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Individuals & Families

Tax planning for individuals and families: retirement account strategy, self-employed retirement plans, foreign gifts and inheritances, and filing deadlines.

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Compliance & Reporting

Crypto Cost Basis: How to Reconstruct It Across Wallets and Exchanges If your basis records are a mess of CSV exports, dead exchanges, and self-custody transfers, you are not alone, and the new per-wallet rules make it urgent. Reconstructing basis correctly is what keeps the IRS from treating your entire proceeds as gain.
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Crypto Taxes: How the IRS Treats Bitcoin, Staking, NFTs, and DeFi The IRS treats crypto as property, so nearly every sale, swap, and purchase is a taxable event, and staking, mining, and airdrops are ordinary income. New broker reporting and per-wallet basis rules make 2025 the year sloppy records start to bite.
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FBAR (FinCEN Form 114): Who Must File and the Real Cost of Getting It Wrong If your foreign accounts together crossed $10,000 at any point in the year, you almost certainly have an FBAR to file. The penalties for ignoring it are far larger than most people expect, and missing prior years is usually fixable if you move first.
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ITIN Applications (Form W-7): How Foreign Individuals Get a U.S. Tax ID An ITIN lets someone who cannot get a Social Security number file a U.S. return, claim a treaty benefit, or be claimed as a spouse or dependent. The application is straightforward once you know which document path avoids mailing your passport to the IRS.
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Streamlined Filing Compliance Procedures: How to Catch Up on Late FBARs and Foreign Income If you missed foreign account reporting because you genuinely did not know the rules, the Streamlined Procedures let you catch up with limited or no penalty. The catch is that they require certifying non-willful conduct and only work before the IRS contacts you.
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Foreign Gifts and Inheritances: When Form 3520 Is Required U.S. persons who receive large foreign gifts or inheritances may need Form 3520 even when no tax is due. The key questions are who the donor really is, whether the transfer came from a trust, and how the amount should be documented.
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Planning Strategies

Capital Gains on Selling Your Home: The Section 121 Exclusion Most people can exclude up to $250,000 of gain on a home sale, or $500,000 if married, but only if they pass the ownership and use tests. The exclusion shrinks fast for former rentals, second homes, and anyone who moves too soon.
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QSBS (Section 1202): How Founders and Early Investors Can Sell Stock Tax-Free Qualified Small Business Stock can let you exclude millions of dollars of gain from federal tax when you sell C-corporation shares held long enough. The 2025 law expanded the benefit, but the requirements are strict and easy to break years before the exit.
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RSU Tax Planning: Why High Earners Owe More Than Their Paycheck Withheld RSUs are taxed as ordinary income when they vest, but employers usually withhold at a flat 22%, far below a high earner's real rate. The result is a surprise tax bill, a common double-tax error at sale, and a concentration risk worth planning around.
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Small Business Tax Strategies: The Augusta Rule, Hiring Your Kids, and Accountable Plans Three legitimate, underused strategies let business owners move money from the taxable column to the deductible one: renting your home to your business tax-free, putting your children on payroll, and reimbursing yourself the right way.
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The 83(b) Election and Startup Equity: ISOs, NSOs, RSUs, and Restricted Stock If you receive founder shares or early-exercise your options, the 83(b) election can convert a future ordinary-income tax bill into long-term capital gain. The catch is a hard 30-day deadline that, once missed, cannot be undone.
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The Backdoor and Mega Backdoor Roth: Roth Contributions for High Earners If your income is too high to contribute to a Roth IRA directly, the backdoor Roth gets you in anyway, and the mega backdoor Roth can move tens of thousands more per year. Both work, but the pro-rata rule quietly ruins the backdoor for the unprepared.
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The QBI Deduction (Section 199A): A 20% Write-Off Most Pass-Through Owners Leave on the Table The qualified business income deduction lets most pass-through owners deduct 20% of their business profit before tax. It is now permanent, but income thresholds, the W-2 wage limit, and the service-business rules decide how much you actually get.
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The Short-Term Rental Loophole: How High W-2 Earners Use Real Estate to Cut Their Tax Bill Short-term rentals are not treated as rental activities under the passive loss rules. If you materially participate, the losses, supercharged by bonus depreciation, can offset your W-2 or business income without needing real estate professional status.
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Solo 401(k) vs. SEP-IRA: Which Retirement Plan Is Right for Self-Employed Business Owners? Both plans offer high contribution limits and immediate tax deductions, but the Solo 401(k) lets you save significantly more at lower income levels and includes a Roth option most business owners don't know about.
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