THE CLIENT COMES FIRST…
Paul Levine
Commercial Realtor and Real Estate Advisor | Retired CPA with over 50 years of income tax experience that no other Commercial Realtor has, Income Tax Consultant and unmatched Creatively!
THE CLIENT COMES FIRST…
AND THAT’S HOW WE WORK…
?PART III OF III… THE END...
About 3 or 4 weeks later I was working in my office in an area in Los Angeles called Century City.?I left my office about 5 PM and stopped off at my favorite restaurant and bar and had a few drinks and dinner.?I got home at midnight with a buzz on to a message from my client in Wilmington, DE asking me to call him NO MATTER WHAT TIME IT WAS!!!?It was 3 AM in Wilmington, DE.?So, I called, and my client answered the phone and I said, I guess that I woke you.?He said no shit give me a minute; I am sorry for using that word but that’s what he said to me.?He got back on the phone and said that they didn’t like me in Wilmington, DE.?I told him that this wasn’t a popularity contest!!!
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?Then he told me that they, DuPont, made him an offer.?But first you have to know something.?Back in 1984 the Federal income tax rate on earned income was 50% (YES IT WAS) and the California income tax rate was 11%.?So, don’t complain too much about the current income tax rates, they are low considering what we had back then.?The offer was that they, DuPont, would write him a check for $561,797.75 and consider it wages.?You see, after income taxes that amount came out to exactly a quarter of a million dollars.?I told him to take it.?So, in the end, DuPont paid the tax of a quarter of a million dollars.?There isn’t any other Certified Public Accountant or attorney or anyone else who could have pulled that off!!!?I said no one!!!?I AM unique!!!
?So, my last point is that I could have charged my client $10,000, $20,000, maybe $40,000 for doing that.?He paid for a very nice dinner when he got back into town.?He was a friend, and I didn’t do that to friends.?Today my philosophy is different.?I would charge someone a reasonable amount for accomplishing that, but I am 76years old, and I will be 77 in two weeks, and my mindset is different.?But I would be fair!!!
?When I say that THE CLIENT COMES FIRST, I am not just saying words, I live my life that way.?When I was a practicing CPA, I would fire clients if we didn’t become friends after I did their second income tax returns.?I wouldn’t make any more money from them from that point on, but the relationship is more important than the money.?I guess that’s why I am not a really rich man today.
?My name is Paul Levine, and I am a Commercial Realtor, a Residential Realtor of luxury homes in Southern California, a Real Estate Advisor, an Investment Advisor, and an Income Tax Consultant!!!?I hope that you enjoyed this article.?