Stop Overpaying The IRS: Real Estate Tax Planning & Deductions Explained

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Show Summary

In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, host Q Edmonds speaks with tax strategist William Spar about his unique perspective on taxes and real estate. William shares his journey from commercial real estate to tax strategy, emphasizing the importance of integrity and relationships in business. He discusses key strategies for tax preparation and the significance of networking. The conversation also touches on the challenges of balancing friendships and business, the importance of being present in conversations, and the value of humor in serious discussions about taxes. William offers insightful advice on personal and professional growth, encouraging listeners to be kind and open to others.

Resources and Links from this show:

• • • Investor Fuel Real Estate Mastermind
    • Investor Machine Real Estate Lead Generation
    • Mike on Facebook
    • Mike on Instagram
    • Mike on LinkedIn
    • William Spar’s Website
    • William Spar’s Email Address: [email protected]
    • William Spar’s Phone No: (623) 889-3403

  Listen to the Audio Version of this Episode

  Investor Fuel Show Transcript:

  William Spar (00:00)
  Well, I’m physically based in Phoenix, Arizona. I’ve been here for almost 20 years now. ⁓ Prior life was in California and spent 25 years in commercial and industrial real estate, not only as a broker, but as an owner, property manager. And so ⁓ as I transitioned into a different life, into the

  financial services world and now the tax world. It’s a unique position to be in. As we talked about earlier, is I can help people, brokers, owners, property managers, anyone who’s done that world or in that world, I already know what they’re going through. And so it really makes the conversations ⁓ much more smooth.

  Quentin (02:15)
  to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I am your host, Q Edmonds. You know what I’m gonna say? I’m excited to be here today. And I am extremely excited because I tell you, it’s always a privilege when I get to have a chance to talk to people and see things through their lens. And this gentleman said something to me I’ve never heard before. He said the people at the IRS are actually cool people. And so you know.

  William Spar (02:43)
  Hahaha.

  Quentin (02:43)
  I’m excited to see this thing through his lens. And I believe him. I believe him. I just never heard it said before. And so this gentleman, listen, he’s a tax strategist. He’s had a dual kind of perspective because he’s done commercial real estate, but also now he’s helping investors with their taxes. Just not how to just get a tax return done, but also like tax strategy, how to plan.

  I am extremely excited for y’all to meet some maybe before it, some maybe before the new time, but Mr. William Spar Mr. William, how you doing today,

  William Spar (03:22)
  Awesome, thank you for having me, appreciate it.

  Quentin (03:24)
  No, absolutely, man. Thank you for being here. And listen, I’ll be honest. I want to dive right in, sir. Like, I didn’t kind of tease it a little bit, but I would love for you to just kind of take us into your world, right? Tell us what your main focus is these days. Maybe if you want to give us a little bit of an origin story. We love origin stories, so if you want to do that, I think people would love to hear that as well, how you kind of got started. And if you want to tell them where you’re from, I would love to hear that too. So the floor is yours, Mr. Boy. You got the floor, sir.

  William Spar (03:50)
  Sure. Appreciate

  it very much. Appreciate it.

  Quentin (03:53)
  Absolutely.

  William Spar (03:55)
  Well, I’m physically based in Phoenix, Arizona. I’ve been here for almost 20 years now. ⁓ Prior life was in California and spent 25 years in commercial and industrial real estate, not only as a broker, but as an owner, property manager. And so ⁓ as I transitioned into a different life, into the

  financial services world and now the tax world. It’s a unique position to be in. As we talked about earlier, is I can help people, brokers, owners, property managers, anyone who’s done that world or in that world, I already know what they’re going through. And so it really makes the conversations ⁓ much more smooth.

  makes it more cohesive. And as you had mentioned earlier, we’re not just tax prep.

  We’re tax strategists so that we can show you by the numbers with IRS code and the page number to verify and to quantify how we can help you lower your tax bill. We have clients that we’ve helped save $10,000. We’ve helped clients save $100,000. So those stories are relative to

  I’m assuming to your audience and how we can hold their hand and make their situation just look much better.

  Quentin (05:20)
  Absolutely, absolutely.

  So listen, I want to ask you about strategy because we use the word strategy. So I’m going to ask it kind of in two ways. One, what are some key strategies that has helped you as a business person, as you build your brand and your business? What are some key strategies that are like core strategies for you? And also what are some strategies maybe when you talk about, know, tech prep and helping consumers, helping customers, like what are some strategies that

  that you know will be beneficial for them. That, you know, a little bit to the sauce, you know, we don’t want to give it everything, wait for free, but just some things that can help them as well. So kind of twofold.

  William Spar (06:42)
  Sure, yeah.

  Yeah, there’s, there’s one of the things that we utilize is, what we call our cheat sheet that we give to each client because it’s a list of about 17, 18 different light items of, of things that people don’t even realize are a tax deduction or an expense related to their business. Whether you’re a high earning W two guy or you’re commission based like I am. And so there’s.

  there’s code after code after code that allows us to take advantage of those things and we’re doing them every day. We’re just not recording them so that we can dump it onto our tax return and get the actual tax benefit for it. And so those strategies are key in helping the picture look much better than it should be. And then for me, you know, I practice what I preach.

  Quentin (07:40)
  Mm-hmm, mm. Yeah.

  William Spar (07:41)
  I’m not a hypocrite. I’m

  not a hypocrite, you know, if I’m doing it for me and it’s okay for me and it’s working for me, then I know it’s going to work for you. And I, you know, just look at the war hero baldness. I mean, that’s, know, I’m in the trenches, man. I get it. I’m seeing things every day. So if, if, if it’s going to work for me, it’s going to work for you.

  Quentin (07:54)
  Yes.

  Yeah, I love it, man. Like you said, listen, I practice what I preach. I’m not trying to tell you something that I’m not doing myself. And I love that. Because of course, you know, there’s a lot of people that don’t have that type of integrity, right? They’re telling you something, trying to make you do something that they’re not doing themselves. And actually, that they know is not really going to help them. So I appreciate that honesty, man. I really, really do. so we said, William, I always talk about, you know,

  William Spar (08:11)
  Correct? Yeah.

  Yeah, for sure.

  Quentin (08:30)
  When we talk about business, the success of business, how business is ran, sometimes we show people the success and don’t show them the journey of how to get to the success. And so I know, you you’ve been in business, been in for a while. I’m sure there are times that maybe has been adverse, right? When things got real, maybe times when you had to pit fast, when you came up against some, some friction maybe within your business. And I’m just wondering is, are there moments that you can share with us?

  William Spar (08:40)
  Mm-hmm.

  Quentin (08:58)
  of times when you had to kind of pivot fast within what it is that you do.

  William Spar (09:02)
  Absolutely. ⁓ Ironically, it was last night, believe it or not, I have a client, have a client who’s a friend. And we know that sensitivity right there to begin with. ⁓ He’s a stock market guy. And the tax strategies that I need to deploy to him, requiring investment, monetary investment in order for the tax

  Quentin (09:06)
  Mmm, wow.

  William Spar (09:29)
  code to be realized. And we we got into it last night. It was it was a little heated in terms of of how we can help and why we can help. And his response was, well, I’ll just dump it into a Vanguard fund and let it grow and utilize the the benefits from that. And yeah, I know I got to pay tax. And I’m I’m trying to tell him stop saying you could you’re just going to pay the tax.

  I’m trying to help you to wipe out the tax. Why pay it when I can wipe it out? So that’s something that he needs to pivot to. His wife’s on board. He’s just not. And so I gotta make that battle.

  Quentin (09:57)
  Hmm.

  Yeah. And it’s something, you know, you know, and I love how you said that there’s always a fine line walking between business and friendships because, know, sometimes people see you as the friend and don’t see you as the expert. Like, hey, man, this is what I do. you know, I’m really trying to help you. And sometimes it’s hard. It’s like the little brother that always feel like he can beat up the big brother. You know what saying?

  William Spar (10:33)
  Exactly.

  Quentin (11:10)
  And listen,

  if your friend is watching this, I’m not trying to sing you or nothing like that. But you know, but like you said, there is a tension sometimes between friendship and really trying to let them know, no, no, I am really trying to do what’s best for you here. And so, so yeah, so I mean, good luck to you, man. That’s, that’s, there you go. There you go.

  William Spar (11:14)
  You

  For sure.

  Listen, we both we both benefit for sure, you know

  He he gets the benefit of of a tax break of up to 88 % of the amount that he would owe we could reduce it You know, yeah, I get I get to benefit from it as well. Not only from a satisfaction perspective, but you know, I Might be able to get a commission out of it as well. He wins no matter what and that’s always disclosed. It’s always up front

  Quentin (11:49)
  Absolutely. No matter what.

  William Spar (11:53)
  And of course it’s a friend, I’m even more honest in how that would work.

  Quentin (11:57)
  Yeah, Now, man, I love it. you know, I’m just a couple of times I’m just hearing your integrity shine through. And I appreciate, I appreciate you that because, you know, everybody’s not always ethical. And so I appreciate that. And so let me ask you, Mr. William, like, what’s the next steps? Like, what are you focused on? Scaling next? Like, what’s the next real goal for you and your business and your brand?

  William Spar (12:04)
  Thanks.

  Sure. So you had mentioned integrity. ⁓ And so I tell people, you know, it’s on my business cards, legal, ethical and moral. It’s got to start there. It’s got to start there. If it’s not there, I don’t unlock the front door. That’s key to us. That’s our moniker. That’s how we live our code. And so, you know, we are scaling. We are growing.

  Quentin (12:34)
  Mmm.

  William Spar (12:45)
  ⁓ I’ve brought on another prepare. She lives in California. so my challenge in helping her scale is getting her through tax school, getting her acclimated. She spent the summer with us, you doing hands on stuff. But there’s behind the scenes things that have to happen, right? I need I need more computer space. I need more speed. I need more ⁓ software. need more storage, blah, blah, blah. We don’t have any of that stuff. So we, know,

  That takes money and so that’s a stress. There’s all those behind the scenes things that in order to scale and be better for the public, there’s a lot of things happening to ⁓ run up those stairs so to speak so that you can get to the top.

  Quentin (13:28)
  Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I hear you very, very clearly. Like you said, you know, I actually broke down a sound bite, what you said, like investment, like you, you’re going to have to invest to go to the next level. So these are things that you have to invest in yourself to get more computer, more storage, more space. And I hear you. And what you said that really rung a bell to me is how you’re investing in people. You said you brought another, you know, lady on, you’re helping her scale, helping her get through school.

  William Spar (13:57)
  Mm-hmm.

  Quentin (13:57)
  And so it seems to me that you know the importance of relationships, even when you were talking about what your friend trying to help help him, like relationships seems to be important to you. And so I just want to get your mindset like around relationships when it comes to building relationships and growing your network, what’s made the biggest difference for

  William Spar (14:06)
  Mm-hmm.

  Yeah, good point by the way. And this is how I grow and this is how I’m teaching my kids, my 22 and 23 year old. I tell them as often as I can, just say hello. Just say hello. Say hello to the next person. Say hello to the person at the bar. Say hello to the witches. Whatever it is at the Chamber of Commerce, just say hello.

  Say hi, you’ll know real quick if they’re gonna be nice or naughty. And if they’re naughty, you turn and walk away, go say hi to someone else. And they always tell me, dad, how do you do that? Why do you, you’re embarrassing, what are you doing, Bob? I’m like, listen, we wouldn’t have 600 clients if I wasn’t out doing that.

  It’s vitally important. Just say hello.

  Quentin (15:44)
  Why is that so simple yet so powerful? Just say hi. I wrote it down, three simple words. Just say hello. You know, my wife has a thought process. She looks for NU people. And I was like, babe, NU, what you mean? And so she says, good morning to somebody. How are you doing? She says, good morning. How are you? Right? And she waits to see their response. And then they say, NU, like, NU, how are you? Like a response to what you said.

  William Spar (15:49)
  Yeah.

  Mm-hmm.

  Quentin (16:11)
  You

  asked me, now let me respond and say, and you, how are you? And she looks with people like that. And so when I hear you say, just say hello, you’re absolutely right. The response that they give you is going to tell you everything you need to know. And so there it is.

  William Spar (16:16)
  Correct.

  You just have to be genuine to follow up with

  your wife. You just got to be genuine. If you’re going to ask somebody, how are you? Be genuine. Stand there and wait for them to say I’m good or I’m bad or I’m different. And again, if they don’t say anything, then you know that they’re not being genuine. If you’re going to ask the question, how are you or what’s happening or whatever it is, you got to listen. You got to stand there and be there, be present in that person’s conversation, whether it’s

  8 seconds or 8 hours, it doesn’t matter.

  Quentin (16:55)
  Hmm, man, you’re talking, man. I’m just looking at just some of the things you said, like you said on the business cards, it’s legal, ethical, and moral. And now you’re just talking about being present to people when you have that conversation. know, one thing I try to do is that when I talk to somebody, I try to make sure my toes are actually pointed directly towards them, right? Because body language, we’re always communicating. And so communication, say, has a 55.

  William Spar (17:17)
  Mmm.

  Quentin (17:23)
  38-7 rule. 55 % of communication is actually your body language. 38 % is your tone. And 7 % of the communication actually the words that you say. And so when somebody talks to me, I want to make sure my body language is in my toes, or pointing towards them, and let them know, got my undivided attention. I’m not having one foot out, you know, trying to get away. Like, and it starts at home. I love how you said you started with your daughters. It starts with my wife.

  William Spar (17:28)
  Mm-hmm.

  Yeah.

  Quentin (17:49)
  When my wife talked to me, don’t talk, know, I turn my back, I turn to her, plant my feet and say, okay, babe, you got my full attention. And so I’m just piggybacking on what you said about actually being present. I think that’s a big thing and I appreciate you saying that. Really, really do. Yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Listen, is there any kind of, and when I say this, it could be about taxes, it could be about just life, it can be about what you learned on your journey. But the question is, is there any,

  William Spar (18:01)
  Mm-hmm. Yeah, it’s huge, for sure.

  Quentin (18:18)
  kind of further inspiration or ⁓ encouragement or advice that you want to give to people out there. Again, it could be about taxes, it could be about life. I just love the way you think and your perspective. And so just want to throw that question out there. Yeah.

  William Spar (18:32)
  Yeah,

  yeah. You know, you know, I think that the, ⁓ you know, say hello, be good, do good, be kind, you know, it comes back to you if you are just walking around in a a in a mood, so to speak, people are going to pick up on it. And so even if you’re having a bad day, portray yourself as being happy.

  It’ll help change your mindset. It’ll help it’ll help you for the rest of your day. And so I tell people You know in this world that we’re living in now where we’re we’re a very chaotic world. We’re a very ⁓ Scary world right now and what’s happening across the world and it’s confusing and a ⁓ lot of misunderstanding all of those things and

  I just want people to be good and do good. Be good to other people, do good for your community, do good for your family, and just don’t…

  Don’t go throw a fit just because.

  Quentin (19:38)
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I absolutely love ⁓ everything you’re saying. I really do. I love how you said, be good. I don’t know if you actually said the word cheerful. You might’ve said happy, but I want to give you what my motto is before I go into anything. Before I go into like an interview like this, before I deal with my wife, before I go into anything, I say, I’m going to be cheerful, courageous, confident, certain, and undaunted.

  William Spar (19:56)
  Mm-hmm.

  Quentin (20:05)
  Whatever I’m going go into, whatever is going to get my presence, that’s going to get my attention, I’m going do it cheerfully, courageous, being confident, being certain and being undaunted. And so I hear your message loud and clear, like it just, it’s not like you just want the world to be a better place. I’m not trying to sound sappy or cliche as, but when everybody bring their best and treat people the way they need to be treated like people, the world could be a better place. Yeah. Yeah.

  William Spar (20:11)
  Mm-hmm.

  Yeah. ⁓

  You

  have to be willing to be open. You have to be willing to open up and allow for messages to receive you. And if you’re sitting there like this and you’re not paying attention, you’re not doing whatever, that just sends a negative impact to the person you’re trying to probably sell to.

  Quentin (20:51)
  That part. Cause we taking it right back to business, right? We’ve been talking about life, but this is business too. This is business strategy too. When you make somebody feel like they’re respected, when you make somebody feel like they’re heard, I mean the opportunities for making the sale, the clothes, whatever is astronomical. And especially when you’re being serious about it, like you’re not just, this is not something, it’s not a gimmick. It’s like really like, no, like you matter. It makes everything so much better.

  William Spar (20:53)
  Can’t do it.

  exactly right.

  Yep.

  Yeah, and you know, I try to inject as much lightheartedness and fun. I poke fun at myself all the time. I want people to laugh because talking about the IRS, talking about taxes, talking about lifetime savings, talking about, you know, not losing money or investing money, those are serious things that people get a little weird about. And so…

  I try to inject humor into it so that it’s more lighthearted even though we’re talking about a serious matter.

  Quentin (21:52)
  Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Listen, this has been great. Listen, Mr. William, if someone wanted to reach out to you, connect with you, collaborate with you, learn more about what you’re doing, what’s the best way for them to reach out to you, sir?

  William Spar (22:06)
  Mm-hmm.

  We have of course a website www.arptaxpro.com local phone number is 623-889-3403 and they can always email me at wmspar @ arptaxpro.com

  Quentin (22:27)
  There you go. And thank you for saying Spar, because I think I said Spur earlier. So I want to pick some respect on your saying sorry, Mr. Spar. apologize. Absolutely. I appreciate you, sir. Well, listen, man, thank you so much for coming through. Thank you for your story. Thank you for your time. Definitely. Thank you for your perspective. I think it was very, very good for our listeners to hear your perspective and the way you think. so again, thank you for coming through. I really, really appreciate it.

  William Spar (22:34)
  You’re good. You’re good. You’re good. Appreciate you.

  And I appreciate it. Thank you for the time and the opportunity.

  Quentin (22:57)
  Absolutely. Well, listen, y’all heard Mr. Spar. Y’all got the value out of the conversation. So please make sure you’re subscribed so you can continue to come back and get the value from these amazing guests that we have on, just like Mr. William. So I thank you again, sir. And listen to everyone else. We will see you on the next time.