One might think ...

[hrj]

... that a lawyer who advertises specialties in partnerships, real estate, and taxes might feel competent to advise on the tax consequences of a partnership sale of real estate. Curiously, I'm zero for two on this matter. The legal referral service that I get through the Big B gave me the names of three local lawyers in response to my question about the above conjunction of topics. One advertises on the web as a specialist in personal injury law. I didn't bother contacting him. One nearly hung up on me in his rush to disavow competence in any combination of the topics he advertised as specialties. The third was much more open to being helpful on the question of dissolving the partnership but indicated that he didn't feel up to advising on the tax questions. Huh.

So I'm resigned to doing the partnership-dissolution and the tax advice as separate transactions. I've got an appointment with the lawyer for tomorrow afternoon and have sent an e-mail off to a local tax consultant who advertises the right sorts of specialties. (Not that that's any guarantee ....)

I am so ready for the rain to finish up and to get back to Spring. I know this makes me a Bad Californian.

Comments

[wingedcorset.livejournal.com]

Ummm... Dude, my dad does both. I work for him. He's in SF.

[hrj.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm pretty much committed to doing the partnership closure paperwork with the lawyer I'm seeing this afternoon. But I am in the market for a tax consultant to help set me up on the right footing. Ideally, I'm looking for someone who's willing to walk me through the 2006 taxes and explain how everything works and what to watch out for, so that I can do it on my own in the future. I realize that professional tax preparers may not be too eager to put in extra work on a one-shot deal of this sort rather than the usual deal. Or maybe my goals are more common than I think and it's a standard option. Whaddaya think?

[wingedcorset.livejournal.com]

I think that this will be fairly difficult for you to find, honestly. We use professional tax preparation software that, afik, does not have a home version. Getting your information into the software is a fairly time consuming process for the first year, but then you are there for the rest of eternity. It's also a whole lot more time consuming for him to teach someone how to do their own taxes than it is for him to just do them.

I guess where I'm going with this is that I don't think it's that common, and I honestly can't think of a time that we've done it.

Sorry.

tax consultant

[dame-cordelia.livejournal.com]

If you want a tax man who will explain things so you can carry on yourself, my tax accountant might be up for this. I'll ask him.

Re: tax consultant

[hrj.livejournal.com]

Would you? I do realize that what I'm asking for is more work than doing the "black box" thing, and I'm willing to pay for the extra effort. It isn't that I want to avoid paying for a tax accountant every year. It's important to me to understand the process and principles, and it's hard to really understand it unless you actually do the tax forms yourself. I'd also be happier getting a referral from a friend than simply picking a name out of a search engine.

www.free-legal-referral.com

[(Anonymous)]

I have used http://www.free-legal-referral.com in the past to find lawyers in my area.