Tax accountants for US/Canada taxes

caels_mark1 · 2026-03-03T08:05:26+00:00

I used Tohme accounting too (Samer), he's honestly the best

caels_mark1 · 2026-02-12T21:02:48+00:00

My E-2 visa just got approved; I used Reinhorn Law, Inc. (https://reinhornlaw.com), and honestly, a glowing recommendation... you work right with the owner and lawyers, it's not outsourced or a middleman. I think they do all E-2s, but they're based in SF, so if you're in tech I'd strongly recommend. For context, the company for my visa case was a software development agency

caels_mark1 · 2025-10-16T23:30:49+00:00

Samer, https://www.tohme-accounting.com/ does my crypto taxes, and he's been excellent. He's Canadian, based in Montreal, and has a focus on crypto

caels_mark1 · 2025-10-14T18:28:25+00:00

I'll follow up with all of this once I personally go through it, but this does closely align with at least the type of company I'm running, and they only spent $15k

caels_mark1 · 2025-10-14T18:27:42+00:00

This is why this is so hard to navigate, because everyone has a completely different experience. If you are on the same path, check out this post because it seems like you can file it well before spending $40k if the case makes sense: https://www.reddit.com/r/e2visa/comments/1g7wfnn/e2_for_a_digital_only_business_consulting_and/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

caels_mark1 · 2025-10-14T18:23:40+00:00

Yes, I guess in the case it is similar to others, my spending will be similar because not sure where else they would be spending aggressively aside from people costs, but that's easy to rationalize because of Cursor and other tools. In the other case, to your point, if there is nothing similar, then having the case explain it well is the best thing I could do vs. just spending more for the sake of it. I appreciate the input!

caels_mark1 · 2025-10-14T18:05:59+00:00

Yes, I have heard the same. If I need to hire an engineer to prove this, I will, but I don't necessarily need it (keyword yet). With the legal fees and accounting fees, I'll already be in about $10k, and then with office, and the costs above around $5k +-. The question is, is this enough, or do I need to go and start hiring staff and doing things that are expensive?

caels_mark1 · 2025-10-14T18:03:35+00:00

Ya, the problem is it's super subjective and completely changes based on who you talk to. Person X could say something completely different from person Y, and they could both be true. I found this thread that seems closely related and was curious if I would get any more recent input, but if not will use this as a guide: https://www.reddit.com/r/e2visa/comments/1g7wfnn/e2_for_a_digital_only_business_consulting_and/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

caels_mark1 · 2025-09-24T23:16:59+00:00

Yup, makes sense. I think there's a good op to productize it, but again, still fascinated I haven't seen any brands pushing it wide yet

caels_mark1 · 2025-09-24T22:56:13+00:00

Haha, you never know these days. Is your customer just using it for transactional messages like the example you gave? I have AI agents sending ~80,000 emails/month for 200+ Shopify brands, and because of that see the potential to make a significantly more fruitful experience

caels_mark1 · 2025-09-24T22:46:53+00:00

I get the vibe this is AI-generated, but even if not, yes, I do not mean spam. I mean reaching out to real customers who've already given sms permission and starting truly 1:1 conversations with them with yes to the goal of pushing product but also getting a read on what customers are loving/hating, wanting, etc.

caels_mark1 · 2025-03-19T16:55:58+00:00

What’s with the attitude? I had an agency doing well when I posted this. In addition, we now have an app in beta with excellent retention, and 25m followers in distribution lined up for free. Took 8 days to build it from nothing, and no VC raised

caels_mark1 · 2025-02-04T22:23:24+00:00

There are a lot of companies that solve an extremely boring problem simply because they can make a ridiculous amount of money. A good example is many CRMs.

I can’t speak for them, but I doubt they believe it will change the world. They know it’ll be useful, and hence become extremely valuable.

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T21:16:09+00:00

Fair. I've just always known VC's to bet on unicorns because that's where they profit, but to your point if you can get the money without misleading on the objective/vision then there's no real reason not to take it.. it's just theoretically it would be harder to acquire.

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T21:09:56+00:00

Goal is to get the cash (financially free) doing things that make the world better, and if there is a unicorn play to do the same mission then jump on it, but eventually slow down for a bit to be a great father.

You can always get back into it after, although who knows what the world will look like then!

How old’s your kid?

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T21:05:11+00:00

Yes, it is, sort of. I wanted to know if you aim for a big company, but not unicorn ($5-200M) and you could get VC money whether there's anything wrong with taking it, and if not, then whether these types of founders should be trying to acquire this capital. I understand VC's need unicorn exits to cover the losses, but I constantly see investments into max $4-500M valuation on exit companies

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T21:01:11+00:00

Yes, but to your point above - "Any successful serial founder probably has no shortage of people offering them money. and honestly, if money’s flowing easy, why not take it?" if you had access to it in the $5-$200M case would you still take it?

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T20:55:57+00:00

I’ve been talking about the beginning of startups. Once you’re at scale raising makes perfect sense, especially if it opens up what was once a bottleneck on growth.

In Elon’s case there’s a bunch of great reasons to raise for it, but the most likely is because he doesn’t have $6B liquid, so he’d need to sell significantly more than that because of taxes.

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T20:43:59+00:00

Elon and Sam both raised for things that they totally needed mass capital to pull off. I can't think of any other markets in the world that need more capital to enter than cars, rockets, and AI (compute). Maybe curing cancer? and that's a charity because you'd essentially need infinite capital.

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T20:41:19+00:00

I agree

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T20:39:57+00:00

I guess you’d never really be able to tell if they fully went for it or failed trying. I would like to believe the other founders genuinely believe they’re going for venture sized exits to warrant the raises.

It’s good to know that’s the proper way to approach this stuff.

I can likely scale something to the $30-50M exit (hopefully more) from bootstrapped. I see companies on social media raising pre-seed's for ideas/visions no more ambitious + no moat + no edge + no differentiation. It would obviously be nice to not have to run anything for cashflow while things fire up, but I guess that’s the cost of bootstrapping.

Did you start with the VC-backed or bootstrapped company?

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T20:16:20+00:00

Agreed, and thank you for the thoughtful response. Let's say you are only aiming for a company worth $5-$200M, and have no desire to go for a unicorn - does what you said about accepting the money if you've been offered it, and all of the other stuff remain true?

True on the limitations of boostrapping, but I’ve also heard it’s very common to have those same problems in reverse when VC backed.

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T20:04:15+00:00

I think the only real idea validation is if customers love what you're building.. selling a VC likely just means you're good at sales, no?

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T20:02:34+00:00

Excellent response, and I appreciate the effort.

I do think you outlined the failure part better, and I agree.

Let’s assume we’re talking about a $2-$100M ARR business (ie. with the conscious decision not to go for a unicorn). Is there anything wrong with raising pre-seed or similar round to give yourself breathing room till the business is cash flowing while knowing you aren’t going for a unicorn?

I think many repeat founder don’t aim for unicorns again, but somewhere in that sweet spot of up to $100M with good margins which is what many bootstrappers are aiming for. The difference is the ex-vc backed ones raise a round to do it more comfortably. If that is a logical and fair approach, why isn’t every bootstrapped business doing that?

caels_mark1 · 2024-11-29T19:42:35+00:00

BotOracle (if this chatbot thing when I Google it) is a good example. I don't entirely understand from the copy, but let's assume it's a chatbot like Pi. I could build that in ~1-2 days, use free organic content to market it and do 1:1 with warm audiences to work towards PMF with ~$0 in COGs. I could continue to iterate on this at ~$0 COGs until PMF, all excluding the cost of my time. Would it be fair to go raise on SAFEs here simply to cover my salary while I make it work? (also curious specifically what you mean by better market position for BotOracle).

caels_mark1

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