Professional Services as an Expense?

[Eric Belgau]

My keyword settings keep me seeing forum posts about LLCs. Inevitably, discussions of LLCs (and the constellation of issues related to them) reinforce the need to work with professionals: attorneys and CPAs especially.

I also hungrily read the deal analyses because I'm here to learn from the BP sages how to go about building my portfolio when the time comes.

The deal analyses don't include a line item for Professional Services. We all need them sometimes; most of us should probably use legal and financial advice more than we do.

So I wonder, especially from the more experienced BP members who have done a lot of deals over many years and can see a realistic average, what should I project for professional services per property per year, if I'm going to build a portfolio over time?

I'd expect to deal with evictions, other tenant issues, disputes with contractors, tax complexity, etc., etc.

Is there a reason why professional services isn't a line item in deal analyses?