Are legal and accounting fees cash flow dream killers?

[Juan F. Saa]

I recently got started with great excitement in RE investing in single family turnkey properties, have spent a lot of time learning about the wonders of cash flow, and just refinanced my primary residence to cash out and invest in two new construction properties with good numbers. I have been very conservative factoring my expenses and determined that my cash flow for each would be close to $300 per unit. Pretty good from my rookie perspective.

Only after I began researching more closely have I come to find that CPA services that include tax advise starting at $150 per month plus return filing fees around $1000 per form are not uncommon. Some "nice" packages like silver, gold, and platinum offered by a firm run from $3000 to $9000 per year for just three properties.

In all my learning the suggestion of using CPAs and attorneys came up occasionally, sometimes as an afterthought, and only a couple of times I saw them used in examples with numbers that had no major impact (e.g. $27/month on a proforma... really!!?!??). At this point I am wondering whether I have started backwards and the whole CPA/attorney factor has even a bigger impact than the typical taxes and insurance on a proforma to influence the decision of whether to get in the passive investment business or not, and not necessarily for the bright side of the tax deductions.

My question is: am I missing something or can I truly expect to give up most, if not all (probably to a loss) my cash flow just for financial advice and its related “advantages” or “protection”? Would I be passively investing only for actively feeding my advisors and have almost nothing left to show in my monthly income? I know I could opt for doing much or most of the work myself but that would defeat my goal of independence by unwittingly getting into a second and less-enjoyable job, besides my current full time which I do still love.

Please excuse the rant but today I feel very much down after several months of continuous highs, to the point that I am even reconsidering the mess I might be getting into. I sincerely hope someone can reply showing me how I am wrong in all this and provide the much needed insight to rekindle the fire :).

God bless.