What We Do

Services

Three core areas built around the decisions that matter most to a business owner — supported by compliance and contract leadership work where it makes sense.

Core Practice

01 — Estate, Succession & Family Office

Structuring for the Next Generation

Estate and succession planning is where tax technique and family reality collide. The structure has to be technically sound — but it also has to work for the people inside it, sometimes across three generations with genuinely competing expectations.

This practice brings both: the In-Depth technical grounding to design and implement the structure, and the experience to navigate the family, ownership, and C-suite dynamics that determine whether it holds.

  • Estate freezes — locking in current value and transferring future growth
  • Pipeline transactions and post-mortem planning
  • Discretionary family trusts, alter ego trusts, and trust wind-ups
  • Section 86 share exchanges and share capital reorganizations
  • Corporate reorganizations under ss. 55, 85, 86, 88, 97 and 98 ITA
  • Multi-entity group design and holding company structures
  • Intergenerational transfers and next-generation ownership planning
  • Family office tax structuring and coordination with existing advisors

Ideal for

Owner-managers planning succession Family principals and family offices Multi-generational business families Estate advisors and legal counsel Executors and estate trustees

Deliverables may include

Structure diagrams Step plans Legal instruction letters Technical memos Family briefing sessions

02 — Sale & Purchase Readiness

The Work That Happens Before the Process Starts

Most owners bring in tax advice when the letter of intent arrives. By then the structure is largely fixed, and the opportunity to improve the outcome has narrowed to the margins.

The highest-value transaction work happens well before a process begins — purifying the balance sheet, confirming QSBC status, resolving the issues diligence will surface, and structuring so the eventual sale is efficient rather than merely completed.

For buyers, the work is the mirror image: understanding what you're acquiring, what it carries with it, and how to structure entry so the eventual exit works too.

  • Pre-sale readiness — purification, LCGE and QSBC qualification, structural clean-up
  • Sell-side diligence preparation and vendor tax review
  • Buy-side tax due diligence — exposures, attributes, and structuring risk
  • Asset versus share purchase analysis and structuring
  • Acquisition vehicles, holdco / opco arrangements, and partnership or JV entry and exit
  • Purchase price allocation and ACB step-up planning
  • Section 116 obligations on non-resident dispositions
  • Post-sale planning — proceeds structuring and reinvestment
  • Business and non-tax considerations — integration, separation, and operational readiness

Ideal for

Owners preparing for eventual sale Owners in an active process Strategic and financial buyers Management buyout teams Private equity sponsors M&A counsel and deal advisors

Deliverables may include

Sale readiness assessments Due diligence reports Exposure quantification Structure comparisons Closing support

03 — Tax Planning for Business Owners

Ongoing Advice, Not an Annual Filing

For an owner-managed business, corporate and personal tax planning are the same exercise. How you pay yourself, what the corporation holds, how investment income is taxed, and what happens to retained earnings all interact — and the CCPC rules that govern them are unforgiving of decisions made without a full picture.

This is the ongoing advisory relationship: proactive planning through the year, not a conversation that happens once the year is already closed.

  • Owner compensation strategy — salary, dividends, and the integration between them
  • CCPC passive income rules — SBD grind, RDTOH, CDA and GRIP
  • Holding company structuring for wealth preservation and asset protection
  • Corporate investment portfolio tax planning
  • Purification and ongoing LCGE / QSBC qualification maintenance
  • Annual and in-year planning, with proactive year-end review
  • Integration of corporate and personal tax positions
  • Structuring ahead of financing, expansion, or ownership change

Ideal for

Owner-managed businesses Professional corporations Owners with corporate investments Multi-entity owner groups Founders planning ahead

Engagement formats

Annual advisory retainer Quarterly planning sessions Project-based review
Also Available

Engaged alongside the core advisory practice, most often as continuing support to existing clients.

Compliance & CRA Controversy

Filing, Defence, and Resolution

Compliance is offered primarily as continuing support to advisory and planning clients — the natural extension of work already underway rather than a standalone service line.

CRA controversy work stands somewhat apart. Audits, transfer pricing reviews, and GAAR assessments require a particular combination of technical grounding and judgment about when to negotiate and when to hold. That experience is available where it's needed.

  • T2 corporate returns and current / deferred tax provisions
  • T1, trust and partnership compliance
  • CRA and provincial audit management and defence
  • Transfer pricing reviews
  • GAAR assessments and responses
  • Notices of objection and appeals support
  • Voluntary disclosures and taxpayer relief (fairness) requests
  • Foreign reporting — T1134, T1135 and T106 filings

A note on scope

Standalone annual compliance without an advisory relationship generally isn't the best use of this practice — or your budget. We'll say so directly if that's the situation.

Ideal for

Existing advisory clients Taxpayers under CRA audit Businesses facing reassessment Taxpayers with disclosure exposure

VP Tax & Interim CFO Engagements

Contract Senior Leadership

Some organizations need senior tax judgment consistently — but not enough of it to justify a permanent executive hire. Others need experienced leadership to bridge a gap, stabilize a function, or carry the organization through a period of change.

Contract VP Tax and Interim CFO engagements provide that: embedded, accountable senior leadership for the period it's required. These engagements are taken on selectively, so that the core advisory practice remains the priority.

  • Contract VP Tax engagements with corporations and family offices
  • Interim CFO and senior finance leadership
  • Building or reviewing an internal tax function
  • Tax accounting and current / deferred tax provisions for multi-entity groups
  • Senior oversight of external advisor relationships
  • Board and ownership reporting on tax risk and position

Ideal for

Family offices Private corporations without in-house tax Companies between CFO hires PE portfolio companies

Engagement formats

Fractional / part-time Fixed-term interim Project-based leadership

Background Experience

Business Advisory

Recent years at a national mid-market firm included leading business advisory workstreams on complex private equity engagements — carve-outs and separations, post-close integration and entity rationalization, cost optimization, process improvement, data rationalization, and ERP and back-office system implementations, through to sell-side exit support.

This isn't the focus of the practice today. It's noted because it informs how transactions are approached — with a working understanding of what actually happens operationally once a deal is signed.

Not sure which service fits?

Start with a conversation. We'll identify where senior tax advice will make the biggest difference — or tell you honestly if it won't.

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