Tax Preparation & Planning Services for Individuals with Equity Compensation

Yes! This site gets updated monthly at the very least. This FAQ answer will be changed ASAP if I hit capacity and am no longer accepting new clients.

My focus is on individuals that have equity compensation, but I am not exclusive to that niche.

I do not take unscheduled calls, so I don’t publish a phone number for clients or prospects to “just call” when you have a question.

To help serve you better and do my best focused work, I don’t want to let a ringing phone or piled up voicemails interrupt me.

I am HAPPY to make time to answer your questions, and I am responsive to my clients, but meetings must be scheduled. Or you can send an email clearly describing your issue. Do NOT email documents, those MUST be uploaded to TaxDome.

In my experience, there are very few tax “emergencies.” Every deadline is known and published, and almost every IRS or state tax notice gives at least 30 days to reply.

If those aren’t being ignored or procrastinated, there’s likely no emergency.

But if you have something to communicate with high priority, first, upload every page (even blank ones or ones you think aren’t relevant – ALL the pages) to TaxDome. I check TaxDome every business day (unless there’s a banner notice on your dashboard of me being OOO).

Second, put a meeting on my calendar for the soonest availability you see. I will reach out to you to meet sooner if a response is required before our scheduled meeting or if additional info is needed.

First, the belief that extensions correlate to audits is a myth. I put my own personal and business tax returns on extension solely so that I can say “would I do this if I knew it increased my risk of audit?”

Second, if you provide all your forms and answer my questions timely (note: “timely” is a few weeks before the filing deadline, not the day before), there is a very low likelihood your returns will go on extension. I prefer to get tax returns done–not to spread work out through the year.

If you receive a Form K-1 from a partnership or S-Corporation that you have an ownership stake in, or from a trust or estate of which you are a beneficiary, I must wait for that K-1 to file your returns (i.e., filing with an estimate and amending later is not appropriate, that would be filing an inaccurate return). If I don’t have that at least a couple weeks before the individual filing deadline, your individual returns are likely going on extension. To reduce your odds of that and to get your K-1 faster, make sure whoever is in charge of the financial records for the entity that is giving you that K-1 is getting those financial records to that tax pro early (i.e., January).

My ideal clients:

• Follow my process and don’t ask for exceptions (e.g., sending paper documents, asking for phone calls instead of booking appointments, emailing documents instead of uploading to TaxDome).
• Don’t make me their babysitter: they take ownership to go FIND all of their tax forms without reminders from me.
• Upload documents to my portal and make sure they are readable.
• Communicate with courtesy and curiosity, rather than presuming negatively upon me.
• Don’t make me their secretary:
  • Retaining copies of past documents and tax returns is the CLIENT’S responsibility–access to past documents via my portal is intended, but not guaranteed.
  • Set their own reminders when I give instructions of what taxes to pay when.
• Watch my Loom videos timely.
• Respond to my emails and TaxDome messages timely without multiple reminders.

I don’t fire clients that fit the above criteria. Every client I’ve fired has failed to meet one or more of the criteria above. I love to find great-fit clients and to keep working with them for years. I hope you will be one of them!

First, if you get a letter from the IRS or state taxing authority, don’t panic. The IRS logo naturally strikes fear into the hearts of taxpayers. Take a deep breath.

Second, upload EVERY page to TaxDome (many government letters are double-sided, so don’t miss the even-numbered pages). Do not skip blank pages or pages you think aren’t relevant — ALL the pages.

Third, yes, I stand by my work. IRS, etc., letters come for one or more of three general reasons:

• I made a mistake. It’s rare, but it happens.
• The client failed to provide ALL tax forms or thorough information to my inquiries.
• Random chance. The IRS and states just send inquiry or investigation letters sometimes. I cannot control this, no tax professional can. Be wary of any tax pro issuing guarantees on this.

It also may be a combination of the above. Upload any notices you receive (ALL pages), any additional information you  might have, and I will reach out within a few business days to discuss next steps.

If you think there might be an error in your tax returns, you can email me explaining your question, book a meeting, or record a Loom to describe it and email me the link to the video.

Another key to helping me help you resolve this quickly is to communicate with curiosity rather than accusations.

No, at this time I do not outsource. Karl does all client work. I have no current plans to outsource. If that changes in the future, this FAQ will be updated and it will be properly disclosed in my engagement letters.

Security and privacy of your data is paramount to me.

I only use paid business-level AI tools that do not feed data models. I take responsibility for all the output from an AI tools.

I am using AI to streamline some workflows and calculations, but I review and own the end work product. AI is not preparing your tax returns.

I also use a specialized Accounting AI tool to help with tax research and for fine-tuning emails and other writing materials. All research outputs are verified by me personally before being relied upon.

Yes! The tax industry often calls those tax returns and clients “orphan 1040s” or “standalone 1040s.” Many tax pros now only want to do business tax returns and/or recurring bookkeeping/accounting work. Those firms will only do an individual (1040) tax return for an owner or partner of a business when the firm handles that business’ accounting/tax needs as well.

That is not my model. I like and welcome “orphan/standalone 1040s.” My smaller firm size (just me, one CPA) accommodates those well.

It’s not secure. Email and text messages are easily hackable. The IRS recommends against sending PII (personally identifiable information) through email or text. As a result, my professional liability insurance company does not want me accepting documents via email or text either.

Please also do not take cellphone camera pictures of your documents. The TaxDome app has a built in document scanner that is much more secure (please save documents as PDF).

I do want to be compassionate to people who have anxiety over uploading documents to my portal. I can be available for limited scheduled Zoom calls and tutorials on uploading documents to TaxDome. I also have a guide available.

If uploading is still not possible, I need to have boundaries to serve all of my clients (and my family)  well because every exception to my process takes more time. I cannot accept paper documents and would recommend you seek out another tax pro.

The standard accountant’s answer applies here: it depends. I do not currently promise specific response times. I have a soft goal to respond within 2-3 business days, and I put up out-of-office messages if I am away for more than one business day so you know when to expect delays.

But here are some ways for you to proactively reduce delays in my response time:

• Closer to a tax deadline (usually March 15, April 15, September 15 and October 15, but there are others), it’ll take longer.  You will carry a lot of favor if you use the “scheduled/delayed send” feature in your email or just sit on it in your outbox until at least five days after the deadline.
• If you are asking about a document that you have, that I do not have, upload it to TaxDome before emailing about it.
• If you are asking about how to use TaxDome or find a document in TaxDome, you should email me: hello AT strubecpa DOT com.
• If you just have a “quick question,” I do charge, either one-off or through an annual subscription. You should describe your entire situation / question and upload relevant documents.
• If you are asking a question that involves tax projections or calculations, you should probably schedule a planning meeting.

Consider when emailing: “what additional follow-up questions is Karl going to have for me to be able to answer my question(s)?” If you can think of anything and address those in your initial message, I can get you an answer faster with fewer back-and-forth emails. And doesn’t the world need fewer emails?

That’s an apples and oranges question. I know many brilliant EAs and CPAs, and I know too many incompetent EAs and CPAs.

EAs only do tax work, but there are subtypes of tax work, so not all of them file individual tax returns, offer tax planning, etc. A CPA is a much broader license that lets you do multiple areas of accounting: so, while many do taxes, many also do not.

Ask your potential tax pro:

• How long have they been doing tax work?
• Do they do the type of tax work you’re looking for (e.g., individual tax prep/compliance, entity tax prep/compliance, tax planning, trust & estate tax)?
• Will they put their name on your tax returns? Note: preparers rarely sign the actual tax returns anymore, but you should be able to find your preparer’s name somewhere on your tax return file they provide (usually the Form 8879 at minimum), or you probably have a ghost preparer.
• Do they have a PTIN (you can actually look this up yourself here) to be allowed to prepare returns for compensation?

There are other less common designations besides the CPA and EA. The key is whether or not they have a PTIN (see last bullet point above).

You can also look up tax pro credentials online (California CPAs can be looked up here, you can google for other states, verify EA status here).

I do not usually start work on returns until I have ALL of your tax documents, unless I am preparing a draft to put returns on extension. A few analogies to help illustrate working on taxes with incomplete documents:

• buying a house but not being able to see the living room first
• working on a 1,000-piece puzzle but only having 800 pieces in the box

There are due diligence checks that must be done once everything is in. So “waiting on one last form” is not usually just a quick switch to flip, and issue tax returns. Thank you for partnering with me to help me complete your tax returns accurately.

First, you should try to contact any issuers (employers, etc.) for another copy, or log into any financial accounts to download any tax forms (or confirm that you don’t have any from that institution). Not all forms get mailed anymore, many require you to log in and look for them.

Alternatively, you can create an account with the IRS to download your tax transcripts. This is a one-person account, so if married, each spouse needs to register for an account. Keep in mind that the “wage & income transcript,” which shows all tax forms issued to your SSN, isn’t available until May or June at the earliest.  So if you know a tax form is missing, plan to file an extension.

Most states with an income have similar processes and access.  Since the majority of my clients are in California (but I file for clients all over), MyFTB is the website to create an account.

This is a misconception perpetuated by social media, that some tax pros implicitly work for the IRS to try and get clients to pay more taxes than needed. This is false. Every tax professional should work to prepare accurate tax returns to help you pay the least amount of tax you owe. Many tax laws are subject to nuance and interpretation. The best way to legally pay the least amount of taxes is to:

• Book a planning meeting before the year ends.
• Write down your questions and fact patterns of the tax minimization ideas and questions you have. Details matter!
• Ask if there are any legal adjustments you can make to help your proposed business activity or rental fit the required criteria for lower taxes. No lies or misrepresentation of facts, sometimes there are slight changes you can make in your business or rental that will drastically affect your tax bill.

There are some tax pros who are more conservative or aggressive in their tax positions than other tax pros. Some will allow a deduction that others won’t. Sometimes that’s a matter of interpretation, but other times it’s a matter of tax evasion. Don’t dismiss a tax pro that says something isn’t deductible; he or she might be trying to help you avoid committing tax fraud or filing an inaccurate return. If you disagree with the fact pattern and decision, and feel this should be allowed, you should probably seek out a [paid] second opinion from another tax pro and proceed accordingly.

Admittedly, it can be hard to tell without experience in this industry or reading through a lot of complex tax code. I offer these two metrics as a starting point:

• Are you being encouraged to lie about or misrepresent how you earn income, or how your business or rental is owned or actually runs?
• Is the tax idea on any of the annual IRS published lists of “dirty dozen” tax scams?

I take the view that not everyone needs tax planning.  If your only income is from a W-2 job as an employee with no equity compensation with many years until retirement, and you aren’t charitably inclined (i.e., high four figures or more of annual giving); tax planning may not be as helpful for you.

But if you have a business, a rental, income that varies heavily year-to-year, high pre-tax retirement balances, and/or a brokerage account; there would likely be value in a tax planning session.

Tax planning can also be very advantageous approaching life stage changes, particularly approaching retirement.

It’s difficult to know precisely without all of your tax and financial documents and information. When in doubt, upload your documents and ask.

Here are the current terms of that service:
Get access to Karl’s tax expertise and avoid one-off billing for “quick questions.” This includes:

Unlimited e-mail/Zoom support and answers to tax questions related to the individual(s) and/or entity/entities for which I prepare tax returns, that can be answered within Karl’s scope of expertise without additional research or calculations required.*
Walkthrough and explanation of any IRS & California (or other state, as applicable) notices received.**
* The standard fee range for “quick question” e-mails/Zoom meetings without this package is $500-700 each.
* If additional research and/or calculations are required, that is a separate engagement that will be quoted upfront and billed separately.

** This package DOES NOT offer “audit protection,” IRS representation, or response to notices.
** I will provide you with the next steps to take, and quote a separate fee to respond to the notice on your behalf, if needed (a response may not be necessary).

Yes, although Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS) transactions are less common than ISOs and RSUs, I have handled this before and am able to assist you with tax prep and planning around this.

Depending on your tax needs, yes. While my focus is on equity compensation, that is NOT a requirement to be a client.

Absolutely! I love networking with advisors.

I do not handle investments or offer financial planning, so if you have someone providing that for you, I can provide a form for you to authorize adding your advisor to TaxDome so I can reduce the back-and-forth for you.

Your advisor can upload tax forms he/she has access to (brokerage and retirement 1099s, etc.) and download a copy of your tax returns when completed.

Your advisor can review the returns in draft before filing. i.e., when I send you your tax returns, you can wait to sign until your advisor has reviewed them. I can’t and don’t e-file until you sign.

I actually have never been asked this directly, but I get many client leads who come to me because their prior tax pro died or ended up incapacitated.

I realize that I have an important duty to my clients to not leave them in limbo near a tax deadline and to make sure returns get extended (see FAQ about extensions above) or filed timely.

If I should suddenly die or become incapacitated, I have a contingency plan and team in place with trusted peers who will be reaching out to you ASAP with next steps on a transition plan. This communication will likely come first from me, but possibly others.

This awareness is also part of why I have a policy not to file on deadline day. That would create too many opportunities for things to go wrong or get missed.

This is important because scammers know that you send me very sensitive information. They will try to trick you AND me to get that information. I get a LOT of phishing emails daily.

I am doing everything I reasonably can to keep up with security standards and keep your private information safe.

I currently have messages going to clients from these domains:

• strubecpa DOT com
• docusign DOT net
• taxdome DOT com
• oncehub DOT com
• notification DOT intuit DOT com
• notifications DOT sayanchor DOT com

Be careful to check the actual email address an email comes from to make sure there’s not a sneaky typo in there.

When in doubt, don’t click any links, instead: log into TaxDome to send me a chat message with a screenshot to confirm an email is actually from me or a legitimate software tool that I use.

Absolutely! Many of my clients that leave a job with equity comp often move to self-employment / freelance consulting afterward.

I want to keep my clients that are a great fit, even if they no longer have equity comp. I can help with the tax impacts of business structure and getting you started with a new venture on the right foot.