Latest / Cleaning Business Life / Episode #52 - Interview-Macen Krauter-Cleaning Business Finances Made Simple: Expert Tips from Macen Krauter

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Episode #52 - Interview-Macen Krauter-Cleaning Business Finances Made Simple: Expert Tips from Macen Krauter · Cleaning Business Life

• 0:00
  Shannon Miller: Welcome to Cleaning Business Life.
• 0:02
  Shannon Miller: My name is Shannon Miller and I am your host and founding member of Klean Freaks University.
• 0:07
  Shannon Miller: This show is sponsored by the Structure, Scale and Profit Cleaning Business Academy, my signature program.
• 0:13
  Shannon Miller: I'm also joined by my co-host, Kimberly Gonzalez, inventor extraordinaire of Pure, Evergreen Cleaning Products.
• 0:20
  Shannon Miller: Kim, take it away, Hello my beautiful cleaning friends.
• 0:24
  Kimberly Gonzales: Welcome back to Cleaning Business Life.
• 0:26
  Kimberly Gonzales: We are so glad you guys are here with us Today.
• 0:29
  Kimberly Gonzales: We have a special guest, shannon.
• 0:30
  Kimberly Gonzales: Would you like to introduce him?
• 0:32
  Shannon Miller: Drumroll Kimberly Excellent, extraordinaire.
• 0:37
  Shannon Miller: I'm so excited to have you here.
• 0:38
  Shannon Miller: Thank you, thank you, thank you.
• 0:40
  Macen Krauter: Thank you guys.
• 0:42
  Kimberly Gonzales: Tell us, I guess just tell us a little bit about how long you've been bookkeeping on your own.
• 0:47
  Kimberly Gonzales: You specialize with bookkeeping and we wanted to bring somebody on, especially right about now, because everybody's doing their taxes and maybe their business is growing.
• 0:56
  Kimberly Gonzales: Maybe they've put money aside to start hiring somebody to do bookkeeping.
• 1:00
  Kimberly Gonzales: I think it's a great idea.
• 1:02
  Kimberly Gonzales: I know for me.
• 1:03
  Kimberly Gonzales: When I first started my cleaning business, I was like I don't want to touch this stuff, I don't want to deal with it.
• 1:08
  Kimberly Gonzales: I had to keep her right off the bat because I knew that I wanted to have everything organized.
• 1:14
  Kimberly Gonzales: Then, when I switched over to my new company, I was like I already had that in place and it's been a dream.
• 1:20
  Kimberly Gonzales: I have a folder and I literally just shove everything in that folder and say bye-bye and send it away.
• 1:26
  Macen Krauter: Yep, yeah, totally.
• 1:28
  Kimberly Gonzales: But is how long it is.
• 1:29
  Kimberly Gonzales: Huh, do you have a full service bookkeeper?
• 1:32
  Kimberly Gonzales: Me, yeah, but she's also my bookkeeper back slash CPA.
• 1:36
  Kimberly Gonzales: Oh, okay, got it.
• 1:37
  Kimberly Gonzales: Then Ellie, my daughter, she's 17.
• 1:40
  Kimberly Gonzales: She's going to be 18 in October.
• 1:42
  Kimberly Gonzales: She's taking classes right now and courses to become a certified bookkeeper by the time she's 18.
• 1:47
  Macen Krauter: Oh nice, that's awesome.
• 1:49
  Kimberly Gonzales: She wants to make some money.
• 1:50
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, for sure.
• 1:51
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, it's an awesome little side hustle when you're starting out and then you can turn into a full-time thing, but that's really cool.
• 1:57
  Kimberly Gonzales: Yeah, tell us how long have you been bookkeeping on your own?
• 2:02
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, I've always been a numbers guy, personal finance nerd since I was a teenager, just trying to manage my own money.
• 2:09
  Macen Krauter: It was just my thing.
• 2:11
  Macen Krauter: When I was growing up Then I started going to school for accounting.
• 2:15
  Macen Krauter: Covid hit so I dropped out of school because I couldn't afford it anymore.
• 2:19
  Macen Krauter: Then I started, went and did sales.
• 2:21
  Macen Krauter: But I always was helping out my family with their businesses, doing the bookkeeping and stuff.
• 2:25
  Macen Krauter: Because, like I said, I've always just kind of been a little bit more inclined to play with the numbers and just being spreadsheets and stuff like that.
• 2:32
  Macen Krauter: So it's been about like five or six years that I've been doing accounting and bookkeeping in general.
• 2:40
  Macen Krauter: But as far as like my business, I started my business back in 2021.
• 2:47
  Macen Krauter: At the end of 2021, I basically saw a Facebook ad like showing you how to set up a bookkeeping business, because I didn't really know that was a thing I'd heard of like accounting firms and all that stuff, but I didn't know you could do a bookkeeping only firm and you didn't have to have a CPA license to do it.
• 3:04
  Macen Krauter: I already kind of knew how to do the accounting and the bookkeeping and I like doing the detail-oriented stuff, just making sure everything's kind of put together.
• 3:12
  Macen Krauter: I saw, yeah.
• 3:15
  Macen Krauter: Me yeah seriously, yeah, and that's how my parents are too, so they're always like, hey, can you put a spreadsheet together or something, or just like, put our stuff together.
• 3:22
  Macen Krauter: And I was like, yeah, I'll look at it.
• 3:24
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, I took the course.
• 3:26
  Macen Krauter: They kind of showed me how to set up the bookkeeping business side of things, so like getting clients, putting agreements in place and then having a good client experience.
• 3:35
  Macen Krauter: So it's not like communicating with your clients every once, every two weeks, because I feel like that's what a lot of the accounting industry is kind of known for is the lack of communication.
• 3:44
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, they just kind of showed you how to set up a really good business side of things.
• 3:48
  Macen Krauter: And then I kind of hit the ground running, just slowly gain clients, and then kind of found myself working with a lot of cleaning services, power washing services, just kind of home service companies and stuff.
• 3:59
  Macen Krauter: But I always like the cleaning companies because they're pretty laid back and fun to work with and but yeah, that's pretty much.
• 4:06
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, totally.
• 4:07
  Kimberly Gonzales: And it's a great niche to be in because I know a lot of cleaning companies.
• 4:12
  Kimberly Gonzales: They always ask for specific bookkeeping or CPAs that specialize in it, so they know how to write off stuff.
• 4:19
  Kimberly Gonzales: So that's good that you, like, have focused on the cleaning side of it.
• 4:23
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, for sure, and it's always good to like in any industry because there's bookkeepers in every niche.
• 4:29
  Macen Krauter: If you can find someone that works with a majority of those kind of clients in your industry, they don't have to niche specifically in there, because I don't niche specifically in cleaning industry.
• 4:40
  Macen Krauter: In the cleaning industry, either, I work with all kinds of service companies, but a majority of my clients are cleaning companies.
• 4:46
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, if you can find someone that knows your industry, they know kind of you know the softwares associated with the industry, just like not only QuickBooks, you know using like Jobber, housecall Pro, market, zenmade, bookingquala, all those.
• 5:00
  Macen Krauter: It really kind of gives you someone to brainstorm with when it comes to connecting those things, because the integrations can kind of be a pain in the butt sometimes.
• 5:09
  Macen Krauter: Oh my gosh.
• 5:10
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, I'm dealing with that right now with like three cleanups.
• 5:13
  Macen Krauter: They integrate with Housecall Pro.
• 5:14
  Macen Krauter: It messed up the integration and then you have to have someone who knows both of the softwares to go back in, fix the deposits, fix and deposit funds, all that fun back end stuff.
• 5:24
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, if you are a cleaning business owner and you can find someone that you know knows the industry really well, then I would highly suggest going with them.
• 5:32
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, it's always good to have someone you know who knows your industry.
• 5:35
  Macen Krauter: As far as the bookkeeping side goes, Nice.
• 5:38
  Kimberly Gonzales: So I'm curious, like I know a lot of people are curious.
• 5:41
  Kimberly Gonzales: So what is the difference between, like, bookkeeping versus a CPA?
• 5:45
  Kimberly Gonzales: Because I think there's a big.
• 5:46
  Kimberly Gonzales: You know there's a difference and I learned that you know early on in my business, to know the difference.
• 5:52
  Macen Krauter: Yeah for sure.
• 5:53
  Macen Krauter: So usually when people ask me that, I kind of describe it as like a doctor and a nurse relationship.
• 5:58
  Macen Krauter: So bookkeepers are yeah.
• 6:01
  Macen Krauter: So bookkeepers are more like the nurses and they, you know, check your blood pressure, do the daily activities, kind of make sure your overall general health is okay and then when there, when it is time to give you like a specific diagnosis, you go to like a specialty doctor right to get your diagnosis or for a CPA to file a tax return or help you with tax resolution or tax planning and all that stuff.
• 6:24
  Macen Krauter: And fun fact, you don't always have to go to a CPA to get a really good tax professional.
• 6:30
  Macen Krauter: So that's kind of one of the misconceptions I see a lot is that a lot of business owners and just people in general they hear CPA and they automatically think they do everything when it comes to accounting.
• 6:39
  Macen Krauter: A lot of CPAs I talked to actually have been transitioning into you know some.
• 6:45
  Macen Krauter: Some have been starting bookkeeping businesses.
• 6:47
  Macen Krauter: Some do tax resolution only, some do accounting only, some do audit only.
• 6:53
  Macen Krauter: So and some CPAs don't even mess with tax like a lot of CPAs in the corporate world.
• 6:58
  Macen Krauter: They go into the audit side of things for corporate and they don't really mess with the tax side of things.
• 7:05
  Macen Krauter: So if you are looking someone to specifically help you out with taxes, I would make sure to make sure that they specialize in tax specifically either tax resolution or tax planning or tax strategy.
• 7:18
  Macen Krauter: And if you don't necessarily, you don't necessarily have to go with the CPA, because you can also go with a tax professional like an EA and enrolled agent, and there's tons of enrolled agents out there.
• 7:30
  Kimberly Gonzales: So where does the enrolled agent do, Like what is their?
• 7:33
  Macen Krauter: They're basically licensed to practice under the IRS and they can, you know, do tax resolution, they can file tax returns and all that stuff.
• 7:40
  Macen Krauter: It's basically another licensed professional that can handle your taxes for you and a lot of people don't know that they can go that route.
• 7:47
  Kimberly Gonzales: They automatically just know that I didn't either.
• 7:49
  Kimberly Gonzales: I learned something new Awesome.
• 7:53
  Macen Krauter: Awesome, yeah, and a lot of the times, if you do go with an EA, they most of the time are a little bit cheaper too, because they don't have the three letters behind their name.
• 8:03
  Macen Krauter: So you're not paying that premium and you can still get a really, really good result and develop a really, really good relationship with somebody who's going to take care of you properly, because it's so.
• 8:13
  Macen Krauter: One of the statistics statistics that I've heard of lately is that 70% of CPAs in the next I think seven or 10 years are going to be retiring, so a lot of them are on their way out.
• 8:25
  Macen Krauter: So if you can find a really good EA or a new CPA, a lot of people aren't getting as much into the accounting profession because it's just it's hard to get licensed, there's a lot of school, it's expensive and generally, when you think of accounting you think of boring but not a fair number is in a spreadsheet kind of a person you don't find it boring, yeah.
• 8:46
  Macen Krauter: Exactly, exactly.
• 8:47
  Macen Krauter: Like myself.
• 8:49
  Macen Krauter: I love like, if you give me a spreadsheet and something to track, I'm like, I'm a happy camper, I'll be good.
• 8:53
  Macen Krauter: Like I don't know, I don't like that stuff.
• 8:55
  Macen Krauter: I like kind of planning things out and all the theory on that side of things.
• 8:58
  Macen Krauter: But I just like business in general.
• 8:59
  Macen Krauter: So but yeah, if you can find like an EA or someone who is just starting out in the tax side of things, a lot of the times are going to be more tech savvy.
• 9:09
  Macen Krauter: They're going to, you know, be a little bit more easier to communicate with.
• 9:14
  Macen Krauter: They're not going to have as many clients, so the communication side of things will probably be better and, like I said, the tax or the tech side of things is also going to be a little bit easier for you because some of the older guys and gals getting out of the profession or they like to do things manually and sometimes it can be a little bit harder on the client.
• 9:32
  Kimberly Gonzales: So I'm curious, like when you are trying to look for an EA, what are some things that you should ask?
• 9:41
  Kimberly Gonzales: Like when looking for an EA, like, what kind of things should they ask?
• 9:46
  Macen Krauter: Um, I would ask their response time if they, if they guarantee a response time.
• 9:51
  Macen Krauter: So I don't know.
• 9:53
  Macen Krauter: In my firm I always guarantee a 48 hour response, besides weekends, just so the client knows that they're not going to send you a message and it's going to get left in the inbox for like three weeks when you need to get your returns done or you need to get a loan or whatever the case may be.
• 10:08
  Macen Krauter: So I would ask response time.
• 10:10
  Macen Krauter: I would ask what industry, um, most of the time, most of the time, they work with.
• 10:15
  Macen Krauter: And then, if you are a business owner, I would ask how many businesses they deal with and how many business tax returns they do.
• 10:22
  Macen Krauter: Um, because some EAs and CPAs and tax professionals they don't, they won't file certain types of returns.
• 10:28
  Macen Krauter: So some don't deal with partnerships, some don't deal with S corpse, some don't deal with business tax returns at all.
• 10:34
  Macen Krauter: So I would just make sure yeah, those are probably the three main things.
• 10:37
  Macen Krauter: So, industry response time and then, um, what types of returns they deal with business or personal majority, just so you know they have experience with it.
• 10:45
  Macen Krauter: They're not going to, you know, let something go to the wayside because they don't know how to handle it or whatever.
• 10:51
  Kimberly Gonzales: Very good info.
• 10:52
  Kimberly Gonzales: We'll learn something new today.
• 10:53
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, awesome, I'm glad I was able to help a little bit.
• 10:57
  Shannon Miller: Yeah, it is, it's awesome.
• 10:58
  Shannon Miller: I had no idea that an EA even existed.
• 11:01
  Shannon Miller: It wasn't on my radar.
• 11:02
  Shannon Miller: Um, I did share a little bit about my first accounting experiences.
• 11:06
  Shannon Miller: Um, when I first got an accountant, I didn't know the difference between a bookkeeper or an accountant.
• 11:13
  Shannon Miller: So I picked someone who was going to help me file my my tax forms.
• 11:16
  Shannon Miller: And the person who was going to do that that very first year he ended up having a massive heart attack on tax day and his wife tried to step into his place and um kept doing the draws on my account and never filed any of the paperwork.
• 11:31
  Shannon Miller: So it took a long time and a lot of money to fix it.
• 11:35
  Shannon Miller: She didn't call me and say by the way, you know, mike has died and blah, blah, blah.
• 11:40
  Shannon Miller: She just kept doing the draws because she was, you know, scrambling around trying to.
• 11:43
  Shannon Miller: You know, I get it, she'd got house payments and everything else, but I'm like it was a very expensive blunder, that is for sure.
• 11:49
  Shannon Miller: So sure.
• 11:51
  Shannon Miller: Uh, and not every experience is going to be like what I just mentioned.
• 11:54
  Shannon Miller: Um, the industry, um, as Mason has um suggested, is changing, which is awesome, and it'll be nice to have fresh eyes and people who can deal with the integration with software, because that's usually what does it for a lot of people is the integration with software.
• 12:09
  Shannon Miller: I have to learn new stuff all of the time and just like mm, and you can't always YouTube it right.
• 12:13
  Shannon Miller: Yep, yeah.
• 12:16
  Macen Krauter: I mean, youtube university is always awesome to go to if you're like struggling with something a little, but yeah, definitely when it comes to like the integrations with QuickBooks and all the different softwares, if you don't know the debits and the credits and like the accounting side of things, it can get really really messy.
• 12:31
  Macen Krauter: Um, and that's I mean honestly, that's a majority of my clients.
• 12:34
  Macen Krauter: They try and deal with it themselves first and then they YouTube it and then they're just like all right, I can't do this.
• 12:40
  Macen Krauter: It's like it's too much.
• 12:42
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, it's too time consuming, too Like you can't put that that time back into building a team.
• 12:48
  Macen Krauter: You can't like go find new jobs.
• 12:50
  Macen Krauter: You can't find new work.
• 12:51
  Macen Krauter: It's yeah, it can take a lot of time, but yeah, most of my clients are just like want to take it off my plate.
• 12:57
  Macen Krauter: I want to focus on growing my business.
• 12:58
  Macen Krauter: Um, it's.
• 13:00
  Macen Krauter: I always kind of refer to bookie being kind of as like Wi-Fi.
• 13:03
  Macen Krauter: It's like you don't notice it's there until it's not, and then you're like, oh crap, I need to do something about this really quick, or it's.
• 13:10
  Macen Krauter: I can't really move in in online business, especially like mine.
• 13:15
  Macen Krauter: It's it's.
• 13:15
  Macen Krauter: It can be a little a little hard to move forward if you don't have Wi-Fi in your business.
• 13:20
  Macen Krauter: Same thing with bookkeeping it's hard to know where you're going to go.
• 13:23
  Macen Krauter: If you don't have accurate financials, you don't know what you're spending money on, you don't know what you're making.
• 13:26
  Kimberly Gonzales: Right, that's so important it is.
• 13:28
  Kimberly Gonzales: And I know one of the main like I get this question a lot from different people in our group.
• 13:32
  Kimberly Gonzales: But, um, one of them is like cause they asked me and they kind of mixed their personal stuff with their business, so they use their personal debit card to buy business stuff, so what are some tips that you and I know we're kind of going off our question- Shannon.
• 13:45
  Kimberly Gonzales: I wanted to tie this in because I see this question a lot and I know.
• 13:49
  Kimberly Gonzales: For me, when I started my business, I made sure it was 100% separate, like I had my LLC, I got my bank set up, I got my credit cards, I got my you know debit card all separate.
• 14:00
  Kimberly Gonzales: So what are some things that companies can do when they're getting ready to hire a bookkeeper slash, you know, or CPA or an EA?
• 14:08
  Kimberly Gonzales: What are some things that they need to do to have in place to make your job easier?
• 14:13
  Macen Krauter: Yeah.
• 14:13
  Macen Krauter: So first thing I tell clients oh yeah, no worries.
• 14:16
  Macen Krauter: First thing I tell clients is to separate that stuff as soon as you can.
• 14:21
  Macen Krauter: If you don't, if you're not able to get a separate bank account or business bank account set up, then I would just make sure you keep track of those things.
• 14:29
  Macen Krauter: I would keep the receipts either put them in like a spreadsheet or something, just showing the date, what you paid for, where it was from, what it was for and the amount, before you get those things set up.
• 14:42
  Macen Krauter: Once you get those things set up, make sure to keep those things separate.
• 14:46
  Macen Krauter: So your personal and business you always want to be separate.
• 14:48
  Macen Krauter: There's always going to be times where you use the wrong card on accident.
• 14:53
  Macen Krauter: I've done it plenty of times.
• 14:54
  Macen Krauter: It's not a big deal, but when you keep doing it it becomes a habit.
• 14:58
  Macen Krauter: That's when it can get really messy.
• 15:00
  Macen Krauter: That's when it's going to cost you a little bit more for accounting, because when you go to do your business taxes you're going to know what your business made and what you personally made.
• 15:09
  Macen Krauter: So keeping those things separate is super, super vital when it comes to the bookkeeping, accounting side of things.
• 15:14
  Shannon Miller: So no commingling of funds.
• 15:17
  Macen Krauter: Exactly no commingling.
• 15:21
  Kimberly Gonzales: So you recommend just from your expertise when they get their business set up, do they need to have an LLC to get their business bank account open?
• 15:30
  Macen Krauter: As far as business bank accounts, I'm pretty sure you do have to have an EIN to get your business bank account set up.
• 15:37
  Macen Krauter: But if you don't have an EIN and you're just starting out and you're just a sole proprietorship, you can just open a separate checking account and just run things through there.
• 15:46
  Macen Krauter: As long as things are separate and you have a separate set of statements, you can connect that bank account to QuickBooks and use that as your business kind of accounting software set up.
• 15:55
  Macen Krauter: Just as long as everything's separate and you're not running business expenses through the personal account and vice versa, you should be good.
• 16:04
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, I always recommend people just to separate things out as soon as possible and, like I said, you don't have to have a business bank account per se.
• 16:15
  Macen Krauter: You can just get like a open and new personal checking account under your name if you're a sole proprietorship.
• 16:20
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, setting up an LLC and getting a business bank account is probably going to be the easiest route, just to keep everything separated and not give you a headache when it comes to tax time.
• 16:30
  Shannon Miller: As far as the LLC, I think it depends on the state that you reside in, because some states require that you have an actual official LLC to register you at the state, and then other states you don't have to have an LLC, like when I had Castlekeeper Cleaning, I was a sole proprietor and it wasn't until I paid cash for my house and then I was like, okay, I need to have an LLC because I want to protect my asset, right, yeah?
• 16:52
  Shannon Miller: So I think it gravely not gravely I think it depends on what state you do reside in, that you're doing business in.
• 17:01
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, and always check, like your local and state kind of regulations and stuff when it comes to taxes.
• 17:08
  Macen Krauter: And that's really when I recommend people go to someone local, because there are tax repairs and tax prep companies that can help you throughout the US and I don't want to knock any of them.
• 17:19
  Macen Krauter: I'm sure some of them do a really, really good job in other states.
• 17:22
  Macen Krauter: But it is always kind of nice to have someone a little bit more personal, someone that knows your local legislation a little bit better in regulations when it comes to like payroll taxes, federal state all that stuff.
• 17:35
  Macen Krauter: Having someone local is a little bit nicer on the tax side of things, especially with payroll too, because things are changing constantly.
• 17:42
  Kimberly Gonzales: Oh my gosh, it's crazy.
• 17:43
  Kimberly Gonzales: Yes, they are.
• 17:43
  Kimberly Gonzales: I know my CJ was like oh, this changed.
• 17:46
  Kimberly Gonzales: And now we have.
• 17:46
  Kimberly Gonzales: I know Colorado passed a new law that once I'm like, because I'm switching over to payroll, now I'm going to be switching over to payroll, so there's a new law like I can only have up to a certain amount of employees before I have to start paying.
• 18:00
  Kimberly Gonzales: You know time.
• 18:01
  Kimberly Gonzales: Like what was it?
• 18:02
  Kimberly Gonzales: I'm thinking I'm going to bring for PTO or something like that.
• 18:05
  Kimberly Gonzales: No, it's family leave.
• 18:07
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, the family.
• 18:09
  Kimberly Gonzales: So it's like I'm always asking my CPA.
• 18:11
  Kimberly Gonzales: I'm like because I have a really good she's kind of like my bookkeeper slash CPA and so I love that.
• 18:16
  Kimberly Gonzales: I like she keeps me in the loop for things.
• 18:19
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, that's awesome.
• 18:20
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, biggest thing is communication, Like if you're, if you don't hear from your tax person, at least if you're paying for the service, at least once a quarter I mean, talking to them once a quarter is always a really good idea just so you have a kind of foundation of like where you're going to be at when it comes time to pay taxes.
• 18:40
  Shannon Miller: You don't have any surprises, yeah exactly Nothing worth thinking a big surprise.
• 18:45
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, and making sure you're setting aside money throughout the year.
• 18:48
  Macen Krauter: Having those quarterly meetings or having a monthly meeting with your bookkeeper is always.
• 18:53
  Macen Krauter: Just.
• 18:53
  Macen Krauter: It kind of forces you to pay a little bit more attention to it, because it can get left to the wayside super easy when you're, you know, got to run payroll and you got to hire people and you got to find new clients and you got to do all that stuff.
• 19:05
  Macen Krauter: So it can definitely get kicked the curve pretty easy, but making sure to stay on top of it is going to save you a ton of stress, time and money during tax season.
• 19:13
  Macen Krauter: So having those meetings and just having that open line of communication with your tax professional or your bookkeeper is super important.
• 19:22
  Shannon Miller: So one time a month, or at least once a quarter, for all of those who are considering maybe giving Mason a call, I think that's awesome.
• 19:30
  Shannon Miller: So you had mentioned that you do a little bit of work for your parents and they are entrepreneurs, correct?
• 19:38
  Macen Krauter: Yeah.
• 19:39
  Shannon Miller: What industry are they?
• 19:40
  Shannon Miller: And, if you don't mind us knowing, a little bit of information.
• 19:44
  Macen Krauter: So my dad has been a photographer.
• 19:46
  Macen Krauter: He was self-employed for I mean, the majority of my life growing up.
• 19:52
  Macen Krauter: My mom she works as a speech therapist.
• 19:54
  Macen Krauter: Well, she worked as a speech therapist in like the skill nursing setting, so she was doing that for about 10 years while my dad was a photographer, self-employed, doing his own thing, and he always used fresh books.
• 20:07
  Macen Krauter: I would always give him crap about it to switch over to QuickBooks and he's like, yeah, I know I need to, I can help you if you want.
• 20:15
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, he was a photographer and she was.
• 20:17
  Macen Krauter: Well, she is a speech therapist and they recently opened up a residential assisted living facility here in Colorado.
• 20:27
  Shannon Miller: That's awesome.
• 20:28
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, it's really cool.
• 20:29
  Macen Krauter: It's like I'm so proud of them.
• 20:32
  Macen Krauter: It's been so cool to see because they found this amazing house.
• 20:35
  Macen Krauter: It's like a ranch style out like in the country.
• 20:38
  Macen Krauter: It's got an amazing view.
• 20:39
  Macen Krauter: It's in Lone Tree, colorado.
• 20:42
  Macen Krauter: It's called the Haven Home.
• 20:43
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, if anyone wants to check it out or they are in Colorado and looking for someone that's or some way that's not a big box of facility for their elderly parents, I would highly recommend it.
• 20:53
  Macen Krauter: They're, they have daycare, they do adult daycare for seniors and stuff, and they also just got licensed for long term assisted living, so like living people.
• 21:03
  Kimberly Gonzales: Lone Tree is pretty.
• 21:03
  Kimberly Gonzales: I like Lone Tree.
• 21:05
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, it's incredible.
• 21:06
  Macen Krauter: I don't know if you've heard of MacArthur Ranch, but it's kind of backed up to some hills and stuff and it's just like it's an amazing view, it's an amazing setting and they've put in a ton of work for the past like two years to get it up and up and ready and up the regulation and just like create a really amazing experience for all their residents.
• 21:24
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, as far as the bookkeeping side of things go, like, they made sure to get everything separated out as quick as possible and it's been, I mean, there's been countless times because they have a partner.
• 21:33
  Macen Krauter: They have a partner with it.
• 21:35
  Macen Krauter: It's another couple and the it's one of my mom's best friends and she's a speech therapist as well and she did a little bit of work in the skilled nursing setting as well as like little kids and infants and stuff, helping them develop their speech and stuff.
• 21:52
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, them being partners has made the bookkeeping really complicated.
• 21:56
  Macen Krauter: So there's been yeah, so making sure like, if you are a partnership or you have a partner, definitely getting an accounting software set up just so you can see what everyone's getting paid, what everyone's contributing and all that kind of stuff, because it can get really muddy really fast, especially with your, if you're putting money into the business and trying to pay your bills with the money from the business.
• 22:19
  Macen Krauter: Having that side of things to figure it out has saved a ton of arguments and stress Just being able to see everything on paper, knowing it's accurate and up to date, and you're not.
• 22:30
  Macen Krauter: You know where's my money going, you know where exactly it's going, where you're spending money on and all that kind of stuff.
• 22:37
  Shannon Miller: Yes, I had a business with my best friend we're no longer best friends from it, but 30 years ago and we decided to open up a business together and she had different financial responsibilities and I did, and arguments ensued and it basically ruined our friendship.
• 22:59
  Shannon Miller: We still talk today but we're not like.
• 23:02
  Shannon Miller: We used to be really close.
• 23:03
  Shannon Miller: I mean, it was awful to watch and it was unnecessary and you know, when you have to give back a $10,000 check, it sucks.
• 23:12
  Macen Krauter: Yep, for sure.
• 23:13
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, that's the one thing I've learned Just from the stress it puts on the relationship with that person, just from seeing like my parents go through it, because it's like my mom's best friend.
• 23:23
  Macen Krauter: I won't dive too deep into it, but if you are thinking about getting into a partnership with a friend or a family member, make sure your values are aligned.
• 23:34
  Macen Krauter: Make sure you're on the same page.
• 23:35
  Macen Krauter: About the finances, everything is on the table.
• 23:37
  Macen Krauter: From what I've seen, it's like it's basically getting married to that person for an extended period of time until you either sell the business or you know you hire an operator, so you guys don't have to deal with a day today.
• 23:48
  Macen Krauter: But right, yeah, I would definitely make sure to Make sure you're aligned with them.
• 23:53
  Macen Krauter: Make sure you guys have everything on the table and you know what's going on, because it can definitely get muddy.
• 23:57
  Shannon Miller: So yes, it got muddy, but it just it was.
• 24:03
  Shannon Miller: It was very.
• 24:04
  Shannon Miller: It was unnecessarily complicated over, you know, finishing work on time and following schedules.
• 24:11
  Shannon Miller: And then Expenses where, like her expenses for brand new jeans, where I had expenses for paper clips, right.
• 24:18
  Shannon Miller: Yeah different values.
• 24:21
  Macen Krauter: Yeah.
• 24:22
  Shannon Miller: So, yeah, learn from my experience for sure, and I'm excited the adventure that your parents have taken on.
• 24:28
  Shannon Miller: I think it's gonna be a very successful Adventure for both of them, so that that's really awesome.
• 24:34
  Shannon Miller: I just love it.
• 24:35
  Macen Krauter: It's been really cool to watch much success for it.
• 24:39
  Shannon Miller: And then it's out that you can.
• 24:40
  Shannon Miller: You can tell our listeners about you and your business and where they can reach you, and all that good stuff.
• 24:47
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, if you do need help with your books or you just want to have a consultation to see where you're at and get some free, some free ideas or brainstorm with me about how to get things organized, anyone can reach out to me.
• 24:59
  Macen Krauter: You can go to my website.
• 25:00
  Macen Krauter: It's checkbookscom.
• 25:02
  Macen Krauter: Chek Books calm and spelled a little bit funny, so I always have to like I always have to tell people the spelling there's no C and check.
• 25:11
  Macen Krauter: But.
• 25:11
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, I'm always open to you know, help people out if they're struggling with keeping things organized.
• 25:16
  Macen Krauter: I know it can get extremely overwhelming, really, really quickly, especially if you are using an accounting software already or you just don't know where to start.
• 25:24
  Macen Krauter: It's it can really help to talk, to talk to someone, even if it's not me.
• 25:28
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, I mean I'm always happy to help anyone that needs help.
• 25:32
  Macen Krauter: It's that's kind of.
• 25:33
  Macen Krauter: My main goal is to alleviate that stress, because I know it gets to.
• 25:36
  Macen Krauter: It can be a ton of breaks on your back, especially when you're running the business, trying to hire people and, you know, using that money to pay your bills too.
• 25:43
  Macen Krauter: So know where it's going is probably pretty, pretty important.
• 25:46
  Kimberly Gonzales: We're at the investment.
• 25:47
  Kimberly Gonzales: You guys, let me just tell you that and I am not a spreadsheet lover I have my VA do spreadsheets and I have a friend that we do the farmers market, where the Directors of the farmers market and she's nice sheets, because spreadsheets just give me anxiety.
• 26:02
  Kimberly Gonzales: I'll draw it out for her and then I'm like this is where I want it to go in the things and like we work good together Because those things, yeah, it's worth the investment.
• 26:12
  Kimberly Gonzales: That's what I have to say.
• 26:13
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, in the time investment, to like the amount of time it takes to Figure it out on your own, especially if you don't know the software or you don't know debits and credits or accounting and stuff, because QuickBooks is an accounting software so you have to have a little bit of technical knowledge to kind of navigate it.
• 26:29
  Macen Krauter: And that's kind of one of the things that bugs me about QuickBooks is they advertise it to all these business owners is like so easy to use, just set it up, just let it just set and forget it, and then People just let it go and it turns into a big mess and they use those numbers to file their taxes and stuff and you can Oversay your income or miss out on expenses.
• 26:49
  Macen Krauter: It's it happens all the time.
• 26:51
  Macen Krauter: But but yeah, the time investment is huge to all.
• 26:54
  Macen Krauter: My clients only spend about like 45 minutes to an hour per month On their entire bookkeeping.
• 27:00
  Macen Krauter: Some of some of the times it's only like 15 to 30 minutes because we don't even have a call that includes like their monthly review call.
• 27:07
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, I mean knowing where you're at, knowing what you can afford, is really huge, especially in the cleaning industry, since you are service-based, knowing if you can bring on another cleaner, or how much money you need to make an addition to bring on another cleaner or hire something out.
• 27:22
  Macen Krauter: Or if you just want to put a little bit more money in your pocket, you can do that a lot easier by eliminating Expenses rather than going out and finding additional work.
• 27:34
  Macen Krauter: Because I mean, if you're running it like a 20% profit margin, then you'd have to go out and find an additional thousand dollars worth of work to get that extra two hundred dollars, whereas you can, if you wanted to, you can go in and look at your P&L, see what you're spending money on.
• 27:49
  Macen Krauter: Oh, I'm spending two hundred dollars a month in credit card interest expense.
• 27:52
  Macen Krauter: Let me pay that off and then that's an extra two hundred dollars in my pocket, instead of having to put the time and effort into finding Additional clients on top of all that stuff.
• 28:01
  Kimberly Gonzales: So Thanks so much, forán, on Melissa's picture.
• 28:04
  Kimberly Gonzales: So pretty black packet, it's internet.
• 28:09
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, that was cool, that's passionate.
• 28:11
  Macen Krauter: And on my instagram, I don't know if there's any thinking about search, I think that's good Good info today.
• 28:19
  Macen Krauter: I enjoyed it.
• 28:20
  Macen Krauter: I learned a lot, awesome.
• 28:23
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, if anyone has questions or anything, feel free to reach out to me on.
• 28:28
  Kimberly Gonzales: I like business nerds.
• 28:30
  Macen Krauter: Yeah, they're, it's fun.
• 28:31
  Macen Krauter: It's kind of like a game for me, so that's fun.
• 28:35
  Shannon Miller: I would actually like to and I'm just going to throw this out there and you can think about it I'd like to actually have you come on as a guest every quarter and talk about what they can anticipate for the next quarter.
• 28:43
  Shannon Miller: I think that would be really beneficial to all of our listeners out there.
• 28:46
  Shannon Miller: And if you can physically send me all your information so I can include that in the show notes.
• 28:52
  Macen Krauter: For sure.
• 28:53
  Shannon Miller: So that way they can just click on the link and get right over to you.
• 28:55
  Shannon Miller: That would be awesome.
• 28:56
  Macen Krauter: Totally.
• 28:57
  Shannon Miller: Um any other questions for us.
• 29:00
  Macen Krauter: Um, what are you guys doing the rest of the day?
• 29:03
  Shannon Miller: We have one more zoom and then we have meetings after this.
• 29:05
  Shannon Miller: So fun stuff, yep, I feel you on that.
• 29:08
  Macen Krauter: I'm in the same boat.
• 29:09
  Macen Krauter: But yeah, thank you guys.
• 29:11
  Macen Krauter: So much for having me on.
• 29:11
  Macen Krauter: It was an awesome talk.
• 29:12
  Macen Krauter: You guys are great to talk to.
• 29:14
  Macen Krauter: It was super fun.
• 29:15
  Kimberly Gonzales: Thank you so much.
• 29:16
  Kimberly Gonzales: I'm not to come down that way again.
• 29:18
  Macen Krauter: It's been a while since I've been down that way, so yeah, for sure, let me know when we'll grab a coffee or something and we can chat business.
• 29:23
  Kimberly Gonzales: That's Coloradans.
• 29:25
  Macen Krauter: Yep, yep, exactly.
• 29:27
  Kimberly Gonzales: Thank you so much, me too.
• 29:28
  Kimberly Gonzales: Have a good day.
• 29:29
  Macen Krauter: Absolutely, you guys too.
• 29:30
  Kimberly Gonzales: See you guys.
• 29:31
  Kimberly Gonzales: Bye everybody.
• 29:32
  Shannon Miller: Take care.
• 29:32
  Shannon Miller: Cleaning business life is sponsored by Pure Evergreen Cleaning Products, that's P-U-R-E-V-E-R-G-R-E-E-N dot com.
• 29:42
  Shannon Miller: Pure Evergreen Cleaning Products.