Insights on tax, equity, and building wealth
Guides and analysis from the Harness team and the advisors on the platform.
IRS Form 720 Instructions—Quarterly Excise Tax Guide
Federal excise taxes are often overshadowed by more familiar filings like income or payroll taxes—but for many businesses, they’re just as important. If your business sells goods or services that fall into certain categories—like fuel, air transportation, or health coverage—you may be required to file IRS Form 720 each quarter.
How the One Big Beautiful Bill Impacts Real Estate Investors
The One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act (OBBA) is here, and real estate investors face a complex landscape of new policies that can dramatically impact returns. The bill introduces sweeping changes that will reshape planning strategies for decades to come, creating both challenges and opportunities for property investors. From syndicators to REIT shareholders, from 1031 flippers to passive LPs (Limited Partners), nearly every real estate investor is affected by this bill.
Why the Modern Tax Firm Doesn’t Need a Traditional Back Office
For decades, tax firms have relied on a familiar structure: a front office engaging with clients and delivering tax advice, supported by a sizable back office that handles administrative tasks, data entry, and compliance. This model is becoming increasingly obsolete, however, in the wake of sophisticated digital technologies.
How to Automate the Tax Engagement Letter Process
Of all the variables involved in the client/tax advisor relationship, one of the seemingly simplest, yet surprisingly time-consuming, is the creation and management of engagement letters. These key documents, which lay the groundwork for the client-advisor relationship, often serve as a bottleneck in the onboarding process, delaying tax work and frustrating both firms and their clients.
What If Your Back Office Ran Itself?
A tax advisor’s back office has traditionally involved extensive amounts of paperwork, manual data entry, and continuous client chasing. When you add the demands of continual deadlines and the relentless need for accuracy to the equation, it’s a complex administrative engine that requires a great deal of attention to keep running smoothly.
How to Report Cryptocurrency Gains on your Tax Return
As digital assets become more integrated into everyday portfolios, reporting cryptocurrency gains on your tax return has gone from optional to essential. If you're asking, “do you have to report crypto on your taxes?”—the answer in 2025 is a firm yes.
The Best Way to Manage Billing and Collections
In the long list of day-to-day administrative tasks that tax firms face, billing and collections sit near the top in terms of the amount of time devoted to them. While the established methods of manual invoicing, chasing overdue payments, and handling client queries may get the job done, what are these methods costing your tax firm in terms of efficiency?
Back Office Bottlenecks You’re Not Accounting For
Supporting a tax firm’s client consultations and strategic tax planning is a complex system of back-office operations. More than just a collection of minor administrative tasks, this system is a major component of your firm's profitability, efficiency, and client satisfaction. Far too often, however, a back office system quietly siphons away time, money, and even talent via unnoticed operational bottlenecks.
How Tax Firms Can Turn Post-Tax Season into a Growth Opportunity
Spring and Fall are typically when an accounting firm’s gears are in full operation. The mid-season lulls, however, offer valuable opportunities beyond mere recuperation. These less intense periods are important windows that allow your tax firm to evaluate its performance and efficiency, and implement improvements that will not only prepare you better for next year’s peak seasons but pave the way for wider growth in general.
Tax Advisor Weekly — July 31, 2025
From retiree tax breaks to IRS staffing freefall and a looming tariff deadline, this week’s tax headlines reflect a fast-changing landscape for advisors and their clients.
How to Minimize the RMD Tax for High Net Worth Retirees
For high-net-worth retirees, Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs) present a significant challenge. RMDs are mandatory withdrawals from retirement accounts, starting at age 73. These mandatory withdrawals can create major complications for many retirees.
Tired of Chasing Clients for Documents? Try This Instead
Tax advisors may be experts in IRS regulations and tax strategies, however, they also need to be gifted in the art of polite persistence—certainly, when it comes to chasing clients for documents. Inefficient client data collection isn't just an annoyance, it’s a drain on a tax firm's resources, often costing a substantial amount of time over the year.
Retirement Tax Strategy: When to Start Drawing Social Security
The age you claim Social Security can cost—or make—you six figures. Social Security isn’t just a safety net, it’s a lifeline. The program is one of the few sources of guaranteed, inflation-adjusted income you can count on for life. And yet, most Americans don’t treat it like a strategic asset. Nearly 60% of people claim their benefits before reaching full retirement age (FRA), even though waiting can significantly increase monthly payouts.
Building an ESG Tax Strategy: Can ESG Investing Help Lower Your Tax Bill?
With political battles raging over ESG, it’s easy to miss the bigger picture: ESG investing isn’t dead or deprioritized. It’s evolving. Despite headlines about record outflows and state-level bans, long-term investors are still turning to ESG as a tool for risk-adjusted returns, portfolio diversification, and yes—even potential tax advantages.
How to Manage Multi-State Tax Clients
Managing multi-state tax clients is no longer a niche issue—it’s a defining challenge of modern tax practice. As businesses expand across borders and remote work redefines physical presence, tax professionals are expected to navigate a patchwork of state rules that rarely align.
How IRS Updates in 2025 Could Impact Your Tax Practice
The IRS updates for 2025 are more than routine adjustments—they mark a turning point for tax professionals navigating an increasingly complex regulatory environment. With major shifts in tax brackets, standard deductions, and digital asset reporting, firms will need to rethink how they serve clients across income levels and asset classes.
The Ultimate Tax Guide to Buying and Selling Startup Shares
The substantial financial returns that can result from investing in promising startups early are a major draw for investors and employees alike. The tax environment that surrounds startup share transactions, however, is a notoriously complex one. Trading startup shares presents far more challenges than dealing in publicly traded stocks, as a historic lack of clarity can leave many investors feeling unsure of their tax position.
Set Your Kids Up for Success: What You Need to Know About 529s and Education Savings
College education represents one of the most significant investments in your child's future. With tuition costs climbing relentlessly, many families struggle to fund higher education without burdening their children with crushing student loan debt.
What the IRS AI Audit Push Means for Tax Professionals in 2025
The Internal Revenue Service is ushering in a new era of tax enforcement. In 2025, the agency's strategic deployment of artificial intelligence represents a fundamental shift in how tax compliance will be monitored and enforced, with over 68 AI-related projects already transforming everything from routine audits to complex investigations.
Why Multistate Tax Issues Are Becoming a Bigger Risk for Your Clients
How states approach taxation is undergoing a seismic shift. Across the United States, revenue departments are reaching beyond traditional boundaries to capture tax from businesses in the digital age.
A Practical Guide to Managing Multiple 1099s Efficiently
As gig work becomes increasingly prevalent, managing multiple income streams has become common, but tax season brings complexity as various 1099 forms flood your mailbox. Missing even one form in your filing could trigger unwanted IRS attention, making organization crucial.
How Founders Can Use QSBS to Minimize Capital Gains Taxes in 2025
For founders anticipating a liquidity event in 2025, Qualified Small Business Stock (QSBS) planning is no longer optional—it’s essential. The potential to eliminate up to $10 million in federal capital gains tax per shareholder isn’t just a tax perk; it’s a meaningful wealth planning lever that can reshape outcomes for you and your family.
What Taxpayers Need to Know about Long-Term vs. Short Term Capital Gains Tax Rates in 2025
Few aspects of tax law have a more direct impact on investment returns than capital gains taxes. The difference between short-term and long-term capital gains rates can mean keeping thousands more dollars of your investment profits—or watching them vanish to higher tax bills.
How to Keep Ahead of Changing Inherited IRS Rules in 2025
In less than two years, estate planning regulations will undergo a seismic shift. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, which temporarily doubled estate and gift tax exemptions, is hurtling toward its expiration date of December 31, 2025.
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