Mike Isaac, EA

From the lending side of the desk

My career did not start with tax returns. It started in commercial banking, where I spent four years as a loan analyst deciding whether businesses were worth lending to. That work is financial statements read backwards: not what does this say, but what is it hiding. Cash flow that does not support the debt. Receivables that never turn into money. A profitable year on paper and an owner who cannot make payroll.

You learn quickly that the statements are only as honest as the books underneath them, and that the number on the bottom line matters far less than whether it can be relied on. That is still how I read a set of books.

Then the accounting side

I moved into US public accounting in 2019, as a staff accountant at a Massachusetts practice. That was full-charge work: monthly close, bank and credit-card reconciliations, general ledger cleanup, payroll tax filings, and Massachusetts sales, meals and excise returns through MassTaxConnect. Small businesses, all of it hands-on, none of it delegated.

From 2022 to 2026 I was a Senior Accountant in Business Advisory Services at a regional accounting firm in Greater Boston. There I prepared and reviewed federal and state returns across the range — Forms 1040, 1065, 1120-S, 1120 and 990 — for individuals, pass-through entities, corporations and nonprofits. I evaluated source documents, K-1s, trial balances and year-end workpapers, resolved the inconsistencies before anything reached a partner, built tax projections and estimated payments, and handled IRS and Massachusetts DOR notices. I also supervised and trained junior staff.

Reviewing other people’s returns for four years is a particular kind of education. You stop seeing returns and start seeing the patterns — the same handful of mistakes, made the same way, year after year, almost all of them preventable months before anyone opened the software.

Why that combination matters to you

Bookkeeping, tax and lending are usually three separate conversations with three separate people, and the gaps between them are where owners lose money. A structure chosen for tax reasons that makes you unfinanceable. Books kept for compliance that cannot answer a single business question. A loan application built on statements nobody reconciled.

Because I have worked all three, they stay in one conversation. When we look at an S-corp election, we look at what it does to your tax and what it does to how a lender reads you. When we clean up your books, they get built to survive both a tax return and a credit review.

Credentials

• IRS Enrolled Agent — a federal credential, the highest the IRS awards. Enrolled Agents hold unlimited rights to represent taxpayers before the IRS on audits, collections and appeals, in all fifty states. A preparer without a credential does not.
• CPA Exam Candidate — Massachusetts Board of Public Accountancy.
• IRS Authorized e-file Provider and QuickBooks ProAdvisor.
• B.S., Accounting & Business Administration (2013), plus certificates in International Electronic Accounting (2014), Banking & Finance (2017), and HR & Communication (2018).

Track record

1. Present

   TaxMap Advisors · Stoneham, MA

   Independent tax, bookkeeping and advisory practice.

2. 2022–2026

   Senior Accountant, Business Advisory · Regional accounting firm, Greater Boston

   Prepared and reviewed federal and state returns for individuals, pass-through entities, corporations and nonprofits — Forms 1040, 1065, 1120-S, 1120 and 990. Built tax projections and estimated payments, resolved IRS and Massachusetts DOR notices, and supervised and trained junior staff.

3. 2019–2022

   Staff Accountant · Public accounting practice, Massachusetts

   Full-charge bookkeeping and monthly close, payroll tax filings, and Massachusetts sales, meals and excise returns.

4. 2015–2019

   Loan Analyst · Commercial bank

   Credit risk, cash flow and financial statement analysis; credit memoranda and portfolio monitoring.

Returns and systems

Forms 1040, 1065, 1120-S, 1120, 990, Schedules C and E, K-1 reporting, Forms 941, 940, W-2 and W-3, and Massachusetts sales, meals, excise and DUA filings.

Day to day I work in CCH Axcess, QuickBooks Online & Desktop, CaseWare, ProSeries, Drake, OLT Pro and MassTaxConnect, alongside CaseWare, XCM, SurePrep, EFTPS and the payroll platforms most clients already run.

Who the practice fits

Owner-operated businesses that have outgrown once-a-year filing. People who have realised their books are not good enough to make decisions from. Anyone weighing an S-corp election, or holding an IRS notice they do not want to answer alone.

It fits less well if you want the cheapest possible return and nothing else. That is a real need and there are good places to meet it. This is not one of them.