Not sure if your financial advisor has your best interest at heart or just a product to sell? Katherine Leonard, CPA, CFP®, breaks down the real questions to ask before you trust someone with your money.

Inheriting money is rarely simple, especially when grief and financial decisions collide. Here's where to start.

An extension buys you more than time to file. Here's how to actually use the next few months before October 15.

Katherine Leonard, CPA and CFP in Newport Beach, helped a client going through divorce figure out what her settlement was really worth, and what to do with her financial life after.

Filing a tax extension isn't just about meeting the October deadline. Learn to use your nearly completed tax return to identify Roth conversion opportunities, adjust estimated tax payments, and make smarter financial decisions before year-end.

Business owners and real estate investors often treat an LLC and insurance as interchangeable. They're not. Here's what each actually protects, where the gaps show up, and how to layer them correctly, with real client examples from Newport Beach and Corona del Mar.

Most clients set up a trust and an LLC separately and never go back to check that the two fit together. Here's why the trust should generally hold the LLC's membership interest, not the reverse, and why getting the sequencing right takes an estate planning attorney and a CPA working in coordination.

The LLC formed years ago, back when the business was small, often can't contain the risk of what's since been built. Here's how to know when it's time to restructure, and how that decision connects to your estate plan.

Selling your California home? Untracked renovation costs can mean paying tax on gains you didn't actually make. Katherine Leonard, CPA CFP® explains why tracking your basis is crucial.

Every California LLC owner knows about the $800. Few realize there's a second, much larger fee hiding behind it, and that it's based on revenue, not profit. Here's the real math once a business crosses seven figures.

Forming an LLC feels like the finish line, but it's usually just the starting point. Here's what a California LLC actually shields you from, and the everyday habits that quietly void that protection.

Most generic advice on forming an LLC is written for a business with nothing to protect. Here's how the decision actually plays out for an established Orange County business owner, and why the LLC and the S corp election aren't the same decision.

If you earn a high income in California, you already know that you cannot contribute directly to a Roth IRA. The income limit phases out well below what most high earners in Newport Beach and coastal Orange County make in a given year.

Almost every parent with significant assets asks this quietly: will this inheritance help my children or work against everything we tried to teach them? Here is how to structure it well.

Every major financial decision has tax consequences.

Changing jobs, exercising stock options, retiring, selling a business, purchasing a home, or converting to a Roth IRA all affect more than one part of your financial life. Coordinating taxes, investments, and financial planning before making these decisions can help avoid costly surprises and create better long-term outcomes.

If you earn income that is not subject to automatic withholding, the IRS and the State of California expect you to pay taxes throughout the year, not just on April 15. That is the concept behind quarterly estimated tax payments, and for high earners in California, it is one of the most commonly misunderstood obligations in the tax code.

This post answers the questions I hear most often: who owes estimated taxes, how much to pay, when the payments are due, and what happens if you miss a deadline.

Leaving a retirement account to your children versus your church can mean a very different tax outcome. Here are the tools that make giving part of your estate plan, not just your budget.

An inheritance and a legacy are not the same thing. Here is how Christian families in Newport Beach can build stewardship and generosity into an estate plan, not just an asset transfer.

Many Christian families in Corona del Mar, Newport Beach, and throughout Orange County give consistently to their church and favorite ministries but have never connected that giving to their tax plan. Here is how a donor-advised fund can do both at once.

Tithing is a priority for many Christian families, not a tax deduction. But how that giving is structured, through bunching, appreciated stock, or a donor-advised fund, can determine how far it actually goes.