Looking for RE Attorney and CPA that specialize in NY and PA

[Ceasar Rosas]

Hey BP members,

I'm looking for real estate attorneys and CPA's that specialize in partnerships and LLC's based out of Bronx and Westchester, NY and the Poconos region of Pa. I have several LLC's one done by an attorney, one done by a CPA(which I may keep working with). These have been formed for flipping purposes with partners who are funding the deals. After a few deals, I'm looking for the best way to structure this moving forward and would like experts preferably under one roof to help me set this up. Any recommendations?

[Chris K.]

@Ceasar Rosas

I know a few attorneys that are admitted to both the PA Bar and NY Bar. That said, almost all of them focus on one state more than the other. Note that some areas of law are easier than others to practice over multiple states. Unfortunately, I don’t think transactional real-estate/contract law is one of them. I did some real-estate work in NY for banking clients and I was shocked by how different the law and customs were between the two states.

CPAs have it a bit easier since they mainly focus on Federal Taxes (which is uniform). For State Tax issues, you might be better off working together with a local expert. For example, Assessment Appeals or PA Realty Transfer Tax issues are “tax issues” in Pennsylvania. But most people get them resolved through an attorney instead of a CPA.

As someone who owns non-US investment properties and has to deal with legal/accounting issues in another country, I can definitely sympathize with wanting to get everything done under one roof. Unfortunately, my experience has been that the options are limited without paying high fees. Incidentally, this is one of the reasons why larger businesses work with very expensive, large firms. A 2,000 lawyer firm can work with the business to work on multi-state/multi-national deals. But in exchange, you pay a very high fee.

Structure wise, it depends on what you are looking for. I'm personally not a big fan of creating any crazy structures for most real-estate matters. Notably, I'm not a big fan of creating deep vertical structures (i.e. where one LLC owns a subsidiary LLC that owns a sub-subsidiary LLC, etc.) unless you have a very good reason to do so.

Disclaimer: While I’m an attorney licensed to practice in PA, I’m not your attorney. What I wrote above does not create an attorney/client relationship between us. I wrote the above for informational purposes. Do not rely on it as legal advice. Always consult with your attorney before you rely on the above information.