AE Tax Advisors

I am a chemical engineer at a major energy company and run a growing consulting practice on the side. Between my W-2 salary and consulting income, I was in a high tax bracket with no real strategy. My old CPA just combined everything and calculated what I owed.

AE Tax Advisors took a completely different approach. They structured my consulting practice as an S-Corp, optimizing the salary-distribution split to minimize self-employment tax. Then they helped me invest in a short-term rental property and structured it to take advantage of the STR loophole.

Here is where it got powerful: because I materially participate in managing the STR (I handle pricing, guest communication, and maintenance coordination), the depreciation losses from the cost segregation study are non-passive. Those losses offset my combined W-2 and consulting income, dramatically reducing my total tax bill.

AE Tax coordinated everything -- the consulting entity, the rental property, the cost seg study, and my W-2 withholding -- into one integrated plan. They made sure the numbers worked together rather than being handled in isolation.

Total savings: $67,000. What felt impossibly complex before AE Tax got involved became a clear, actionable plan with defined steps and projected outcomes. They even created a quarterly check-in schedule to make adjustments throughout the year as my income from consulting fluctuated.

For any engineer or technical professional with side consulting income, the combination of S-Corp structure and real estate strategy is powerful. AE Tax Advisors made the entire process feel manageable and produced results that speak for themselves.