Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / How Diane Hagerty Solved $898,000 IRS Bill and Helps Small Businesses Navigate Tax Nightmares

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How Diane Hagerty Solved $898,000 IRS Bill and Helps Small Businesses Navigate Tax Nightmares · The Inspired Stories Podcast

0:04
Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast,
0:08
where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from
0:11
their successes and be inspired by how they've overcome
0:14
adversity. My name is Anthony Cotispodi and
0:16
today's guest is Diane Haggerty, an IRS Enrolled Agent and the
0:21
owner of Grassroots Taxes in Springdale, AR Diane and her
0:26
team are dedicated to helping individuals and small businesses
0:30
navigate tax rules without fear. Grassroot Taxes offers services
0:35
like tax preparation, bookkeeping, payroll management,
0:38
and business formation guidance. They also share free educational
0:43
resources through a blog and YouTube channel focusing on
0:46
practical tips for everyday financial challenges.
0:49
Her firm is recognized throughout the region for its
0:52
friendly, hands on approach, encouraging clients to ask
0:56
questions and stay informed. Diane's background includes
0:59
hosting local workshops, representing taxpayers before
1:02
the IRS, and helping entrepreneurs build more
1:06
sustainable foundations for their businesses.
1:09
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All right, back to our guest today, the owner of Grassroots
1:55
Taxes, Diane Haggerty. Thanks for making the time to
1:57
Share your story today. Thank you.
2:00
Thanks for having me. So, Diane, I understand you've
2:03
got a weird origin story of how you got into the accounting
2:07
field. I'm on the edge of my seat.
2:09
What is that? Well, when I was a kid,
2:14
teenager, I was a musician. I played music.
2:18
I was going to devote my life to music.
2:19
I would write music. I was in, you know, tried to do
2:23
Broadway and tried to do a bunch of other stuff, played music,
2:26
wrote music. If it didn't have to do with
2:28
music, I didn't care. So school was kind of, you know,
2:33
other than band and choir, school was just not my thing.
2:36
So here I am, being lazy, not doing my stuff in the summer.
2:41
I go back to school day before school, start, pick up the
2:44
books, pick up my classes because I had failed to do that.
2:48
And I was going to Catholic school that year.
2:50
And there was this old nun and I went in and I was like, so I
2:55
want to take these, these classes.
2:57
And she's like, well, your first period class isn't available.
2:59
It's full. And I was like, all right, well,
3:03
take, how about this one? She's like, it's full.
3:06
You had all summer to pick out your classes.
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The only thing that's open first period is accounting.
3:11
That's what you're taking. Here's your books next.
3:15
And I was like accounting. I didn't even know what
3:19
accounting was like, I was just, I was just a partying kid with a
3:24
guitar, you know? So I was like a, a, are you a
3:29
business class? I'm a musician.
3:31
Are you serious? So I was like, that's it.
3:34
I got plenty of credits to graduate.
3:35
I'm I just won't go, Like I just won't pass the class.
3:41
I can fail. It doesn't matter.
3:42
I don't need the credits to graduate.
3:44
I got plenty of credits. I just have to put in my time
3:46
right? So I tried to fail this class
3:49
and I tried so hard to fail this class and I got like hundreds
3:55
and 98 on like every assignment. I could not fail this class if I
4:00
tried it just. So.
4:01
Everybody else. Is failing and I'm like this
4:03
class. Is so easy.
4:05
Sorry to interrupt. So when you say you tried to
4:07
fail, you just weren't studying. You weren't putting.
4:09
In any effort. But it was just coming easy to
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you, OK. It just came so easy to me.
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And then it was like something else, you know, somebody was
4:17
like, Oh, I keep bouncing checks and I was like, well, you
4:20
balance your checkbook and they're like, how do you do
4:23
that? I'm like, tell people know
4:25
anything. You know, here I am like, you
4:27
know, 1819 years old and, you know, really didn't care about
4:31
anything. And I, I was not the most
4:36
entrepreneurial kid, you know, and it just, I, you know, here I
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am like always balancing people's checkbooks and reading
4:42
letters and understanding stuff for people and explaining stuff
4:45
to people and, and it just kind of came naturally.
4:49
And then I, I met my spouse of, of 14 years that we know we
4:53
haven't been together for like 20, but, and you know, he was
4:59
very entrepreneurial, but he wasn't very good with numbers.
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So, you know, I did the books, he made the money and that's the
5:05
way it worked for a long time. So that's how I got into
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accounting. And it was all because a nun had
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no other classes to give me because I was too lazy to pick
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out the classes I wanted when I had time and waited to the day
5:17
before school. Student Isn't it funny how doors
5:20
open for us sometimes because other ones closed?
5:23
So how would you go from there? How did you go from there doing
5:27
the accounting and the bookkeeping for the business
5:31
with your husband to actually starting your own accounting
5:34
firm? That's because I got divorced.
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The marriage didn't work out. We grew in very different
5:43
directions, became very different people.
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And so I went off on my own and, and the, everything that I
5:51
learned and everything that I did for our businesses, I
5:55
figured I, I could use that for other people.
5:58
That would be easy. And that's what I started doing.
6:00
I, I started doing bookkeeping, accounting, and eventually got
6:03
my, my EA finished my college degree because I hadn't done
6:06
that for several reasons, you know, And over the past 30 years
6:11
I've, you know, really built it all up again, you know.
6:16
So now. It's kind of a big deal, I
6:18
think. What?
6:19
What is an EA? What does that allow you to?
6:22
Do it enrolled agent, it is, you take a test, basically it's,
6:26
it's a three day test. It's, it's really difficult, but
6:31
the IRS, you know, test your knowledge on taxes on pretty
6:35
much every area of taxes, business representation,
6:39
personal taxes like, and the questions are from all over the
6:42
board. You don't know what you're going
6:43
to get, but it's a three day test.
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And if you pass, you can, you're an enrolled agent.
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You have enough knowledge and taxes that you can represent
6:53
people before the IRS. So basically and and most states
6:56
accept that too. So if you're having tax
6:58
problems, you want to go to an EA we tax.
7:03
Problems specifically, Yeah, that's that's right.
7:05
So I'm not, I'm not a CPAI, don't do accounting.
7:09
I don't do like corporate audits or audits for, you know, your
7:15
licensure. I don't sign off on how much
7:17
money you made for public accounting.
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Like I don't do public accounting.
7:21
I don't do things that are for other people.
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I do stuff that the government's going to see.
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I do accounting that reflects back that the government's going
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to approve. So explain a little bit more
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about that. What does that mean?
7:32
So I'm, I'm one of your clients and I hire you to do what
7:36
probably. I do everything else, you know,
7:39
any accountant could do. I mean, I have a degree in
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accounting and small business management, so I mean, I could
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do bookkeeping and payroll and sales tax and you know, all the
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other things that, you know, any accountant could do.
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However, the, the real dividing line is Cpas are licensed by the
7:55
state. They, they're an association.
7:59
They kind of judge each other. They're peer reviewed.
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They have to they judge each other's work similar to doctors,
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engineers, you know, they hold the standards high, further you
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know, further what they do. Sorry, I'm just kind of at a
8:13
loss with the right word I'm. And so, so who's going to do my
8:17
taxes? Who's going to actually prepare
8:19
my taxes to file? Is that CPA or CPA?
8:23
Or DA? Both.
8:24
Both do taxes? Both.
8:25
Can do that. Sure, anybody can do a tax
8:27
return. That's the tax industry is
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pretty much unregulated. You can choose to get education
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and you can choose to get, you know, some kind of credentials
8:42
through the IRS, but there's really no standards of
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credentials to prepare a tax return.
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I mean, anybody can go to work at one of the big box tax return
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places and take their class and start being a tax return
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preparer. It's The IRS does not regulate
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who can prepare a tax return. That's interesting.
9:05
But they do regulate who can represent somebody in front of
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the IRS when there are questions to be answered.
9:13
Right. So you have to be either an
9:16
attorney, ACPA with your state, or an enrolled agent to
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represent taxpayers in in tax issues.
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So does being an EA give you some kind of extra access to the
9:27
IRS that being ACPA at the state level does not?
9:30
No, it's exactly the same with the IRS.
9:33
OK. But I mean, to be ACPA, you
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don't have to do taxes. I mean, they don't teach you
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individual tax returns. When you go to get a degree in
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accounting, you learn that by doing it.
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You learn the basics of taxation and how it works and how the
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government assesses taxes and what's a graduated tax bracket
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or is you know, you know, things like you know how the taxes are
9:57
applied and how to figure it out.
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But you know, at the end of the day, you learn taxes by doing
10:02
it. Yeah.
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So I hear about you representing clients in front of the IRS, and
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that just kind of makes my skin crawl.
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Like it feels like that would be a pretty scary encounter.
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Am I right? Or am I being overdramatic here?
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You are not being overdramatic. You should be terrified.
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I, I have, I'm, I'm in Arkansas and I don't want to trash talk
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Arkansas too much, but everybody else does apparently.
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But you know, the Department of Finance here, the, the people
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that collect the state income tax, state sales tax, payroll
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taxes, things like that. The state Department of Finance,
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you know, they, they, they just will charge you money and send
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you a letter and say you owe money.
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And a lot of people don't know why.
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And they're, they're scared of do I pay this?
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And I'm like, didn't I tell you to pay that back in April?
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And they're like, yeah, I was like, did you save the receipt?
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You know, like the download code or whatever that shows you paid?
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Did it come out of your checking account?
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Well, yeah. I'm like, well, show me where it
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came out of your checking account and show me your
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download code. And let's send it back with the
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letter. They had no idea they already
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paid it. Why didn't they credit their
11:16
payment? I don't know.
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They do it a lot. That happens a lot.
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People file forms by on paper and they're they're never
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approved, they're never received.
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The the missing payments is a big one.
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And then a lot of times they're just like, oh, you're late,
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we're going to charge you this amount of money.
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It's like I filed an extension. So do you think they
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intentionally lose these forms in these payments or is this
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just? Poor records.
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It's government. It's just government.
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I mean, they're just overwhelmed with volumes and volumes of
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information. And you know, if they get 99% of
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it right, that's that's great. But 1% is an awful lot of people
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when you have millions of people in your state, you know?
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So what you're describing there sounds like clerical errors on
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the part of the government. And while it's concerning,
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that's not maybe scary. What are some of the scary
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encounters that you've been through?
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OK, let's let's go back to almost 20 years ago.
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Wow. About 20 years ago, I, I had a
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client contact me just out of the blue, just saw who I was or
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knew who I was, I don't know. And he's like, I'm having a
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little bit of a problem. I'm wondering if you could come
12:41
over here and and look at it. I have a lot of vehicles and
12:45
trucks and it's like, OK, so it wasn't that far away.
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It's like 20 miles from here. So I drove over there later that
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week and I pulled in and there's like acres of tractor trailers
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and most of them are in various states disrepair.
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Like I don't think any of them were roadworthy, but there was
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probably 100. I mean, there was just acres of
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tractor trailers, old beat up trucks that probably didn't run
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like flat trailers, like flatbed trailers with like fences around
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them for like trash. Probably fifty of those, like
13:26
everywhere, just parked everywhere amidst these piles of
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garbage. And So what was the issue from a
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tax perspective? It was kind of a dump.
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So I went up there and there was literally IRS agents, three of
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them walking around, numbering everything, writing everything
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down, taking pictures. This was 20 years ago.
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They didn't have iPhones. They had a camera, right?
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And they're like taking pictures of the license plates and taking
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pictures of the vid numbers of all these trailers.
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And I was like, who are you, 'cause I'm about to be his
14:04
accountant. And they're like, oh, we're with
14:07
the IRS and they flash their badges and I'm like, OK, this is
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going to be an interesting day. Explain it for us.
14:14
Like what? Why were they so interested in
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these vehicles that weren't being used?
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Well, he apparently had some health issues.
14:21
He had a very positive big growing business using all these
14:26
trucks. And he was, you know, pretty big
14:29
deal in the community. I think, you know, provided a
14:31
lot of jobs, had, you know, millions in sales.
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I mean, he was a pretty big small business and he had some
14:39
health issues and it required some surgery and the surgery
14:45
required some medications afterwards.
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And, and it turns out he got addicted to these medications
14:53
and well, the business just kind of fell apart and he kind of
14:57
stopped paying his taxes. He also stopped making money
15:03
because any money he made he would immediately spend on.
15:07
Yeah, sounds like a pretty unfortunate situation.
15:11
It was very unfortunate. And he was, him and his wife
15:13
were literally falling apart. I mean, they were mentally
15:16
falling apart. They didn't know where to go.
15:19
It was really tragic. And I felt so bad for them that
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I I didn't walk out on him. And I was like, if you're going
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to pay me, I need a contract. You know you're going to pay me
15:33
or I'm just going to start taking stuff you.
15:36
Know So what were you able to do for them How could you help them
15:38
out, Diane? Turns out the bill that the IRS
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was sending them was for $898,000.
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I don't have a copy of it here to show you, but I saved a copy
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of that and it's hanging on my wall, $898,000.
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They were trying to get out of them.
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At the end of the day, since he had gone out of business and not
15:58
made any money and didn't have any money, I got him out of all
16:03
of it. He wound up paying zero to the
16:06
federal, zero to the state of that $898,000 bill.
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Why? Because I mean, if you don't
16:13
file your taxes, they make up a number.
16:15
And he made a lot of money. And since he hadn't made any
16:18
money in several years, they just assumed he wasn't filing
16:21
his taxes and making tons of money, whereas he was really
16:25
losing a lot of money because he had, you know, lost, you know,
16:29
all semblance. You know, I've seen this before
16:32
from a personal perspective. I had a business that, you know,
16:36
used to pay sales tax and then the business wound down and it
16:40
wasn't making income anymore, but they still expected me to
16:44
file those sales tax returns. And so they just started sending
16:47
me bills for made-up numbers. And so it was the same kind of
16:51
thing here that, you know, they didn't sort of get the memo that
16:54
they weren't making any money anymore, so they sent this giant
16:57
bill to get his attention. Clearly it worked, but you, you
17:02
went to work, you did your thing, you waved the magic wand
17:05
and said hey, not only they not making money, they're losing
17:07
money, so they don't owe any of this.
17:09
And the problem went away. It took 3 1/2 years to solve
17:14
most of it, but yeah, he was my project for about 3 1/2 years.
17:18
But he did have enough money coming in from selling off the
17:22
stuff to keep me paid. So I stuck around until, until
17:26
we sold the property and paid off everybody, which, you know,
17:32
it took 3 1/2 years. It was.
17:34
I've had a lot of projects like that so.
17:36
That's that's a good example of how dealing with the IRS can be
17:40
really scary, especially when you don't have experience, you
17:43
know, for somebody like me or the client that you were
17:45
describing. Let's take a step back though,
17:48
Diane, and kind of paint a bigger picture for us on the
17:52
services that you typically provide for your clients.
17:55
We know about the IRS engagement.
17:58
What else is involved there? Like what what else do I do?
18:02
Yeah, OK. I, I take a lot of phone calls.
18:06
I do a lot of free consultations.
18:08
I probably do a hundred a year free consultations.
18:11
People calling me and just having questions.
18:13
They just don't know. And you know, that's that's kind
18:18
of a lot of what I do is explain stuff to people because they
18:23
don't know. Like nobody teaches this stuff,
18:25
which is why I started the, the videos and the blog and stuff
18:29
like that. Because where else are you going
18:30
to learn this stuff? It's like, how do you know you
18:33
should get an LLC or not? How do I know if I should be
18:36
running payroll or not? How do I know if it's, you know,
18:40
should I be charging sales tax? Where do you look this up?
18:43
Where do you, there's no place to look this up and know this
18:46
stuff? And they don't teach it in
18:48
school very much, at least not applicable to individual states
18:53
where every state has different rules.
18:57
And So what you sort of collected a lot of the common
18:59
conversations and questions that you get on these free
19:02
consultations and you turned them into blog articles and
19:05
YouTube videos that you can send to people, say, hey, check this
19:10
out. Well, how I really started the
19:13
the YouTube channel was during the pandemic because, you know,
19:17
they published this one piece of legislation that had, you know,
19:21
an alphabet soup of stuff. We had the PPP and the ERC and
19:27
everything had a three letter acronym and nobody else.
19:30
Should I do this one or this one or this one?
19:32
I'm like, hold on, let me read it all.
19:35
And I sat down and read through all the legislation and I, I got
19:39
a big poster board that was like 3 by 5 and I write real small
19:44
and I made all my notes and then I was like, all right, I know
19:47
what it is. And I had one person call me and
19:50
then the next person to call me. That's the same question.
19:52
And then I'd get 3 emails with the same question and I'm like,
19:55
I've got to be able to get this out there to everybody at once.
20:00
This is ridiculous. I'm wasting days just explaining
20:04
the same thing over and over. So I had somebody start filming
20:08
me, in which case it was really difficult because it was a
20:11
pandemic and I didn't want to be around anybody.
20:14
So my videos changed from time to time and style because it was
20:18
different people doing it in different places.
20:21
But, you know, through the whole pandemic, I was like, you know.
20:26
This is how it is. This is what this is, this is
20:28
what this is. Does it work with this?
20:30
And I'd make, you know, I'd just make probably 50 videos just on
20:34
the, the pandemic stuff. And then I, you know, it came
20:38
and went and then I got back into it.
20:40
And I go in phases where I'll make a whole bunch of material
20:43
and then I don't. But anytime I get a question or
20:47
like a strange question, I write it down and eventually I'll make
20:51
a piece of content on it. What's probably the most
20:55
commonly asked question that you get?
21:01
What's this letter mean? Seriously.
21:07
How about like a more general? Topic.
21:09
I have no idea what it means. I get people send me pictures of
21:12
letters all the time. It's always something different.
21:16
I mean common questions. How do I start a business?
21:21
I teach a class on that. I get a lot of questions on
21:25
nonprofits too. I just taught another class on
21:27
nonprofits that's on the library's YouTube channel, so.
21:34
So these classes that you teach, they're also online or some of
21:37
them in person, Do you charge for them?
21:39
Are they free? How's this work?
21:41
I generally teach classes that are free to attend and I try to
21:48
get them filmed and put on and, and get the original thing and
21:52
put it on my YouTube channel, at least on theirs or get, you
21:56
know, get a link so people can watch my content because I, I
22:01
don't, I mean, I get paid to teach sometimes I don't a lot of
22:05
nonprofits that are, I live right near the university and
22:10
there's a whole lot of like a business startup seed places,
22:18
you know, entrepreneurial engines for people that are
22:20
majoring in small business, Like how do you start a small
22:22
business? And they have funding from like
22:25
Rockefeller Foundations. I don't know, but a lot of them
22:29
are like software developers, stuff like that, that, you know,
22:33
they want, they want to scale up, then they want to buy your
22:34
company. You know, they do this whole
22:36
scale up, make money. And I don't know, but a lot of
22:41
you know, but they also have to deal with everybody that's like,
22:44
I want to just start a car detailing company or I want to
22:50
start a delivery service or I want to, you know, open a
22:54
restaurant. Don't do.
22:57
It don't open a restaurant. Why?
22:59
Because they're not profitable. They're hard to run.
23:01
What's the deal? They're not, they're not
23:03
profitable. Somebody's got to do it, you
23:06
know, But it's like, if you're not good at, if you're good at
23:09
cooking, that's great. But you have to be good at
23:11
running a business to run a restaurant.
23:12
I have a lot of a lot of great cooks that lose a lot of money
23:15
trying to run a restaurant because they know how to cook
23:18
but they don't know how to run a business.
23:20
So Diane, who's your ideal client industry size, geography,
23:26
who's who's, who's a good fit for you?
23:31
I, you know, that's a really hard question because when I
23:35
have people come to me and they have it together, you know,
23:39
they've got everything on spreadsheets, They got all the
23:41
facts. They just need this, this and
23:44
this. I'm like, yeah, that's great,
23:46
but you could have done that yourself.
23:51
I'm, I'm just getting my approval stamp and putting it on
23:55
there. I didn't do anything for you.
23:57
And the people that come to me that are just a complete
24:00
disaster and like they can't figure anything out.
24:04
They're terrible with numbers. They don't have any receipts.
24:07
They, you know, and they haven't, they have no idea what
24:11
they're doing. I really enjoy working with
24:13
those people because I feel like I've made a change in their
24:15
life, You know, I've made a positive impact in their life
24:17
and I've got them on the, the road to, you know, doing things
24:21
right and not getting in trouble in the future and.
24:25
So is there like a minimum or a maximum size or certain
24:29
industries that you feel like you specialize in or is it hey,
24:33
from zero to 100 million or a billion?
24:36
Oh, I, I don't do really big businesses.
24:41
No, they, I mean, anybody that's really big.
24:43
I mean, once you start bringing in a couple million a year, you
24:46
probably need somebody at a desk in an office that works for you,
24:50
That's your employee that's keeping track of all this stuff.
24:55
I'm kind of the training wheels for those.
24:57
You know, like a lot of times, you know, people use me and then
24:59
they get bigger and I'm like, all right, you need to hire
25:02
somebody. And like, then we check on the
25:04
person they hired and make sure they're doing stuff right.
25:07
And, and I review them at the end of the year, I have several
25:10
people that have grown out of me, but I still, you know,
25:13
complete their tax return. And some people move on to a
25:16
bigger, a bigger firm because, you know, like there's some
25:18
things I don't offer. Like, you know, like I don't
25:22
have a whole bunch of partners. It's just me.
25:25
So I can't have any one client take up too much of my time.
25:29
I have to deal with everybody else.
25:31
So you know so. Anything from start up to about
25:36
1 to 2 million, and that's sort of the point where they might
25:39
graduate from you. Yeah, at least, Yeah, I've had
25:43
people that made even less money.
25:44
I mean, it depends on how many transactions you have.
25:47
I mean, some people have, you know, a zillion transactions and
25:52
some people make several million a year and have 50 transactions
25:54
a month. So it, you know, it really
25:56
depends on how much you have to keep track of how many employees
25:59
you have, that kind of thing. Gotcha.
26:02
So all this content that you put together, all this advice,
26:05
whether it's free or pay that you provide to folks, what is
26:11
low hanging fruit that you typically recommend to your
26:15
clients to help them be more tax efficient?
26:20
Like what's the easiest thing? Like what would I tell people if
26:24
I could tell you, if I could give one piece of advice?
26:28
I got a few. So let me let me start with
26:32
that. The thing I say the most, the
26:37
thing that I have on a lot of stuff is make money 1st And if I
26:40
ever finish my book, that's the name of it, make money first.
26:45
I have so many people trying to start a small business and
26:49
they're like, oh, and I need an LLC and then I that LLC needs to
26:52
be owned by a corporation and that corporation needs to be
26:55
owned by a trust. And that way I don't own
26:57
anything and I'll never pay taxes.
26:58
And I'm like, A, that's all a bunch of lies that that's not
27:05
real. That's, that's content people
27:07
make that is that they're not tax accountants.
27:11
You're going to pay higher taxes most of the time if you do that
27:14
kind of shenanigans. And B, all that costs money, you
27:22
know, it costs money with the state.
27:23
It costs money to have it set up for you.
27:24
It costs money to keep track of all this stuff.
27:26
It costs money every year to have an LLC.
27:28
You got to pay the state, you got to pay this fee, you got to
27:30
pay that fee. And if you don't file a tax
27:32
return, you can get fined if you file as a business, you know, so
27:36
small businesses, make sure you have a viable idea.
27:39
Make money first, go ahead and. Go out and start selling my
27:45
product or service before I get the LLC registered and I meet
27:49
with my CPA and all that stuff you're saying.
27:53
Go test the idea, get some clients, get some money coming
27:55
in. Exactly.
27:57
See, see if you have a good idea, you know, see if you're
27:59
growing. See if you know, I mean, like,
28:02
OK, I'm going to start a business being a painter and I'm
28:06
going to paint houses. Well, I've never painted a house
28:09
before. If anybody hired me, they
28:13
certainly wouldn't recommend me do their friends.
28:15
I would do a terrible job and I probably would fall off the
28:18
ladder. I mean, you know, I mean, make
28:22
sure that you're selling a good product, that you're the best
28:25
out there, that you know what you're doing, that, you know,
28:29
being really good at something is great and have or, you know,
28:33
so I have people that are like, well, I want to sell my art and
28:35
I want to put it on T-shirts, you know, and they're like, at
28:39
this point in time, you don't even need to have inventory.
28:41
I have several people that do that.
28:42
They just draw the stuff and they put it on a website and
28:45
people order that shirt, the website and the website makes
28:48
the shirt when they buy it and then they ship it and you get a
28:53
Commission for your artwork. And that's great, unless nobody
28:56
likes your artwork. So, you know, put it out there
29:00
before you start all this business structure and all this
29:03
other stuff. You know you can.
29:04
You can deal with that, you know.
29:06
So you make money first, Make money first.
29:09
I like that. What else you got?
29:12
My other easy advice, especially for small business owners, is
29:17
consistency. I have so many people at that
29:20
time of year. We're recording this now in
29:22
December. You know, you might be listening
29:25
to this in January, you might be listening to it at another time.
29:28
But this time of year everybody's like, oh, I got to
29:31
go through all my receipts. I have all these bags of stuff,
29:35
and then it's March, and then it's April and that comes and
29:39
goes. And then it's September or
29:40
October and you're still adding receipts from last year and
29:44
you've lost half of them at this point.
29:46
Consistency. Consistency is the best thing.
29:51
Every Sunday I sit down for 5 or 10 minutes and I go through my
29:59
receipts, my payments, everything that I need to take
30:03
care of, and I take 10 minutes. If it takes longer, 10 minutes,
30:06
what I'll do next week, you know, or maybe I feel like
30:09
spending a little more time on it, but I promise myself I'm
30:11
going to sit down for 10 minutes every Sunday and do something.
30:15
And most of the time it doesn't take that long because, again, I
30:18
don't have a lot of transactions.
30:21
But, you know, I calculate my mileage for the week, which is a
30:24
lot easier than calculating your mileage for the year, right?
30:29
Trying to remember, oh, wait, how many times did I go to the
30:31
post office? Yeah, I know.
30:34
I went on Wednesday and that's one trip to the post office I
30:37
can put down, right? It you don't forget things, you
30:41
know, just spend 10 minutes a week, you know, recording your
30:45
transactions, gathering up your receipts, looking at your stuff.
30:48
You need to know how much money you're making.
30:50
If you don't know how much money you're making and how your
30:52
business is doing. And to your accountant tells you
30:54
when you file your taxes in April or September or October,
31:01
then how do you, how do you know you have a successful business?
31:04
How are you? How do you know what you're
31:05
doing? You need, it's your business.
31:07
You need to know how you're doing.
31:08
And the only way you could do that is consistency.
31:11
You know, even if it's 5 or 10 minutes once a week, it's better
31:15
than nothing, you know? And that way you don't have this
31:18
giant pile work at the end of the year that everybody treads.
31:21
And then I have to wind up filing an extension and ruining
31:24
my summer vacation because I have to come home and do taxes
31:27
for people that didn't do their taxes in the spring.
31:31
So I want to go back to something you said just a minute
31:33
ago. You said if you ever finished
31:34
your book it would be entitled Something Something Something
31:37
Make Money. 1st. Make money first, but you
31:42
actually have finished a book. It's available.
31:44
People can buy it on Amazon. What is it?
31:47
Oh, that's what I did on my summer vacation.
31:50
No, crossed out what I did on my business trip.
31:54
So make your summer vacation a business trip by doing business
31:59
stuff every day on your summer vacation.
32:03
You know, and it gives you some a lot of pointers and things you
32:06
need to do how to make your vacations tax deductible.
32:09
And it's also a log of, you know, day after day, like how
32:12
much money you spent, where you ate.
32:14
You know, you can write right in the book and it's a workbook
32:16
tells you how to add it up. If you don't feel like adding it
32:18
up, it's all in there. Just hand the book to your
32:20
accountant and you know it. It records everything you did on
32:25
your big trip, how much money you spent and why your trip is
32:27
tax deductible. If you ever get audited, guess
32:30
what? Here's the business stuff I did
32:31
every day and why the whole trip was tax deductible.
32:34
It doesn't matter that you worked for 30 minutes and you
32:37
had fun the rest of the day. If you work for 30 minutes a day
32:40
doing something on your trip, guess what?
32:41
It's tax deductible trip. So let me put this to the test.
32:45
I took my family on a cruise for spring break last year, and each
32:50
day I was on the trip, I'm checking e-mail, you know, I'm,
32:54
you know, sending Slack messages to my team.
32:57
I'm responding to things. Does that check the box?
33:02
No, 'cause yeah, all the stuff that you said, checking your
33:07
messages, something like that, you can do that from anywhere.
33:09
You didn't have to be there. Now, if you went on one of these
33:13
cruises where you go out on land every day and you, I, I, I know
33:20
you podcasts, I don't know what else you do employee benefits.
33:25
But you know, if you set up a meeting with a podcaster that
33:30
you know in Cancun, right, And met with them and talked about
33:34
stuff and had a meal or coffee or drink with another podcaster.
33:40
And then you got back on the boat and the next day you got
33:42
off in some fancy island. I don't know, I don't, I don't
33:45
cruise. And, and there you met with a
33:49
podcaster there, then it would count.
33:51
You have to do something that you couldn't do from home.
33:55
All right, shaking hands. I.
33:57
Have to do something each day that I'm gone.
33:59
Every day. Now, would your family's cruise
34:03
tickets be deductible? No, unless your spouse is also a
34:09
member of your business and your spouse is also doing said
34:13
businessy things on land where you physically have to be there.
34:17
Now, could it have been a phone call?
34:19
Could it have been a Zoom meeting?
34:21
Of course. But being there in person and
34:23
shaking hands counts as an ordinary and necessary expense.
34:26
Meeting people in person to build that trust or to network
34:30
with people, you know, that always counts.
34:32
You can make it a trip. So, but you'd actually have to
34:36
meet with somebody, go somewhere.
34:38
I mean, it depends on what business you're in.
34:40
I have a lot of people in restaurants and they, they, they
34:44
buy ingredients in foreign countries and bring them home on
34:47
their suitcases and visit their family, right?
34:54
OK, that's interesting. Now what about on this cruise if
34:59
I had taken pictures of myself and my family at some of these
35:03
exotic locations and then use those on my website?
35:06
That's that's kind of iffy. OK, that that's kind of I like
35:10
black. And white.
35:12
I don't want Gray. A meeting or go to a class or
35:16
visit a place of business that's similar to your place of
35:19
business to do, you know, networking or compare your
35:22
business to theirs or you know, it has to be where something you
35:26
can't do it, you know, and just taking pictures of yourself.
35:30
No, not, not that much. Dice OK, all right, all right,
35:35
so that this is the basis of of this book is how to.
35:40
Take your and it's only. It's only 26 page or 24 pages.
35:43
It's the minimum number of pages.
35:45
Read and the worksheets. That have allowed to publish so
35:47
yeah. So it's super easy.
35:49
It's mostly a workbook. It's a lot of lists.
35:52
And if you don't, I mean, if you're going to go on vacation
35:55
and you're planning it, there's all the planning pages of, you
35:57
know, this is what I'm going to do every day when I'm on a trip.
35:59
This is ideas and stuff I could do that would make that day tax
36:03
deductible. So you have to do business stuff
36:05
every day that you couldn't do from, you know, an e-mail.
36:10
I mean, just going somewhere else and check into emails.
36:13
You have to have contact with people, you have to go places.
36:16
And that makes sense. I'm glad I understand the rules
36:19
there. OK, so give us another one.
36:22
Diane, what's another piece of tax efficient advice that you
36:27
often provide to your clients? Oh, let me think.
36:32
Don't, don't, don't believe all the stuff on the Internet, for
36:36
one. And of course that's weird
36:37
because I'm on the Internet and I'm like, yeah, believe me, but
36:40
don't believe anybody else. It's just, you know, that sounds
36:42
like a cult like. Something that you've seen often
36:45
repeated on the Internet that is not actually true is bad advice.
36:50
Like a lot of the things I see especially are like setting up
36:54
trusts or having one corporation own all your LLCS and having
36:59
your house in an LLC, you know, I see a lot of.
37:05
And why are these bad ideas? They cost money and they really
37:09
don't save you anything or make you anything, especially when
37:12
it's your personal property. And if you associate your
37:14
personal property with your business and your business
37:17
fails, you could lose your personal property.
37:20
So that's, you know, that's always kind of scary.
37:22
I'm just like, oh, I put my house in my business.
37:24
I'm going right off my whole house.
37:25
Well, first of all, it's based on how you use it.
37:29
So if you get audited, they're going to see how much space is
37:32
actually just business. And if you're like living in
37:35
that house and it's not all office space, then you can't
37:40
deduct your whole house. You can't deduct personal living
37:42
expenses. So that's one, that's the other
37:49
one I was thinking of. Oh, the deducting.
37:52
Oh, that's the, the other one was that the, oh, the use the
37:54
Augusta rule and, you know, rent your house to your business for
37:57
two weeks and and it's tax free income.
38:00
No, you'd actually have to vacate your house and use it for
38:04
a business purpose for two weeks.
38:07
You'd actually have to, you know, like I mean your business
38:10
would have to use it for two weeks and you can't live there
38:12
too. Can you so if I have records I?
38:16
Suppose. But I'm not going to do that for
38:18
you. If I have a bedroom in my house
38:20
that has a desk at it that I work at, can I deduct a portion
38:24
of my mortgage? But not your mortgage payment
38:28
because that's between you and the bank.
38:30
But you can depreciate a portion of your house and you can deduct
38:35
a portion of the taxes and your mortgage interest and your
38:38
utility bills. There's a much easier way to do
38:41
it rather than doing all that 'cause that sounds, that's a lot
38:43
of math. About about 15 years ago, 10 or
38:47
15 years ago, they, they changed it to a flat rate where you just
38:51
take $5 a square foot up to 300 square feet in your home and
38:55
they don't ask any questions at all.
38:58
If you get audited, you'd have to probably show your work as to
39:01
how you came up with 300 square feet or send a picture.
39:04
But it's, you know, pretty simple to deduct, you know, $5 a
39:10
square foot, you know, so you get a $1500 deduction if you're
39:12
using a portion of your home. And they really don't ask any
39:14
questions on that. OK, that's a new one for me.
39:19
I learned something today. Bonus.
39:23
Yeah, but you do have to be working at home.
39:25
And if you rent an office and you kind of look like you're in
39:28
an office, it has to be your primary place.
39:31
Yeah. It has to be your primary place
39:33
to work, yeah. OK.
39:35
So I don't get the Home Office deduction either because I'm I
39:39
even though I work at home a lot, I have an office that have
39:42
people come to so. So what is it about your process
39:46
that helps take some of that feeling of being overwhelmed
39:51
away from your clients? Overwhelmed by payroll?
39:54
Overwhelmed by bookkeeping? Overwhelmed by compliance
39:58
issues? Well, I start out every call
40:02
with what's going on, tell me what's going on.
40:05
And usually once they start, they, I listen, you know, and I
40:11
sometimes I listen for a long time, you know, and they tell
40:14
me. Everything that's going on, I've
40:16
had a lot of people tell me, I, I used to have a a different
40:20
office and I had a couch in there and people would say, you
40:23
know, I come in and they like sit on the couch.
40:25
The next thing you know, they're laying back on the couch.
40:27
They're like, I feel like I'm at the psychiatrist.
40:29
You know, I was like, well, yeah, I kind of am.
40:34
I kind of figure out, you know, where your problems are coming
40:36
from and figure out why you're overwhelmed and kind of simplify
40:40
it, figure out what we can do, get some actionable steps and
40:45
make a plan going forward. And I have so many people have
40:48
come to me just for that, just, you know, to figure out, you
40:52
know, what's a problem, what's not a problem, what they should
40:55
be scared of. If they're not what the what
40:58
they shouldn't be scared of that they are scared of, which is
41:00
usually exactly the way it is. Everybody's afraid of, oh,
41:03
they're going to send me to jail.
41:05
I'm like, no, no, they're going to take your money.
41:08
They're not going to send you to jail.
41:10
Sending you to jail cost them money.
41:12
They want money, One thing money.
41:15
So. Is there not a tax violation
41:19
that could send people to jail? Oh, there is.
41:22
But you, it has to be pretty egregious and it has to be
41:26
outright that you intentionally tried to commit a crime and
41:30
defraud the United States government or the state
41:33
government. It has to be pretty egregious.
41:37
You have to be, you know, running some kind of scam or I,
41:44
I only ever had one person go to jail.
41:47
They weren't my client. It was a relative of my client
41:51
that was kind of financially stuck with them.
41:55
So I had the relative as you know that.
41:57
But anyway, it's a long story. And what did they do?
42:00
I I want to get an idea of what it takes to cross.
42:02
That line, I can't really reveal a whole lot, but they, they ran
42:09
a, there's there's many, many kinds of nonprofit
42:12
organizations. So it's, it wasn't a charity.
42:15
Things like homeowners associations and private clubs
42:20
and a lot of other things are charities.
42:23
And this was something that I didn't mention, a different kind
42:26
of nonprofit. That's not a charity, that is
42:28
not a for profit thing. And they were running one of
42:31
those as they were. They were stealing a lot of
42:36
money from people saying they would get certain benefits.
42:42
They were using the money for things that was not what they
42:48
said they were using it for. And at the end of the day, there
42:52
was no money left to pay the taxes that they should have been
42:55
paying on the money that, you know, was not used properly.
42:59
So. Yeah, they were basically
43:01
running a scam and not not a nonprofit and they got a lot of
43:06
other people drug into it financially, especially a lot of
43:10
the relatives and I, I really felt bad for the relatives.
43:15
But he did wind up going to prison and.
43:19
Do you think it was more of the stealing money from people and
43:21
not using for the correct thing or more of the not paying taxes?
43:26
Well, they caught him because he wasn't paying taxes.
43:29
He went to jail for not paying taxes based on the fact that he
43:33
scammed people out of money and used it for personal use.
43:36
So basically all the money he was scamming became taxable
43:39
income to him. And that's how they got him.
43:41
And that's basically how they got Al Capone too.
43:46
That's how they get you, you know, 'cause I mean, if you're
43:49
going to steal money from people, that's great, but you
43:52
have to report it as income. If you don't and you're living
43:56
way out just to. Be clear, people.
43:57
I don't think Diane meant that it's actually great if you're
44:00
going to steal money from people.
44:01
I think it was just sort of an expression.
44:05
It's not great to steal though. Don't do that.
44:07
Don't, don't steal money. But if if you decide that that's
44:11
how you want to live your life, you know, if you don't report
44:17
any income and don't report that you're living this luxurious
44:23
lifestyle and you own a lot of real estate that you paid cash
44:27
for and you own a lot of vehicles that are registered
44:30
with state and have tags on them and you paid cash for them, you
44:34
know, you know, or wrote a check or whatever, not necessarily
44:36
came in with green money. But I mean, if you're not
44:39
financed and you, you're buying all this real estate and you're
44:41
buying all these cars and you're buying all this stuff, you know,
44:46
the government's eventually going to wonder why aren't, why
44:49
is this person not filing a tax return?
44:52
If he owns 3 Lamborghinis that he has to pay for tags every
44:55
year, where is he getting the money?
44:58
And that's 99% of the time, that's how they bust people
45:01
because they're, they're living a lifestyle that's not supported
45:05
by their tax returns. They're filing or they're just
45:07
not filing at all. And that's where the criminal
45:10
charges come in. Gotcha.
45:13
When you're intentionally defrauding the government,
45:15
people that just forget to pay or forget to file, or they're
45:19
just scared they're not going to jail, they just want money.
45:22
They're just going to charge you a lot in penalties and interest.
45:26
And or, you know, you could have somebody like me to try to get
45:29
you out of them too, so. OK, there you go.
45:32
That's I've. Done that quite a bit too.
45:35
Well, let's shift gears. Diane, I I'd like to hear about
45:37
a big challenge that you've worked through in your life.
45:40
In my life. What you learn.
45:43
A big challenge in my personal life.
45:47
I've. Been through a lot of
45:48
challenges. I was, well, like I said
45:50
earlier, you know, I was, you know, I wasn't a very
45:53
entrepreneurial teenager. I didn't care much about
45:56
anything or do anything. So I kind of lived kind of a
45:58
carefree lifestyle and that that got me in a lot of trouble.
46:02
I had to get out of that trouble on my own and I decided I was
46:07
going to live a better life when I was about 19 years old.
46:11
I, I tried to do that. So I, I set my standards a
46:16
little higher and I met Prince Charming and we, we had a good
46:24
life together until we grew into very different people and we
46:28
went in, in different directions.
46:30
You know, we had kids, we had a business, we had, you know,
46:32
everything was right except for we just, it just didn't work
46:36
anymore. And when I went out on my own, I
46:39
walked away with pretty much nothing because I didn't, I
46:42
didn't want to fight about it. I figured it would just ruin
46:45
everybody's life if we just spent the next 14 years fighting
46:49
over the kids. So I pretty much walked away
46:51
with nothing and had to start over with the shirt on my back.
46:56
And that was, that was a real challenge.
46:58
That was a real challenge. There was other people involved
47:02
that, you know, was out to get me for some reason that I still
47:07
never understand. It seems like a lot of our
47:09
employees and you know, everybody that, you know, I saw
47:13
every day, You know, when you live together, you work
47:15
together, you run a business together, you have children
47:19
together, it's like you're always together, you know, so we
47:22
don't have any separate friends or separate, you know,
47:24
everything was together and, you know, I lost most of the
47:28
friends. I, you know, I just, you know,
47:32
I, I decided to look, play the long game and not throw a temper
47:36
tantrum and get me, me, me now, now, now and try to just make
47:40
everybody's life a little bit easier by not fighting and just
47:44
letting everybody have their way.
47:47
So it was a challenge. I only got to see my kids on the
47:50
weekends sometimes. You know, I was there for, you
47:56
know, everything I could do. And I had to, you know, kids
47:58
with special needs that needed therapy and needed stuff and
48:00
doctor's appointments and, you know, I still had to take care
48:03
of all that without, you know, and making sure they had
48:05
insurance and filling out all the forms and, you know, without
48:09
really seeing them all that much.
48:12
It was very challenging. So I had no money and nothing to
48:15
start with. And I literally started from
48:18
scratch with nothing. And I hadn't had a job in years.
48:23
I hadn't finished college because we wound up buying a
48:25
restaurant. Don't buy a restaurant.
48:30
So, you know, it was, it was crazy.
48:34
It was crazy starting over with nothing at 35 years old, I had
48:39
zero. And I, you know, I wound up
48:42
having to build myself up and set my standards a little
48:45
higher. But going from, you know, hey, I
48:46
haven't had a job in years, you know, how am I going to make any
48:49
money? How am I going to feed myself?
48:51
And some days it was really difficult.
48:54
It was really difficult. I went back to school, I
48:58
finished, I went to, can I say names of things 'cause it's kind
49:05
of relevant, OK, I went to University of Phoenix and since
49:09
I was doing so good and they were like, OK, you're in one of
49:12
the top 8 and you could compete for the valedictory speech when
49:15
you graduate. And I was like, OK, so I wrote a
49:21
speech about rising from the ashes and being a phoenix.
49:24
And of course, I won and gave the valedictorian, you know, and
49:29
that was, you know, that was, you know, it took me like 10
49:32
years to really pull myself up to where I wasn't struggling
49:36
day-to-day to be able to pay the bills and make sure the rent was
49:40
paid and, you know, not need help with anything.
49:44
How did you get through those early days?
49:46
I mean, it sounds like everything was just sort of
49:48
stripped away from you at once. Yeah, I.
49:51
Your marriage, your business, your family, your friends.
49:56
Pretty much, yeah. I was, I, I had a lot of anger,
49:58
but I, I had a punching dummy. I did a lot of knuckle push ups.
50:02
I got really strong. I exercised every time I got mad
50:08
and that was a lot. I, it was, it was really
50:14
challenging. You know, I joined a church that
50:15
was supportive for the most part for several years, you know, and
50:20
they were kind of like the family, the emotional support I
50:23
needed that kind of helped me out.
50:24
I really was grateful. I'm still friends with some of
50:27
them now. You know, it was, it was a
50:32
really small church. It was, you know, everybody was
50:35
like family. We had holidays together and had
50:37
dinner at each other's houses and stuff like that.
50:39
So it was that helped a lot, you know, have an emotional support
50:44
'cause you really, you really can't go through life alone.
50:46
A lot of people try to, but you really, you really need to find
50:49
a place where you, you know, you can find your people and have
50:52
people to give you emotional support and have that, oh, you
50:55
said it, girl. You know something behind you,
50:57
you know, Oh, you didn't need him anyway, you know, like.
51:03
That human support, that human connection's so important, yeah,
51:07
through all aspects of life, but especially when you're going
51:09
through something that trying. Yeah, which is you again, brings
51:13
me back to what I do for a living is people come to me when
51:16
they're scared and need that emotional support and, you know,
51:19
like I try to be their people. You know, I, I try to.
51:22
And when you think back to that time, how do you feel now and
51:25
what's what's your gut feeling? My gut feeling.
51:29
I'm not angry anymore. I guess I'm the anger.
51:32
'S gone now. Yeah, yeah, 'cause I mean, we're
51:34
all still family. I mean, we all have grandkids
51:36
now and we see each other on holidays and we grandparent
51:40
together sort of. I mean, you know, it's, it was,
51:46
it was very difficult. But you know, I, I think I feel
51:48
really like I've really accomplished something, you
51:51
know, like I really in my personal life because I came
51:55
from, you know, pretty rough background.
51:56
I had pretty rough teenage years, you know, and I guess a
51:59
lot of people didn't expect me to, I don't know, live this long
52:02
or become anything. Wow.
52:04
And people are always like, Oh, yeah, you're so smart, you know,
52:07
it's a shame you're from the hood, you know, it's like.
52:11
OK. So, So what advice would you
52:15
have for somebody else who's listening right now that's going
52:19
through an emotionally trying time like what you just
52:23
described? Don't give up.
52:27
Find your people and don't give up.
52:31
You just, you know, just get out of bed and, and do what you got
52:35
to do every day. And, you know, some days it gets
52:39
really bad and you feel like you don't have anything you're
52:41
supposed to be doing. Find something.
52:45
And that, that was, that was the hardest thing.
52:46
I, I had a friend who was like, Diane, you're always so busy.
52:52
It's like I, you don't have time.
52:54
It's like you're always doing something.
52:55
You have all these people that need you and you're always like,
52:59
well, yeah, because if I don't, you get depressed, man.
53:02
I'm, you know, you got to be busy, you got to volunteer, you
53:06
got to help people, you know, look outside yourself.
53:08
Because if you all you're doing is looking inside yourself, you
53:11
just get depressed. You know, you can't, you know,
53:14
you got to, you got to keep going.
53:16
You got to find a goal and and anything you know.
53:21
So you got to clean. Up your house or getting your
53:23
tax. And you found a tribe.
53:24
Yeah. Yeah, you you found a way to to
53:28
add structure and purpose to each of your days.
53:31
That sounds like it is that. Is that accurate?
53:33
Yeah, yeah. And a lot of it is, you know,
53:36
around other people, you know, it's like you have a neighbor
53:39
that that needs help. You know, I mean, literally like
53:43
my downstairs neighbor is a a Vietnam vet and he only
53:48
qualifies for like, home nursing like so many days a week and the
53:51
other days he needs his bandage changed.
53:53
I've been doing that for like a year just because he's my
53:57
neighbor. It's like, why wouldn't I do it?
53:58
I mean, like, wouldn't you like, you know, you know, giving to
54:04
others, you know, making life about other people around you
54:07
is, is far, far better than making it about yourself.
54:11
And how much can I make and how much can I succeed and how much
54:15
can I get? You know, because I've built
54:16
this life that I'm so happy with and most of it is helping
54:21
others, you know, one way or another.
54:24
Do you think you would be where you are and helping so many
54:28
people in the way that you are if you hadn't gone through that?
54:33
No, no, no. This is all, this is all born
54:40
from my own adversity. Yeah, this is, this is all born
54:43
from my. I've been there.
54:44
And I know how hard it is. And, you know, and I, I wouldn't
54:50
have gotten out of it if I didn't have, you know, the, the
54:53
people that would occasionally reach out and give me a hand for
54:56
no reason that I couldn't pay back.
54:59
You know, like when I was a teenager, there was, you know, a
55:01
couple people's moms that were like, you know, you really got
55:04
to pull your life together, you know, and, and you know, like
55:12
church people that were like, you know, I, I can help you get
55:15
your car fixed, you know, and like when I didn't expect it and
55:18
there's no way I could have paid them back.
55:20
I've had several people, you know, just help out for no
55:22
reason, you know, and you know, you, you got to pay that back.
55:28
I love that. So as you look forward now for
55:31
grassroots taxes, what are you excited about?
55:34
Where are you going? Growth, new services, new
55:40
initiatives, new projects. Well, should have more content
55:46
available on my website in the next few weeks, so maybe by the
55:49
time people are listening you can see additional content on my
55:52
website. So you can access my videos and
55:55
my blogs on any subject just by searching and you can see all of
55:59
my content on that. Hopefully that'll be done.
56:02
I want to make more content this year.
56:04
I've been actually off being grandma for the past six months
56:11
or so. I have really haven't made any
56:12
new content since July. So my studio set up ready to go.
56:18
I'm going to go do some microphone tests today and
56:21
hopefully I will be recording again tomorrow.
56:25
But we'll see more content, more speaking engagements.
56:30
I really want to be out in the public more.
56:31
If anybody looking for a good public speaker for starting
56:35
businesses, this would be me. You can have my :) there.
56:42
I love teaching live classes. It's and people always come up
56:46
to me after be like, this is the funniest class I've ever taken
56:48
in my life and I'm like my head just keeps growing.
56:55
So what's your superpower, Diane?
56:57
How would you characterize that? That's that's funny that you ask
57:01
me that because people keep buying me Wonder Woman stuff and
57:06
like as like gifts like, like, oh, here Wonder Woman for
57:09
Wonder. I don't know how a shelf full of
57:12
Wonder Woman stuff in my office that people buy me.
57:15
What is my superpower of simplifying what the government
57:20
wants, like understanding, being able to I read really fast.
57:25
So being able to like read 1000 pages of legislation and break
57:29
it down and be like, OK, this is what it is.
57:31
And and be able to convey that to people.
57:34
Or, you know, just the basics of what the state says this, but
57:37
the federal says this, but you got to get a city business
57:40
license and then you need insurance, which is a state
57:42
problem. You know, like, you know, trying
57:44
to sift it all out to this is what you need to do ABC, you
57:49
know, making people have action plans what to do next.
57:55
Or even with like, you know, if you didn't pay your taxes, this
57:58
is what you need to do. You need to file your taxes and
58:00
then you need to set up a payment plan.
58:01
And we need to do this, you know, set in an order of things.
58:05
Try and just basically simplifying things that are
58:09
really confusing. That's a great, a great
58:13
superpower and a great service to most people to be able to
58:17
take the complicated and make it simple, make it digestible.
58:21
So I've just got one more question for you today, Diane.
58:24
But before I ask it, I want to do 3 quick things.
58:26
First of all, anybody wants to get in touch with
58:28
dianetwothingsgrassrootstaxes.com. And by the time this interview
58:33
is published, it's going to be a brand new website with some new
58:36
content on there going to look great.
58:39
You guys should go check it out. You can also e-mail her
58:42
directly, Diane. Diane diane@grassroottaxes.com
58:48
Also as a reminder for my company, you can be the hero
58:52
that informs your clients. You can give more employees
58:55
access to therapists, doctors and prescription meds that I
58:59
know it's hard to believe actually puts more money into
59:02
the company's pocket. So you can reach out to us at
59:04
Add Back benefits.com. And if you can take just a
59:07
moment, pause for a second, go to your favorite podcast app,
59:10
Leave us a question, a comment, a review that really helps other
59:14
people find the podcast. I appreciate that.
59:17
And so last question for you, Diane, a year from now, what's
59:21
something big that you hope to be celebrating?
59:27
Wow. OK.
59:30
I didn't see that question coming.
59:32
OK, What do I want to be doing? What do I want to be celebrating
59:35
any. Yeah.
59:35
Something big. You've got a big goal.
59:38
You're from now just pumping in the air.
59:41
You're super excited. I'm actually thinking, I mean,
59:44
like, I mean, personal wise, I'm thinking about buying a house
59:47
this year, but I don't know if that's going to happen, but
59:51
let's let's see. But other than that, I mean,
59:55
just, you know, I'm pretty much a full time, you know, grandma
59:59
with a in a in a in a part time. I have to go to work every day
1:00:02
so. No, I work a lot, but I I feel
1:00:08
like a full time grandma. So do I just celebrate my, my
1:00:10
grandkids? You know, I, I just, I love
1:00:13
playing with them everyday and just watching them grow up.
1:00:15
They're they're awesome. They're the light of my life and
1:00:18
I'm I am that grandma and everybody's like Diane, you hate
1:00:22
everybody like no grandkids definitely change your life and
1:00:26
make you a happier person that. They find a special warm place
1:00:29
in. Your house definitely the cherry
1:00:31
on top of of having to put up with teenagers.
1:00:36
Well, Diane Haggerty from Grassroots Taxes, I want to be
1:00:39
the first to thank you for sharing both your time and your
1:00:42
story with us today. I really appreciate you.
1:00:44
Thanks for having me. Folks, that's a wrap on another
1:00:48
episode of the Inspired Stories podcast.
1:00:50
Thanks for learning with us today.