you a simple way to avoid it next year.”

Every inconvenience to the public is an opportunity for a Tax Office Owner to meet new prospects if you pay attention!

The Tax “What if” Doctor;-)

U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren has a new target: the biggest sellers of annuities and the diamond-encrusted rings, iPads, stock options and cruises she says they’re using to entice brokers to sell their investments.

Last time the “powers that be” in there many forms went after the annuity business in a really big way was the attempt at passing 151 which would have changed EIA products to Securities. For advisors that haven’t been around that long the fight came and went and “We Won” is in the mind as the final outcome. Great thing about the peace and tranquility of being naive. Other advisors are now watching Source of Funds as the next battle ground but thinking all the constant inability around deciding on what fiduciary standard means is going to cripple the assault.

For the seasoned advisor its all about using radar and seeing the horizon beyond the clouds or at a greater distance than the human eye can see. If yours is working then a use it care about it and then this news better be on it!

Warren was quoted as writing,“I am concerned that these incentives present a conflict of interest for agents and financial advisors that could result in these agents providing inadequate advice about annuities to investors and selling products that may not meet the retirement investment needs of their buyers,” in the letters, which were slated to go to companies including Prudential Plc’s Jackson National Life, American International Group Inc. and Lincoln National Corp.

In the letters, Warren said car leases, National Football League Super Bowl-style rings and other perks are widely known in the industry and appear to be “kickbacks directed at annuity agents and brokers.” Warren’s office is asking the companies to provide by May 11 a list of all incentives offered to middlemen.

It isnt the only time or the last time the insurance lost a profit center fight , the medicare supplement market was attacked and the same fight was used to change the commissions to a set standard was well as the products themselves. This is the budding of the same fight. If they cant get the fiduciary standard agreed upon quick enough they can while they are working on it, make it impossible to want to sell an annuity unless your a IAR and its part of a non commission platform.

Hope your working on becoming an active IAR at a minimum and you keep your radar on!

The Tax “What if” Doctor;-)