Sometimes I hear people say, you know,
you're just putting numbers on a form.
- That's spreadsheet. - Yeah, you're just data entry, you know?
“Like, why should I pay so much just to fill out a form?”
It's not dollars for hours. It's your payin' for my experience, my expertise, and knowing where to hit that nail. - Tarin Halomo is a resilient, strategic, and growth-driven licensed tax strategist
in the founder of Tarin Tax Pro. Drawing from her expertise as an enrolled agent, she helps entrepreneurs and investors maximize savings and build lasting wealth. - You don't even need to sit for your CPA,
which was my next step. I said, don't do that. EA is no more about taxes and CPAs do. Unfortunately, I need a license to file your nails. I don't need a license to do your taxes.
- How did you know that you were on the path of greatness? Like, this is it. - You know? (dramatic music) - It spans the globe.
Like a super high school, internet helpers. (dramatic music) - Today, Apple is going to reinvent the phone. - It's not over, I'm telling how we're... - The living your legacy podcast
for those who live to leave a legacy. - That's extremely great. - Yeah, awesome, awesome. - Oh, that is sensational. (dramatic music)
Open. - Chicago was the lead years ago. - It's about just not on the planet. - You can live your dreams. - Welcome back to another episode
of the Living Your Legacy podcast.
“For Insight's Success, I am Ray Gutierrez.”
Moment before filming your episode for Women in Power is Terran Hallamo. She is the founder of Accountable Tax Professionals. - Welcome, Terran. - Thank you.
- Happy Friday. - Yeah, happy Friday.
- First of all, I have to compliment your amazing frames.
- Oh, thank you. - Those are awesome. When someone does tax or someone says a calculator in the corner, how does one kind of stand out? Do they start with amazing frames like that?
- Oh, no, I mean, I always like to do something a little different. I don't want to be that nerdy tax person. - For sure. - So I like to do a little bit fun stuff when I can.
- Speaking of fun stuff when you can, but we'll just step into the room. You'll be doing your session with Lauren today. - Okay, great. - Hi Lauren.
- So I'm just a preview. Ooh, speaking of which, what will we learn about you in your Women in Power episode? - Oh, I'm a little bit of what brought me to where I am now, a little bit of what I do and maybe a little bit of what's to come.
- Oh, Helia, where would you like to start? The future, the past or the present? - Hmm. - Why would we talk about the present? - What's going on today?
- Today. Today, I lead a firm that specializes in businesses and their owners. We use some aggressive tax strategies, more advanced tax strategies.
Then you might see or know from your everyday CPA with this shingle out on the street. Because we specialize in businesses and people. And their owners wanna save money. I mean, every day I hear like, you know,
I don't mind paying my share. I just feel like I'm paying too much. - Sure, sure, sure, sure, sure. - So that's what we focus on. - That's awesome.
- You're the reason why a lot of these billionaires now seem to be trillionaires. Don't pay tax for a couple of decades. It's because they've paid their taxes. All their dues, they've got geniuses like you kind of going,
don't jump here. Turn it right here, make a left there, trust me and wink twice when you get to this form. - And you got it. - Yeah, I do that, no, no, no, no, no.
- None of the idea exactly and thing. So I'm gonna start talking budget number. - No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. - Mine is more like when I go, well, what I do. - It's awesome, like can you explain to folks
why all these weird numbers and these forms? Like it almost feels like it's designed to complicate things, but it's really simple and streamlined
“and if you're kind of trained like you are, isn't it?”
- Some of it is simple and streamlined.
You know, I always say, you don't know what you don't know.
And if you don't know, you shouldn't be trying to, you know, do not try this at home kind of thing, you know. There are a lot of forms, there's a lot of crazy forms. We talked a minute and go about international tax. If you have any international things,
there's always some form that you might forget that has a hefty five-figure penalty. - Oh, gosh. - So, you know, those are the kinds of things that if you don't know, you don't know. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Sometimes I recently encountered somebody who didn't know how to claim for some credit, so they just didn't, okay. So let's just leave $40,000 on the table. Like that's not a thing.
- That's not another thing. - Let's not do that. - Yeah, what are some fun, like, kind of superstitions of what people think you do when you versus what you actually do?
- Mm, I get it, sometimes I hear people say, you know, you're just putting numbers on a form. - That's pretty cute. - Yeah, you're just data entry, you know, like, why should I pay so much just to fill out a form?
Well, it's, you know, the old story, the boat that was broken, they couldn't get the engine
To fix, and they brought all these high dollar people
into fix it, and finally they get this one guy
“comes in, takes a hammer, hits it, this one spot,”
and it fires up, and Handsome Bill for $50,000. Now like, $50,000 is like, yeah, $1,000 for my time, and $49,000 for no one want to do and where to do it. And that's kind of, you know, what it is, it's not dollars for hours, it's your pay and for my experience,
my expertise, and knowing where to hit that nail, though, knock off a couple grand. - Yeah, very, if celebrities can do it. - Right, well, and why not the real heroes? - Exactly, the people out there making the money
and making the world spin. - For sure, for sure. What's the difference for someone doing tax for business versus someone for personal? I know it's very, like, rudimentary like, oh, obviously,
but I'm a five-year-old when it comes to these sort of things, so explain it to me.
- Okay, if all they have is a W2,
maybe some bank interest, not a big deal, turbo taxes your friends. - Right on, you know, don't waste your money paying for a specialist, you know, honestly,
“because they're not doing anything more than what you could do.”
However, if you have rental properties, if you have a business, if you have crypto, if you have any kind of complexity to your tax return, absolutely having a professional in your corner, not only is going to get you better savings
than you can find on your own, or, and/or is going to do it right, or everybody, you know, Dr. Google, Facebook, friends, what should I do? You know, that those are not, you know, authority. - No, no, exactly, yeah, and it's funny 'cause it's almost
like pre-determined, it's like, now we've got the JATCBTs, the Google universities. I know you're a several steps beyond a CPA, it's almost like, you know, real estate lawyer versus doing real estate, but that's a different podcast for a different thing.
You are, you are not just, you are academically weaponized to protect ourselves from ourselves, really. - Yeah, exactly. - Talk about a little bit of some of that experience, you know, where that $29,000, it really goes into
what it was at $39,000, but talk about some of that experience and what it, you versus the other word, the tiny version of you that is trying to mimic you, what is, like, expertise, sound like. - Education for sure, you know, my license is a federal license.
- A CPA is a state license, and a religion is a federal license. And I've gotten very active with educational organizations. I go to no less than three tax conferences a year, one of them being an international tax conference that I try to hit every year.
- Very cool. - And then I serve on the board for the Texas Society of Enrolled Agents, the local DFW chapter, and I'm very active in the state chapter. And in fact, the Texas Society of Enrolled Agents
awarded me their EA of the year this year. - Nice. - So, so I try to give back to our community as well as, you know, taxpayers in general and the community in general. But the difference is the education.
I don't, I don't take education and continue education on how to fill out a 1040. - Yeah, I don't know. - Yeah, some people need that, absolutely need that. But after nearly three decades, I don't need that anymore.
- Sure, sure. - What I do need is the more advanced level of, you know, what's coming down the pipeline. And absolutely, with this current huge tax act that's hitting us right now as we speak.
Some of it hit this year, a lot of it hits next year and on. There's a lot of education that's required around that to understand it because it's so complex that Congress has even still hatching it out. And yeah, we're gonna see changes to it
all of this next year. - Very cool. - As they, you know, firm it up. So I would say that if you're interviewing a tax professional, you're looking for like who should I look for.
Definitely somebody who stays up with the current tax, trans current tax law. Somebody who gets at least the minimum tax requirement for professionals is 24 hours a year. I'm currently sitting at just shy of 100 hours this year.
But that's because, you know, like I said, I go to a lot of conferences and I chaired this tax conference in Mexico this year. So that was a lot of fun too. So we can have some fun while we--
- Oh, I've learned it, yeah, yeah. But that's what I would look for. There's a lot of, you know, unfortunately, I need a license to follow your nails. I don't need a license to do your taxes.
“But you should have one to do your nails.”
- Got such a great Instagram hook. If I was doing strolling, you know, I heard you say, I was like, wait, what? I didn't know that.
That's such an amazing hook.
- Yeah. - Yeah, unfortunately, you're very true. - Oh, for sure. - Yeah, good old America, the USA. Oh, gosh, I don't even know where to pivot this conversation.
Actually, when, I'm sure, did you start this on your own?
Were you just solo, were you lone wolfing it?
And then you started building your team?
Talk about your experience when it comes to running your-- - 'Cause I lone wolfing it. So I started out as a single mom. I had four young children from newborn to seven years old. - Right on.
And I became an instant mom going through a horrendous divorce from a man who told anybody with listen that he was going to destroy me. - Well, you know, as the oldest daughter, the oldest granddaughter, the oldest niece,
the oldest, you know, sibling, everything. Don't tell me you're in the stream. - Yeah, don't mess in me. - Yeah, I don't mess in me. - I don't mess in me.
- Oh, my beard. - Yeah, my beard.
“- This is my elbow, that's what we saw with you.”
- Exactly. - Exactly. - And I'm like, oh yeah, okay, so now I've got to find a job
that helps me raise my own children.
- Wow. - Support my children, 'cause you weren't going to pay child support if you didn't, if you wasn't forced to. So I needed a good income and I needed to come out not just as a survivor, but as a thriver.
And I needed to have an income that gave me that flexibility. And so one of my instructors, I've took me a very long time to finish college, but one of my instructors told me that I had a propensity for this, you know,
I'm like, oh, you know, accounting. You really get this concept, that was accounting. It wasn't tax, but he was a partner in a tax firm in a CK firm. And he said, you know, take a quick book's class
and then I'll go over some stuff with you. Quick books at that time was we were in the 90s. It's a long time ago. It was desktop. And so he started giving me jobs at their firm,
started having me work on tax returns at their firm. I started showing me how to get clients and started giving me clients. And at that time, I was making $50 an hour. In 1997, that was a lot of money.
Oh, yeah. And I was at home with my kids. Cool. And so that's kind of where I started and from there working at that firm.
Love those guys. They were super supportive of me. They believed in me and they were like, you know, you don't even need to sit for your CPA, which was my next step.
I said, don't do that. EA's no more about taxes than CPA's do. Now that's what he says. Okay, I'm not, it's not my quote. That was what he said.
There is a lot of very smart CPAs and a lot about taxes. That's not my point of my story. What he said was, you can learn more no more and be better at taxes if you do this.
Oh, for sure. And so that's what I did. So I sat for and passed the exams. And so then my kids saw me do that. They saw me fight through.
They saw, you know, mom did this in a time when that wasn't a thing. Working at home was not a thing in the 90s. It just wasn't. Most people didn't have computers.
We had to dial up internet, you know, the whole night. I was in middle school, making websites. So I was part of the webbies. It was this was a different time. Yeah, 97 was a good year.
Yeah, it was. It was. So my kids have watched me do that. And through the years, I live in a southern state. I'm part of the LGBT community.
So I feel like I have to set myself a little higher, and, you know, to be respected in the heteronorm societies which is tax.
“Honestly, it's a very conservative industry”
with a lot of old dinosaur CPA models. Yeah, and so in Texas with old men being a girl, being a gay girl is a whole another thing, you know. And so I needed to prove to myself
that I'm better stronger smarter, you know? So that I would be respected in those fields. And I am. And you go. Yeah, so, and now my oldest daughter and my youngest
daughter both worked for me. And my oldest daughter is following my footsteps. And in fact, came to me as a single mom with two daughters and said, hey, Mom, you know, you were 27. When you started your tax firm, I'm 28.
I'm already behind night ball. I want to do what you do. And I'm like, oh, let's do it. So she is studying for her exams. She is doing some lower level tax stuff
or it's not a business. You know, just kind of get her feet wet. Oh, she runs my office. She manages the bookkeeping that my youngest daughter does bookkeeping for me.
And she's a rock star. She's my right arm. Some folks have a knack for the numbers. They just see the numbers everywhere. And those are the folks I just make,
like, authentically honest, CPA is sure. But I mean, folks like you that are strategists and see the numbers and go beyond just tomorrow, they go a decade, even a decade into their, into their, into their legacies.
It's really powerful stuff.
“How did you know that you were on the path of greatness?”
Like, this is it. Your origin story is quite literally death in taxes. You were going to destroy this man that was willing to destroy you and your children. And you said, no, oh, I'm going to tack you with the numbers.
I guess I just entered your own question.
I love it. Keep going. But don't be about me.
But how did you just know that?
Wow, I can truly see the numbers. Folks are affirming my power. Let's use this power for good. How did you know?
“You know, I guess I have to go back to those,”
those two guys that I worked with the beginning. Leon has now passed away. He then became my resource partners. So in our industry resource partner, I mean, we had our own book of business, our own clients,
did our own thing. But we shared an office, we shared software, and we shared a receptionist.
And through that, we also bounced ideas off each other.
And that was invaluable. I earned sharp and siren. And I tease about him being my work husband. And he was a great, great man. I miss him terribly, because he passed away on March 11,
which is a very detrimental time in our industry. It's four days before the business corporate tax deadline. But I owe a lot to him for the support and encouragement. From day one, he's like, you're smart. You can do this.
And I'm going to help you get there. So that was great that I had that. I'm also a self-starter. And unfortunately, a little bit of a workaholic, so I think
“that I feel like you should do what you love.”
And you should do what you're good at. And you should stay in your line. And too many business owners spread themselves too thin, too into many things. And that's why I focus on businesses.
I think it was a natural progression from doing bookkeeping. I'm doing bookkeeping for businesses. Now I'm doing taxes for businesses. Now I'm doing the taxes for the owners of the businesses. And that's just kind of how that came.
Quite frankly, a W2-only tax return is boring to me. It just doesn't stimulate. It's just not my family, it's just not. But what does stimulate me, what I really just want to get into this is when I see a complex tax return with a mover and shaker.
Somebody just go, go, bring in the business, hand over foot. And then stuff kind of falls away, the bookkeeping falls away. Without good books, we don't get good taxes, so we got to start with that. But then I love seeing the complexity and where are you not taking advantage of the legal-- I don't want to call them loopholes.
But the legal tax strategy is just strategies and advantages that are out there. We stay definitely illegal, everything that I do, I can fight with the IRS for you because I know the statute and the IRS rules and regulations to be able to get you there. But our strategies are advanced, and they're primarily for people who want to pay less taxes and not just, oh, I'm paying a couple of hundred bucks, I want to pay less.
But I'm paying five and six figures every year in taxes and I need to pay less for sure. And there are strategies out there, you know, I mean, you mentioned the billionaires aren't paying as much. Oh, no, everyone's on Twitter or whatever. It's called Twitter.
Why is that happening? Because you're not paying what's due to fear out the actual knowledge of what's happening all around you. Right. is on your phone and go away.
“>> Right, right. >> Speaking of staying on your phone and going away, how can folks learn more about you and discover you? Do you have a website or something?”
>> I have a website. I have an Instagram that I'm not as good as I should be with it, but I do have a website and I have a fairly active Facebook business page. And I have a calendar that's open to people that they can schedule. I get to know you appointment with me, for free. >> Also, I'll just go for a call as you will? >> I'll just go for a call. >> That's exactly what I call, get to know you to see if we're good to work together because you may not be my ideal partner in this, and I may not be your ideal partner.
>> So who is your ideal partner? For folks that are watching listening to this, who is the person that you want to go ahead and click down this amazing video funnel?
To get the learned to sketch on that call with you, who is your ideal client? >> Definitely a business owner, definitely somebody who we do consultations to. You just want to ask me questions and learn more about what your situation is. You can buy an hour of my time and we can do that. >> But ideally, the clients that I work with are growing.
They're sometimes growing too fast for their own good, but they're growing and they kind of all of a sudden found themselves in this position like, "Oh, wow, this business really does make good money." And now look at the taxisiles. >> Yep. >> And you know, they get to tax time and they're like, "Oh crap, what can I do?" Well, on April 15th, it is too late. We're too late. We are just recording history. There are little tiny things we can do.
That will hit last little time. >> Maybe maybe maybe there's some retirement venues that are available to us that we can still hit from last year.
I tell clients like, "The end of the year is the best time to make sure that ...
Because in my opinion, a tax return is just a report card.
>> Yep.
“>> You need to know where you're going and how you're getting there before you get there.”
And once you got there and we've missed last year's tax planning, it's an oopsie.
So my ideal clients are people who have maybe medium to high complexity and they return a couple of different things going on on multiple investments.
“You know, those are probably the ones that get the most value from me.”
>> Absolutely. But anybody who's a business owner just wants to know where they need to go, what they need to do and who they need to hire to get it done. >> Right on. >> I can help with referrals too.
“>> Cool. And what's that website that people can find around?”
>> The easiest one is TerranTaxPro.com. So it's T-A-R-Y-N-T-A-X-P-R-O.com. >> Perfect. Cool.
>> And, all right, I guess that concludes our amazing episode of the Living Your Legacy Podcast. >> Thank you.
>> TerranTaxPro. >> Ray Gutierrez, podcast and my pro, and we are inside success. [ Music ]
