Here goes.
I hate to even bring this up for those of you that may be in my position.
The toughest thing that I find in business is to have the discipline (and teach it to other family members) to hold back for taxes. Our biggest problem is we're in that stage of our business where we're doing enough sales to cover our personal expenses and businesses expenses and have some monies left over for taxes but not quite covering the whole nut. Of course we're also into that stage where we don't have any BIg writes off's and also caught up in paying for some of those 179 writes offs we used previously.
I got frustrated when I talked to the Plummer putting in our hot water heater last week and find out he hasn't paid taxes in the 14 years he has been in business. Of course he doesn't use any software program and may not be doing things legit like we do and he has 6 kids and gets back an avg of 8k per year!
I am going up on residential prices some this year but maintaining commercial pricing since I only land about 30% of my bids now (excluding restaurants). However these increases may only cover our governments generous tax increases!
It's weird but when I'm able to talk shop with a business person my side of the conversation doesn't deal so much with marketing or what equip you use, or what's your favorite chemicals or spotters, but how do you discipline yourself to save enough for taxes and how long in business before that burden smoothed out a bit.
I realize that sometimes I make poor business decisions, for exams buying a new TM instead of purchasing a used one however quite honestly at this point it was easier to buy new than used. Also, I was at a point in business where our company couldn't afford the lengthy break downs of the V, sometimes getting us 30+ jobs behind. This was also my decision in buying American made vehicle where I could get it worked on a little less expensive and by many different repair shops and not be held hostage by one dealer. I also decided to buy new so as to limit breakdowns while I went through my slide in learning curve.
I also realize that it definately takes "time". I remember my first gm position in the restaurant business paid 20k a year and over the course of 30+ years my salary went up to the biggest of 130k a year when I supervised 10 Ryans drove 5k miles a month and worked about 80 hours a week. Then as the economy tank and business owners started finding ways to not pay bonuses to make their bottom line profits I decided after a 4 year decline in salary amongst lots of other reasons I decided to make this change.
Sorry for opening my soul to you guys but I did this without even having a beer. And I suppose this would be a great time for all you guys that have been through this or conquered this issue to either share your experience or your disciplin or bash.
I hate to even bring this up for those of you that may be in my position.
The toughest thing that I find in business is to have the discipline (and teach it to other family members) to hold back for taxes. Our biggest problem is we're in that stage of our business where we're doing enough sales to cover our personal expenses and businesses expenses and have some monies left over for taxes but not quite covering the whole nut. Of course we're also into that stage where we don't have any BIg writes off's and also caught up in paying for some of those 179 writes offs we used previously.
I got frustrated when I talked to the Plummer putting in our hot water heater last week and find out he hasn't paid taxes in the 14 years he has been in business. Of course he doesn't use any software program and may not be doing things legit like we do and he has 6 kids and gets back an avg of 8k per year!
I am going up on residential prices some this year but maintaining commercial pricing since I only land about 30% of my bids now (excluding restaurants). However these increases may only cover our governments generous tax increases!
It's weird but when I'm able to talk shop with a business person my side of the conversation doesn't deal so much with marketing or what equip you use, or what's your favorite chemicals or spotters, but how do you discipline yourself to save enough for taxes and how long in business before that burden smoothed out a bit.
I realize that sometimes I make poor business decisions, for exams buying a new TM instead of purchasing a used one however quite honestly at this point it was easier to buy new than used. Also, I was at a point in business where our company couldn't afford the lengthy break downs of the V, sometimes getting us 30+ jobs behind. This was also my decision in buying American made vehicle where I could get it worked on a little less expensive and by many different repair shops and not be held hostage by one dealer. I also decided to buy new so as to limit breakdowns while I went through my slide in learning curve.
I also realize that it definately takes "time". I remember my first gm position in the restaurant business paid 20k a year and over the course of 30+ years my salary went up to the biggest of 130k a year when I supervised 10 Ryans drove 5k miles a month and worked about 80 hours a week. Then as the economy tank and business owners started finding ways to not pay bonuses to make their bottom line profits I decided after a 4 year decline in salary amongst lots of other reasons I decided to make this change.
Sorry for opening my soul to you guys but I did this without even having a beer. And I suppose this would be a great time for all you guys that have been through this or conquered this issue to either share your experience or your disciplin or bash.
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