Accounting and Tax Services for Property Maintenance Businesses in Canada
Being a property maintenance company requires you to deal with more than just homes. You oversee crews, vehicles and equipment, seasonal demand, customer contracts, fuel costs, invoices, and taxes. If you're in the pest control business, or junk pick-up, snow removal, or a general property maintenance company, you need to make sure your finances match what is going on in the field.
Online Accountant offers cloud accounting, bookkeeping and tax solutions to property service companies in Canada. We help you see where your money goes, plan taxes before they get in your way and make better choices with numbers that you can trust.
From Pest Control to Snow Removal
Your Business Runs on the Field
No business, especially a property maintenance company, is 9 to 5.
The pest control company might have contracts that are repeated, costs of chemicals and equipment, wages for the technicians and service vehicles. The costs of a junk removal company include disposal charges, fuel, truck expenses, and variable workload. Many snow removal companies experience extremely heavy demand during the winter months, need to finance equipment, and have to deal with the expense of fuel and subcontractors; for a company that performs property maintenance, landscaping, seasonal projects, exterior maintenance and recurring commercial contracts, these can be bundled together.
Landscaping and seasonal maintenance of properties are included in the services to buildings and dwellings sector by Statistics Canada. It does include seasonal property maintenance, including snow ploughing in winter, and landscaping in other seasons.
One of the significant financial challenges is that of seasonality. Expenses for equipment, vehicles, labour and insurance may be constant, while revenue could spike during a specific season.
Then there is tax. When your fuel, equipment, commercial insurance, advertising, salaries, repairs and motor vehicle expenses are within the scope of the CRA's requirements, they can impact taxable business income. Records of business use are a requirement for vehicle deductions as well.
This is where accountancy assistance becomes valuable and seeing an accountant who has an understanding of how your business operates is an advantage.
Your Software Should Connect
the Office to the Job Site
Property service companies are gaining a greater reach into the digital world. Everything from scheduling to invoicing, customer management, estimates, payments and accounting can occur on a variety of platforms.
You may be employing a tool for field service and payment, such as Jobber, ServiceTitan, Housecall Pro, Yardbook, QuickBooks Online, Xero, Stripe or Square, to handle various aspects of the business.
All of this data should not be isolated in your accounting system.
Online Accountant's cloud-based solutions help to simplify your finances and provide you with cleaner books and more valuable reporting.
Online Accountant is a Xero Gold Partner Champion and QuickBooks Online Elite Partner and can help businesses create an accounting workflow around the tools they utilize.
The Financial Pressure Looks
Different Across Property Services
Pest Control Businesses
Recurring service contracts can generate fixed revenue, but profitability requires technician labour, vehicles, chemicals and equipment, insurance, and customer acquisition costs.
We support your revenue and cost tracking by service line, recurring revenue tracking and margin identification.
Junk Removal Companies
There are costs associated with each job besides labour. An apparently lucrative job can be eaten up by the costs of fuel for the trucks, disposal and tipping fees, equipment, repairs and driving time.
When financial reporting is accurate on the job level, you know what each job is really bringing into your bottom line.
Snow Removal Businesses
A prime example of seasonal cash-flow pressure is snow removal. The cost of trucks, plows, salt, maintenance and labour can be a big expense beforehand or throughout the season, and the income can be received under contract, invoice or completed work.
Well done to those of you who have done a good job of preparing for the lean periods through good accounting, rather than finding a lack of cash at the end of the season!
Property Maintenance Businesses
If a business is providing lawn care, landscaping, seasonal services, exterior maintenance and other services to properties, there can be a huge difference in profitability between the various services.
The right reporting can highlight which contracts, crews and services are delivering healthy margins.
Accounting That Helps You
Keep More of What You Earn
Bookkeeping is a first step only. The business value of financial records for a property maintenance company is that it equates to more effective tax and business decisions.
Tax Planning Before Year-End
Finding out your tax liability at the last minute can result in a cash crunch.
We assist you in planning throughout the year by analyzing profitability, expenses, owner compensation, capital purchases and other issues that impact your tax situation.
GST/HST Management
If your business is registered for GST/HST, you must properly record the numbers from customers and the tax on eligible business purchases.
Eligible for input tax credits if you pay GST/HST on operating and capital costs, based on accounting method and circumstances. Helping to ensure your GST/HST records are in order and your remittances are on schedule.
Finding Legitimate Deductions
Vehicles, fuel, repairs, equipment, insurance, advertising, wages and the rest of the costs of running a business can be large items for property service businesses.
Capital cost allowance and other rules typically govern capital purchases, whereas reasonable current expenses that are incurred to earn business income are covered by the CRA. We can point out and classify eligible expenses, ensuring that you aren't forfeiting legitimate tax deductions.
Owner Compensation & Year-End Planning
With an expanding business, it's more than just the amount of money the business generated.
It is also about how to extract cash when it is needed, when big purchases are made, how much cash to keep and how your compensation fits into your overall tax plan. We help you think about these decisions before the year ends, not after the numbers are in.
Know These Numbers Before
They Become Problems
One should know more about a property maintenance company than what their bank account holds. Online Accountant can assist you in keeping track of the monetary KPIs that matter:
Direct labour & operating margin
Are direct labour & operating costs covered by the prices of your services?
Labour cost percentage
What percentage of the revenue is being spent on technicians, seasonal workers and crews?
Cost per crew/technician
Which teams are bringing in the most money?
Job profitability
What are the most profitable jobs and service types?
Vehicle and equipment costs
Are your trucks and machinery earning their keep?
Fuel cost per job
Particularly important for junk removal and snow removal.
Recurring revenue
What percentage of the income is received as a result of maintenance and pest-management contracts?
Accounts receivable
How fast is the collection of commercial customers' accounts?
Seasonal cash flow
Do you have enough cash to cover bills in less busy times of the year?
These numbers are not just a monthly task of accounting but a tool for management.
Who Is Online Accountant Best Suited For?
Our services are particularly well suited to:
Businesses that provide services to owner-operated property who require financial advice, but do not have an accountant on staff.
Newly formed startups and businesses establishing accounting & tax systems correctly from the get-go.
Companies that have scaled up to 5-50 employees and are no longer using basic bookkeeping.
Multi-crew service companies looking to gain better visibility of labour, vehicle and job profitability.
Seasonal businesses that require forward-thinking cash-flow and tax planning.
Existing companies seeking cleaner books, better reporting and a more strategic tax approach.
Whether local or multi-country in Canada, our model will allow you to interact with your accounting team without having to be in a physical office.
What We Can Handle for Your
Property Service Business
Online Accountant can support the financial side of your operation with:
Cloud bookkeeping and financial reporting
Business and personal tax filing
Actively planning for taxes and taking advantage of ways to save on them
Tracking and filing GST/HST.
Payroll and payroll remittances
Accounts payable and accounts receivable
Bank and credit-card reconciliations
Profitability reporting of jobs and services
Year-end accounting
Owner compensation planning
Financial forecasting and cash-flow planning
Accounting-system setup and cleanup
Business advisory and growth planning
We're just trying to keep your properties, customers and crews moving and provide you with financial clarity.
Turn Better Numbers into a
Better-Run Business
When you set up a property maintenance business, you didn't do it to spend your evenings reconciling transactions or to fret about your next tax check.
When it comes to the finances, let Online Accountant take care of that, so you can concentrate on your customers, crews and growth.
Cloud accounting offers more than up-to-date books. It offers you CPA oversight and proactive tax planning. You will gain an understanding of the state of your business and where you can take it next.
Looking for a financial solution to your property service business? Please call Online Accountant today for a consultation.
Contact Online Accountant