Expat Community > Panama

gSky
Joined 2020
Posts: 630

Able Tax advisor wanted!! Dead or (preferably) alive!

3 years ago

I am converting my SEP IRA slowly since 2 years into a Roth IRA.

My tax consultant for many years advised me to look for someone else since he has no experience with expat intricacies and, since I would have been his only expat, it was not worth his while to study it. Others would have specialized in those topics already and would therefore be able to share their expertise.

I looked and found a self declared expat-expert. I explained my situation and he listened attentively and then did my taxes after billing me 400$. Even though I had explained the sep->roth situation he just declared all conversion money as taxable, which it isn't. I found that out on my own. After a bit of grumbling he sent me an appropriate tax return.

What bothered me was, that there were some deductions that I, the layman found. How many deductions could I have had, if he were really an expert.

So this year I tried someone different, who was said to be good and decently pricing in Panama, an ex-IRS employee who would know all the ins- and outs of the tax law. He sent me a tax return, in which I have to pay no taxes at all, which is also wrong. After telling him and showing him from last year what was done, he copied the data from last year and billed me 220$. That's not correct either. After calculating it myself and asking him if I calculated correctly, he became silent.

So one calculated too high a tax, the other one too low a tax while both did not know what to do at a conversion.

I do, at this moment not have any Panama costs or profits, so don't need an expat specialist. Just a competent tax advisor who would know about capital gains, SEP->Roth conversion and the rest is run of the mill: My retirement. No Caribbean tax heaven, no Panama Papers to be found in.

If anyone here has a good (preferably affordable) accountant that they know and trust so please PM me or tell the appreciative public since those 'animals' seem to have become rarer than the Dodo!

Having a 100% failure rate with 2 cases is statistically irrelevant, but still nothing to tell your mother on Mother's Day.

Kovalenko & Vera Attorneys at Law in Panama

SJB Global

SJB Global is a top-rated financial advisory firm specializing in expat financial advice worldwide, offering retirement planning & tax-efficient solutions with a regressive fee model.
Learn More

SJB Global

SJB Global is a top-rated financial advisory firm specializing in expat financial advice worldwide, offering retirement planning & tax-efficient solutions with a regressive fee model.
Learn More

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SJB Global

SJB Global is a top-rated financial advisory firm specializing in expat financial advice worldwide, offering retirement planning & tax-efficient solutions with a regressive fee model.
Learn More

SJB Global

SJB Global is a top-rated financial advisory firm specializing in expat financial advice worldwide, offering retirement planning & tax-efficient solutions with a regressive fee model.
Learn More

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Expat Community > Panama

Able Tax advisor wanted!! Dead or (preferably) alive!

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