November, 2011
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Watch Your Beneficiary!
I think we may have written a post on this a couple of years ago, but I got reminded of the issue a couple of days ago with another sad situation that was relayed to me. I was talking with one of my CPA friends and he had a client whose husband had just passed […]
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New Tax Education Program for Farmers
The USDA-Risk Management Agency (RMA) in conjunction with several Universities has just announced a new site for financial and tax information for farmers. The site is located at www.ruraltax.org. The site is comprised of: Tax Topics Sample Farm Tax Return Small Farm Tax Guide Links Plus some information on who has contributed to the site and […]
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Should You Switch Your LIBOR Debt?
With the Euro Zone upheaval in the financial markets, farmers may want to consider changing any LIBOR based debt that they currently have or anticipate having in the future. Almost all loans these days are based upon some type of index. The most common ones are the Prime Rate, LIBOR and some type of US […]
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Happy Thanksgiving!
With Thanksgiving coming up in a couple of days, I wanted to take the time to say what I am thankful for: My wife of 29 years, Patty Neiffer, for putting up with me for all of these years and for some reason still in love with me. My four sons, Garrett – 24, Grant […]
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Tri State Grain Growers Convention
We have a booth at the Tri State Grain Convention in Spokane, through Friday of this week. We set up the booth yesterday afternoon and had several people stop by. If any of our readers from Washington, Idaho and Oregon are attending the convention, please stop by and say Hi.
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Sustainability Test – Part 3
Today’s post is our last part of the sustainability test. Although this is designed for all businesses, most of all of these items apply to farms too. If a key manager or administrator suddenly became incapacitated, someone other than the owner/CEO could assume his or her duties within a week. Have you done a good […]
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Sustainability Test – Part 2
We continue our sustainability test from yesterday. Our company can withstand the financial impact of a “bad” job or lower than anticipated revenue and still comfortably absorb overhead expenses. Do you stress test your budget each year to see what your break-even point is? Have you locked in enough revenues to cover overhead costs including […]
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Sustainability Test – Part 1
A reader gave me a 10 part questionaire regarding how sustainable your business is. This questionaire applies as much to farming as to any other business. During this week, I will list the questions here with my comments. If you can get a true response on at least 7 questions, I would say your farm […]
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Watch Out for Sales to Related Parties – Part Two!
On the last post regarding sales between related parties, my example was not 100% correct, so I have updated the post to more accurately reflect what the rules for related party sales. Thanks to the reader that pointed this out.
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Watch Out For Sales to Related Parties
Many times we have farmers come in to get their tax return prepared and tell us that they will probably not owe any tax since they sold some property at a large loss. After reviewing the facts with them, we find out they sold the property to their son. We then have to tell them […]