OK. Maybe that sounds like a silly question. But the fact is that quite a number of people choose a tax amateur to do their tax return rather than a tax professional because it “saves money”. Or so they think.

You are better off with a professional tax advisor than an amateur.

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Their Uncle Bob is pretty good at math, and he does all his own tax returns for his business as a sole family plumber. So why not?

Well, yes, Uncle Bob might actually be quite good at math, but how well versed is he in tax law? Heck, at Safe Harbor, even we have trouble keeping up with everything (we do, but it can be hard work) because the rules change all the time.

But then you have another problem. Your situation is different from Uncle Bob’s. He has a wife, two children, a cat, a mother-in-law, an insurance policy for public liability, and 101 other things.

You may have some of those or all of them and still have more. But maybe you only have one child, or none, your wife has run off with the gardener, you have a mortgage, etc., etc. Can you see how your situation is almost certainly going to be very different from Uncle Bob’s?

So there may be things that you can claim for which he can’t or vice versa. Even if there are, do you suppose Uncle Bob will be fully up to date with all the latest changes?

Look, Uncle Bob may well do your tax return for nothing, as a favor. But if it costs you a couple of thousand dollars in tax that you could otherwise have saved, it’s hardly done you any favors, has it?

That’s Why You Need A Professional

That’s why you need a tax professional to do your tax return because at Safe Harbor it’s what we do. We don’t like paying taxes any more than you do, and you can bet your bottom dollar that we don’t pay a cent more than the law requires – not any of us here. That’s because, as a tax professional, it’s our job to keep up to date and make certain that we don’t. And it is our job to do exactly the same thing for our clients.

Indeed, if we didn’t do that for our clients, they would very soon change their plans and run a mile from us. As we said, keeping on top of all the latest tax changes is complicated, but that’s what you pay us for.

At the end of the day, it comes down to this: if we charge you, say, $1,000 to do your tax return and save you $2,000, you just made $1,000 profit.

Do you reckon Uncle Bob could do that?


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