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In the Hidden Money podcast, you'll learn how you can legally use the tax code to your financial advantage. There’s wealth inside the tax code. Taxes aren’t the enemy.
Most people hate taxes (and pay more than they should). But when you view taxes only as an evil expense, you miss out on legal ways to grow your wealth. Unlock the secrets to saving tax and building wealth with the Hidden Money Podcast! 🎧💰 Hosted by Mike Pine and Kevin Schneider.
Mike Pine: Another W-2 taxpayer,
$218,000 in taxes they saved
by working with us last year.
Another taxpayer, $207,450.
And this was our first
year working with this one.
$185,969.
$164,055.
$158,953.
I mean, it goes on and on and on.
In our top 15, the lowest one so
far through April 7th is $101,027.
Tax savings.
Money that would've gone flushed
down the toilet, not been
pushed back into our economy.
Go out there, take back
what's rightfully yours.
Get hundreds of thousands of dollars back.
Kevin Schneider: Welcome to this
episode of the Hidden Money Podcast.
Today, we are gonna talk about some
of our biggest wins in tax season.
So remember, at Revo, what we
do is tax savings strategy.
We try to get ahead of the curve
on our clients to save them money.
We do not wanna be IRS administrators.
I do not want anyone coming into our
office saying, "Here are my documents.
Prepare my return."
We can do that, but the value
is what we're gonna talk about
today, and that is how do we
actually save cash for our clients?
And we have a great list, and we
have a good client testimonial
that we're gonna talk with.
His name's Paul Richardson.
He's one of our clients.
We're just gonna interview him and
talk about his experience with us,
so you can hear it directly from him.
But Mike, you know, w- in the first
quarter, we have a good amount of
clients that we file tax returns for.
I think when we ran the numbers, we
filed probably 30, 32% of our tax- 38%.
38.
We've filed about 38% of our
entire tax returns in one
quarter for the entire year.
So the first quarter is not
gonna be our biggest tax savers.
Those typically come in October
because we did so much planning.
There's other K-1s that come in.
Those are gonna be the big guys.
Yeah.
But even for this first quarter,
walk us through, like some of our
biggest wins in this filing season.
Oh.
numbers
Mike Pine: Some of our biggest
wins in this finals season.
I'm- Like numbers … excited to do that.
But before I get into the
numbers, I just wanna point out,
you look really good in pink.
Kevin Schneider: Thank you,
Mike Pine: for all those, you know, the
six people that listen to these podcasts
on YouTube, please comment on how much
better Kevin looks in a button down,
like professional looking shirt versus
the grunge thing he normally wears.
Because dude, you are
Kevin Schneider: It's,
uh, you know, I took…
So my, I have a, I have two daughters.
My youngest daughter, she
had a gymnastics banquet.
Yeah.
This, I have one suit, and my one
suit I wore on my wedding day.
And so I don't, I have, like,
three dress shirts, one suit.
I don't own ties.
I don't even have dress socks.
So I was scurrying about going
to this banquet, and I was
squeezing into my wedding suit.
Yeah.
And this, my wedding was
only about five years ago.
I, it is rough.
I, I need to invest into
my, I need to invest into my
attire and care more, I guess.
Mike Pine: Y- y- I would, I
would agree, but I appreciate.
At least you're shaving these days and
the hair's not below the shoulder, so
Kevin Schneider: by.
Mike Pine: it.
I appreciate your wife, Ty.
Thank you, Ty.
He's representing the firm so much better
these days, but let's, let's work on
the clothes a little bit more, please.
All right.
So yeah, the important thing to point
out is at Revo Taxpayer Advocacy,
like you mentioned, we want to be tax
planning advocates with our clients.
We can't do that come January 1st.
I mean, there's…
A- and most clients out there are
used to their CPAs, before they
come to us, not even reaching out
to them until mid-January when
they can start filing tax returns.
Um, that's not where you get your savings.
So we worked with a lot of clients
this year, and like you said, April
15th, we get the clients that generally
have their own business or W-2s.
They're not, they don't have
income streams all over the place.
The ones that have income streams
all over the place are the ones
that are paying, potentially
paying a heck of a lot more taxes.
Um, but we got some great wins.
Excited you'll hear from
Paul Richardson directly.
My favorite quote he said, and this
is why I asked him, "Can you please
let us interview you for a podcast?"
Um, we're talking, I
said, "Well, how, how…"
He gave us a five out of five.
We ask all our clients after we deliver
their, um, their work to them, we say, you
know, "Please rank us five out of five.
What could we do to improve?"
And he ranked us, ranked us five
out of five and didn't mention
anything we could improve.
So I'm talking to him, I'm like, "Five out
of five is great, Paul, but what can we
do to make it even like better next year?"
He's like, "Mike, I just wish
I would've found y'all earlier
because this is the second year I've
made s- saved so much in taxes."
And, uh, he'll, he'll talk
about that here in a second.
Kevin Schneider: in a second.
And he's a W-2 earner.
Mm.
Like, he has a high W-2, and we
won't get into his specifics unless
he wants to when we interview him.
But he is a W-2 earner, and we
do tried and true methods that
are defendable, that are s…
He's growing his net worth.
He's growing his
Mike Pine: asset base
Kevin Schneider: While saving-
while saving
Mike Pine: cheat.
He did not cheat.
He's following the tax law.
I, I feel confident if
the IRS pushes back-
Kevin Schneider: We've already
won audits in this exact
Mike Pine: exact situation.
Exact situation.
Um, and he's saving a lot in taxes.
I mean, a lot.
And we have, uh, these are clients
I'm not gonna go name, but I have
a list here just leading up to…
Let's see.
The latest date that we filled out
one of these returns is April 7th.
So there's still a lot of clients
that aren't on here, but we-- I got
the top, I think this is ten or 15.
I can't count 'cause there's no numbers
and I don't have a spreadsheet, but
I'm just gonna list some of them.
Um, another W-2 taxpayer,
$218,000 in taxes they saved
by working with us last year.
We filed, um, most of that was in a
refund, uh, because they were W-2.
Another taxpayer, $207,450, and this was
our first year working with this one.
Um, did a couple really cool things.
They worked hard for this, but we
worked throughout the year with them.
Uh, $185,969.
$164,055.
$158,953.
I mean, it goes on and on and on.
In our top 15, the lowest one so
far through April 7th is $101,027.
Tax savings.
Money that would've gone flushed
down the toilet, not been pushed
back into our economy, would've been
wasted on Medicaid fraud probably,
is I'm reading a lot in these days.
Do you know people are getting paid
to sit with their family members in
the house that they live in already?
They're getting paid to have conversation
with their, their family members.
Over a billion dollars in one
state, I just read two days ago.
I want to get in
Kevin Schneider: state,
I just read two days ago.
Only- Fraud is a very prevalent
topic these days- They all are
with everything going in
California, Minnesota.
There's even
Mike Pine: red states Oh,
a lot.
There's a lot in Texas.
Yeah.
And we're re- I mean,
it's, it's a Republican…
One thing we can rely on, whether you're
Republican or Democrat representatives,
they tend to allow a lot of fraud.
I don't know if it's on purpose-
Kevin Schneider: Yeah But whatever.
Is it a process thing
or is it a heart thing?
It's probably both.
Um, but yeah, these-- I mean,
just with that list alone, if the
lowest is 100, I mean, that was
two million plus just of this.
More than two million not getting
wasted in fraud, but going back
into the economy, going into our
clients' nest eggs so they- Mm-hmm
have more financial freedom.
Um, gotta
Mike Pine: Yeah, these, I mean, just
with that list alone, if the lowest is
a hundred, I mean, that was two million
plus More than two million not getting
wasted in fraud, but going back into the
economy, going into our clients' nest
eggs so they have more financial freedom.
Um, you gotta work with a tax strategist.
If you don't work with us, that's fine.
We don't, we, we don't have hard feelings.
We actually…
There's only so many clients we
can serve in a year, actually.
But work with a tax
strategist during the year.
It's May now, a- or June.
June is when this is gonna air.
It's June.
You've got six or seven months.
You really only have a few months to
start the big strategies and get them
executed before the end of the year.
Go out there, take back
what's rightfully yours.
Get hundreds of thousands of
dollars back, unless you like
Kevin Schneider: funding fraud.
And you might be wondering, and like
some people out there, they just
don't even know what it looks like.
Like, what does proactive
tax planning look like?
Well, with us, we prepare tax returns.
We prepare our clients' tax returns,
but every single client that we prepare,
Mike and I meet with as many as we can.
Um, they, we call them discovery calls.
So if you're a tax preparation
client of ours, at, when we file
your tax return, we're gonna send
you that exact survey that you
hinted with or mentioned with Paul.
We're gonna say, "How did we do?
What was the high points?
What's going on this year?"
Then after you fill that short
three-question thing out, you're gonna
be sent to Mike and I's calendar, and we
do a free, what we call discovery call.
So we say, "Hey, we saw on your, um,
on your survey you gave us a five.
Cool.
Is there anything we can do better?"
Or, "Hey, I saw you're gonna
have a spike in income in 2026.
Now is the time.
Let's just open the door
for no additional cost.
What are we gonna do this year?
What does that income look like?"
And then we-- I have probably five of
these a week to where I'm saying, "Hey,
there are some strategies we could
do in Q3, Q4, but in the meantime, in
the short term, here's what we can do.
You know, if, if your passion is real
estate, let's get that short-term rental.
Let's get that long-term rental.
Let's invest into syndicated deals
if it works out, and we can bridge
that and network that for you."
But we're thinking today, and we're
not trying to recreate a tax plan
in December or not even doing it.
And so we are trying to be
as proactive as possible.
Some clients are harder to
get on the phone than others.
I mean, it is what it is.
There's some entrepreneurs, they are
busy with family, and I had a guy that
popped on, and he literally has four
kids, and his wife's pregnant, and he's
like, "Hey, I bought the, I bought real
estate last year, and it saved me a bunch.
I'll be honest, I don't have
it in the tank this year.
I do not have the time with
my personal life to tax plan."
And I'm like, "It's fine.
There's
Mike Pine: other things to
Kevin Schneider: do."
There's passive.
We, we do not have to go into real
estate with active management.
There are so many other things, and we
can tailor a tax plan that fits your life.
Yes And that's what it's all about.
It's just communication.
And so is your CPA out there
communicating with you?
Are they filing the tax return, sending
an invoice, and then you're waiting
for that engagement again next year?
Mike Pine: Or are you
communicating with your CPA?
'Cause again, we have some
high-earning clients that they're
still not picking up the call.
We, we had this one client made
$7 million profit last year, much
bigger than they've done in the past.
I
Kevin Schneider: I know
who you're talking about.
Yep.
Not
Mike Pine: one, not, not-
Oh … th- my-- The one that I
Kevin Schneider: I work with
Mike Pine: than the one
that you work with more.
We-- I guess we had a couple of them.
But they-- We talked, I
think, twice during the year.
Uh-huh.
He's like, "Yes, we're gonna
do tax planning this year."
Come October, crickets.
Novem- I mean, I was texting everyone I
Kevin Schneider: This is when the wi-
Mike Pine: He's the one where
the wife is like- And I even
Kevin Schneider: us."
Mike Pine: neighbors They were
like, "We're trying to save money."
Um, and we, we just sent him his
tax return and with a tax bill, or
his tax payment due on April 15th,
and it was, you know, millions of
dollars going straight to fraud.
Well, not all of it, but
the super majority of it.
And the guy still won't take my calls.
So
Kevin Schneider: But he still
wants us to prep his return
Mike Pine: But he still wants us
to prep his return every year.
I know.
Like, why?
I'm not adding any value here.
Please let us add value.
Please let your tax advisor add value.
Call them, respond to them.
Kevin Schneider: Yes.
It is, it's preparation is,
it's a necessary commodity.
It's something that has
to be done every year.
It is.
Mike Pine: And there's an art to it too.
I mean, you can file the same
tax return 20 different ways.
You got to look at, one, the best way to
make sure you're maximizing the savings,
'cause you put one thing in one different
form, suddenly you're limited out by
some AGI limitation or some other deal.
Yeah.
You got to, you got to optimize
the tax savings, but then you also,
there's red flags, and there's ways
to mitigate the likelihood of audit.
And even if you're not
cheating, audits are no fun.
They can be expensive.
So make sure whoever's preparing your
return, the commodity, the necessary evil,
make sure they know what they're doing and
they're, they're filing it in a way that
reduces the likelihood of getting audited.
But also make sure if you do get
Kevin Schneider: get
audited, they're ready to
defend you.
Yeah.
And I've told this story before, another
big win is Section 1202, and I was
actually thinking about this the other
day 'cause I was going through our income
from year to year and just looking at
all of our clients and our kinda, our
average bill, just CPA stuff, back end
CPA stuff like, is my average cost okay?
You know, just all that stuff.
Such data.
Yeah.
And then there was this big jump for
one client in 2024, and I knew…
And I was like, "Ah, I
remember that client."
I remember why, 'cause it was
like a $60,000 tax return that
year, but they've been paying us
four grand every year since then.
Well, it was a cool story, and I've
told this before, but it's, it's a huge
win to where they were self-employed.
They created this C corp, and it was
an HVAC company, and they worked their
tail off growing this thing, and they
actually sold the stock in their C corp,
and they were gonna exit and retire.
They were
Mike Pine: the end of their career.
And it's important to
note, they hired us, they
Kevin Schneider: hired you
to prepare the tax return.
And this was the first year that
we worked with them, was the year
of sale, 'cause they're like,
"Oh my gosh, there's a big sale."
They usually self-prepared.
And so they came to us, they're
like, "Hey, we sold our business.
We just want a professional to handle it."
Okay, cool.
They came in, and it
was all after the fact.
And then we saw that all the data started
coming in, and it came to us, and we
saw that, hey, you sold C corp stock.
You've been in business for like 20 years.
Section 1202 states if you sell your
American-based business and you've
been in there longer than five
years, you can sell that tax-free.
And so they actually withheld and saved.
So they sold it for millions of
dollars, but they had about $700,000
in savings, and they parked it there.
And they said, "This is my tax.
I know that I'm not touching this money.
This 700K is…
I'm gonna have to part with it, and
that's just the cost of doing business."
Mm-hmm.
But when we got to the return
and we mentioned 1202, I was
like, "Look, that $700,000, what
if I told you you can keep it?"
And this-- They're like, "What?"
And so that's why the tax fee
went up, 'cause I was like,
"Hey, I'm gonna defend this.
I'm gonna paper it up.
I'm gonna document this.
I'm gonna do all the research.
I'm gonna protect your 700,000 bucks, and
I will defend it if you're audited at no
additional cost," 'cause I'm just so…
I'm…
It was just such a cool thing.
So the look on their face was really cool,
that it w- you could just see the stress,
and they're like, "I can legally do this?"
I'm like I already did the research
and I just emailed them Section 1202
highlighting the specific parts, the
qualifications, how it applied to them,
Mike Pine: they were like,
Kevin Schneider: "Okay, let's do it."
Yeah.
And we filed that tax return
and they kept their 700.
Mike Pine: And let's-- That was before
the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, right?
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act
actually enhanced twelve oh two, made
it better, made it apply to more,
made it reduce the holding period.
You used to have to hold
for at least five years.
Now you can sell after three years- Yeah.
-and you get half the gain tax-free.
Four years, three-quarters.
Five years, all of it.
So I was just talking to a new client
last week, and he's in the middle
of buying out his family for the
family business, and they're needing
to recapitalize and bring in new
funds to, to be able to buy him out.
And I was like: What's your plan
for the next five to ten years?
If you can, if you can-- I mean,
so what he's had is, like, kind of
a passive family for a while, and,
like, they've been the noose around
his neck from preventing the company
from growing, and he's already
starting to grow it a lot faster.
It's like, if you get these revenues
up to twenty, thirty million, someone
offers you, you know, two, three,
four X of EBITDA, would you sell
right now or sell in a few years?
He's like: "Well, yeah, but I, I would,
but if-- then if I sell the business, I
don't have any cash flow, and I'd have to
pay so much in tax to sell the business."
And I said: Let's talk
about twelve oh two.
And now we're gonna restructure
him in twelve oh two.
Um, it doesn't make sense for
everyone, but for this guy, it does.
We're gonna restructure him, um,
make him qualify for twelve oh two,
let him pump up the revenue on this.
Um, you know, he's gonna have to pay
a little double tax for now, but with
twenty-one percent flat rate corporate
tax rate, it's really not that much.
But then when he
Kevin Schneider: a little double tax for
now, but with 21% flat rate corporate
tax rate is really not that much.
But then when he sells
that sucker, 100% tax free.
Yeah.
I, it's funny we're talking about 1202.
Just I had a, a consult with
a new client yesterday, and he
was-- he's gonna start a business.
And so we started talking about how to
structure, and this is on a sales call.
I don't know this guy.
I just-- He just walked in,
um, on my schedule, right?
And he's like, "Hey, I'm
starting a business."
And I was like, "Okay, tell me
a little bit about your goals.
Like, do you wanna sell?
Do you wanna grow this?
Do you want it to be a generational thing?
You got three kids.
What's, what's your plan?"
He goes, "Oh, I just wanna build it.
Um, you know, I'm-- My family
already, we have a trust set up.
We're pretty wealthy already on this, and
I'm just using some of my distributions
from my trust to fund this new venture."
And I was like, "So you don't need
the operational income to live on?"
He's like, "Oh, no, no, no."
And I was like, "Okay."
And then I walked through 1202.
I was like, "Let's structure a C corp.
Let's leave all your revenue in there.
If you don't need to take distributions,
let's just leave it all in there.
And then in five, 10, 15 years,
whenever you build this company
up, you could sell it tax free."
And so we're ahe- that was
just came out on an initial
Mike Pine: and if we
Kevin Schneider: can
get ahead of things- Yes
we can structure things that
benefit and go towards your goals.
Some people that, like you
said, it doesn't make sense.
Some people need the operational income
to live on, or they wanna pass the,
the business down to their children,
and they're not willing to exit.
I mean, every situation's different.
That's why a relationship and
communication matter so much is you
can't just grok and ChatGPT this stuff.
You gotta have someone watching you
of all the different options and
Mike Pine: picking the best
option and executing it.
Yeah.
Let me talk about one
other call that I had.
It was about two weeks ago, I think.
There, there's some tech companies
out there that make things called
chips that are being used, like
GPUs being used big time in AI.
Um, and we've seen a lot of
people who are u- engineers,
used to making 100, 120 a year.
Suddenly, their stock
options are through the roof.
But they worry about,
"Well, do I sell these?
Do I exercise these?
'Cause now I'm going to have to pay--
I might get two million dollars,
but I'm going to have to pay,
you know, almost 800,000 in tax,"
depending on what state they live in.
And, uh, so I was talking to
this guy, and I was like, "Do
you ever like to go to Airbnbs?"
He's like, "My wife and I love to.
Um, we don't have enough time
to, but we, we do love to, and
hopefully one day, as we can bank
enough money away, we can do that."
I said, "Are you familiar with
qualified opportunity zones?"
He said, "No."
I said, "What about
rural opportunity zones?"
He said, "No."
Um, it turns out they go to
Broken Bow, Oklahoma, regularly.
Um, and I explained to him, Broken
Bow is a rural opportunity zone.
You can go buy some land there or buy
a property there completely shelter
your gain for the next five years, and
because it's a Rural Opportunity Zone,
in five years you only recognize seventy
percent of your gain, and because it's
a Rural Opportunity Zone, you only have
to improve, increase your basis by fifty
percent over the next thirty months."
And he's like, "Wait a second."
And he started looking, and he
called again the very next day.
He said, "My wife found this place.
It's a real- it's a little bit old
cabin, but if we go finish it out and
everything, it's gonna cost us about,
like, eight hundred thousand to buy now.
We're probably gonna have to put four
or five hundred thousand into it.
If I do that, does that work?"
And I said, "Yes."
And he said, "Well, what happens after
we've used it for a while and we want to
sell it in ten years or eleven years?"
I said, "It's all tax-free."
So, you know, you hear a lot of
people, and it's true, the majority
of tax strategy, tax saving is
deferring taxes down the road.
But there are ways, legit legal ways,
if you strategize enough, with enough
foresight, with enough proactivity,
where you can avoid taxes a hundred
Kevin Schneider: 100% legally.
Yeah.
So- And that's why tax planning
is not a one-time event.
No.
It is an year-by-year event because
we're deferring taxes, so if we defer to
next year, we defer, we defer, we defer.
Time value of money tells me if I can keep
deferring, if I could save 100 grand today
and I'll pay the government that 100K
that I saved, and 10 years from now, that
100K I'm gonna turn into 200K, and then
inflation and time value and all that.
So it is m- so beneficial to defer
as much as possible, and that's a
lot of our job is just educating that
because a lot of people just think,
"Oh, you know, depreciation, I could
just-- Uh, these are tax savings 100%."
And- Yeah … we're like, "Well,
you know, there's a two-edged sword
to-- There's not many areas in the
tax code unless it's 1202 step-up in
basis stuff to where you could truly
Mike Pine: Truly eliminate taxes
Although there's another
one I gotta bring in sales.
So, uh, just a sales call I had yesterday.
Um, it's kind of morbid, but
look, we got-- we all have
an expiration date, right?
Everyone's gonna die
Kevin Schneider: The
death rate is pretty high.
It's like
Mike Pine: Well, it's .999999%
'cause Christ didn't die.
And, and I'm not sure Elijah did,
and we know Enoch didn't, and Elisha.
I mean, they had the
whole tornado taken up.
Did they?
I don't know.
Kevin Schneider: I, yeah, I don't know.
Maybe .99999
to eight.
Mike Pine: It's a high death
rate for everybody else.
We're, we're gonna die.
And anyway, so this new prospect
I'm talking to, um, they,
they, they don't make a ton.
Um, they make good money, but not a ton.
Um, they don't have capital
to buy an STR or anything.
But what they're wanting to do is they
bought their parents a house a few years
ago, um, that's gone up a lot in equity.
The mom just passed away this past year.
The dad, he's doing okay, but I mean,
he, he's not likely gonna live…
I mean, he's almost-- I
think he was eighty-seven.
Not that much longer.
But if they sell the house, and
they're talking about selling as
soon as he dies, they own the house.
If they sell it, they're
gonna recognize capital gain.
I said, "You guys could
gift this house to your dad.
He owns it at your basis.
When he dies, he gets a step up
in basis, then you turn around and
sell it and there's zero taxes.
Permanent deferral."
Um, he says, "Yeah, but it's, you know,
it's worth three hundred thousand, three
hundred and fifty thousand right now.
I only paid a hundred thousand for it.
Um, won't that hurt my in- my
gift tax, your lifetime gift
and estate tax exclusion?"
I'm like, "It's sixteen million now.
You can handle it."
He's like, "You can do this?
Is this legal?"
I said, "Yep."
Um, and there's permanent deferral there.
There's so many ways of doing this, man.
Kevin Schneider: It's, man,
Mike Pine: in this one, we're
predicting when someone's gonna die.
I hate doing that, but I mean,
Kevin Schneider: You have to plan.
It, it, just 'cause you don't plan
doesn't make the event not happen.
So I
had that conversation too where
just yesterday I had a call with
somebody, and their father passed
away in 2021, and they have about
$750,000 of stock that came to him.
And they're like, "Hey, I'm
gonna have all this gain.
I wanna liquidate this."
Um, and so I explained, "Hey, in 2021,
did your advisor step up the basis
whenever those stocks went to you?"
And he goes, "I don't know.
I mean, it's showing that
I have $750,000 of gain."
I'd be like, "I would be shocked unless
he's just, uh, you got enough money
in there or it's been a, it's been in
some really good stocks that you've
appreciated that much in four years."
But you never know.
I mean, you could have 10 million
in there, then 750 grand doesn't
make too big of a stretch, so.
But he's like, "No, no, no.
The account value's like a million,
and I have $750,000 of gain."
I was like, "Okay."
I was like, "Go to your financial guy.
Link me up with him, and I just
wanna make sure in 2021, did all
those stocks that transferred
to you get stepped up in basis?
'Cause I think you can probably
sell all this tax-free.
It's not tax-free, but there's gonna
be some appreciation in those five
years, but we need to look at this."
And he's like, "Oh, he had no idea."
And so it's like you don't know what
you don't know until you talk to…
'Cause he was coming to us
'cause he's like, "Hey, I'm
gonna have a $750,000 gain.
What do I do?"
I was like, "Step one, maybe
you don't have a gain."
Mike Pine: The
Kevin Schneider: best tax plan ever.
So that's…
It, it's cool.
Like, everything that pops up is
so different that we're doing-
Mike Pine: I know we're running
out of time, but I want to add one
more 'cause that just reminded me.
Very similar fact set.
Um, the father died during COVID.
Um, at the time when the markets were
just-- the economy was ter- uh, you know,
i-in free fall, everyone was terrified.
The stock market's gone down hugely.
He died at that point.
Um, but then six months later, the
alternate valuation date, almost-- the
stock had almost completely recovered.
And it was I think in twenty
twenty-three, they were going to sell it.
Their CPA didn't file an estate
return, so they didn't elect
that alternate valuation date.
Um, and the CPA told them, "Hey,
you're gonna have to pay all this gain
'cause he died when the stock was down.
Now it's up."
Um, and we went back and looked at it,
and we actually convinced that other CPA,
since they had all the data, they should
have done it in the first place, to do
it for free and file the estate return,
choose the alternate valuation date.
And the guy, instead of paying tax
on a ton of money, paid a tax on a
little money on the exact same stock.
So you just-- gotta, you gotta have
Kevin Schneider: we didn't
even do that work, you know?
Mike Pine: s- We didn't even do your work.
We, we didn't.
And you know what?
He never hired us.
Um, but hey, uh, it was, it was worth it.
Yeah.
He should have hired us.
Like, now what are you
doing with that money, guy?
Uh, you're probably paying too much tax.
Come back, come
back.
Kevin Schneider: Yeah.
We, you can only, you know, it's kind
of like you show them the promised
land a little bit and then, yeah.
It's hard.
It's hard, it's hard to see that when
you serve someone, you solve a problem
for them, and you don't hear from them.
But people are going to go
back to what's comfortable.
Mike Pine: Yeah, but I think the point, if
we can land this plane for this episode,
is there are so many ways to save taxes.
Most of them require
proactive tax planning.
However, when you find yourself, like
Kevin's client that sold a business
and was ready to pay seven hundred
thousand dollars in tax, before you
write that check, before you file
that return, make sure you're talking
to a competent tax advocate for you.
Not a traffic cop for the IRS like
most tax preparers are, a tax advocate.
But those are few and far between.
The cases-- We just bounded
out a bunch because we've been
doing this for twenty-six years.
Ninety-eight percent of our
clients, they pay too much tax
because we didn't proactively plan.
Get out there.
Be proactive.
Find a tax
Kevin Schneider: strategist, make
sure they're an advocate for you
Thank you for listening to this episode.
Revo Taxpayer Advocacy LLC is not licensed
or registered as a CPA firm with the
Texas State Board of Public Accountancy.
I'm a CPA, Kevin's a CPA.
We have a lot of CPAs on staff that are
licensed and held to the same standards.
However, when we decided to be
revolutionary and change our
name to Revell Taxpayer Advocacy,
the state board would not allow
that and let us remain licensed.
They say we have to have one
of our names in the firm for
us to be licensed as a firm.
And guess what?
It's not us that's important.
It's revolutionizing the way you feel
about taxes and saving you money.
We are advocates for you, so we were
willing to drop our firm license even
though we're still individually licensed.