The tax situation described by OP would take more like 2 hours, not 20. The exception would be if bookkeeping is included, but I bet it’s not. And CPAs don’t get all that education and training so they know how to prepare the ultra-complicated tax return of a freelancer with a few 1099s. If you have employees or complicated accounting or whatever, yeah, hire a CPA. But their expertise is overkill here.
Source: have done my own semi-complicated taxes (multiple businesses, multiple states, real estate investments, mix of retirement accounts) for 20+ years, never been audited. Had a CPA do them for a few years, it was fine, but nothing I can’t easily do myself.
But what about the opportunity cost? Wouldn't you rather do what your passionate about and good at, not taxes? How do you know you weren't missing out on deductions, leaving money on the table?
I understand what you’re saying, I wrestled with this myself for years.
But in the end, I feel pretty confidant that a CPA isn’t going to find some magical (legal) deduction in OPs situation that TurboTax wouldn’t find. And I consider it my responsibility as a business owner to understand the basics of finances, accounting, bookkeeping, taxes, etc. It’s not that complicated at this level, any software engineer can pretty easily grasp this stuff with a little effort.
Also, CPAs are human and make mistakes, something I’ve personally encountered multiple times. So unless you check their work, how do YOU know you aren’t missing out on deductions or overpaying even if you do use a CPA? But then we’re right back to opportunity cost and expertise.
I don’t think using a CPA is a horrible idea, but you’re overstating the difficulty and risk of doing it yourself.
As I said elsewhere in this thread, the real value for me is in paying for bookkeeping and advice, but I doubt OPs $1800 includes much of either of those.
There is a reason that many tax prep services and CPAs give free reviews to folks who do their own taxes, because it's common to find meaningful deductions and mistakes that cost real money.
As a business owner I feel that its my responsibility to understand the basics of finance, accounting, bookkeeping also. I also know when it's time to ask for help and get advice and checks and balances. It's called due diligence.
You are just assuming that you've done it awesome without ever even checking. Maybe once in 10 years get it double checked, you could have been leaving a lot of money on the table and not even known it. You just say your smart, awesome at taxes, but have not proven it to yourself. Companies pay external firms to do audits all the time for exactly this reason. It's a complex subject, the laws change every year, and a good CPA (yes, there are bad ones, but again that's part of the responsibility of running a business is vetting the people you trust) will keep you up to date with those changes and help you minimize your tax burden. Mine also gives me advice, helps me when I have a business or finance question with real experience from his other clients. Who better to learn these things from than a CPA? It's not as if we come out of school just knowing this stuff. It's like a doctor, they know stuff, provide value way beyond just looking up symptoms on webmd.
Again, I used a CPA multiple times, and it sounds like your tax situation and your interests are such that it makes sense for you to use a CPA. That doesn’t mean it makes sense for a freelancer with a few 1099s to use one.
Yes, no bookkeeping with the annual $1800 fee. They do however give me quarterly estimates and remind me when to pay them, but that seems like a simple calculation I can do myself moving forward. I have 6+ years of returns they did at this point, so plenty of info to cross reference if I get stuck using turbo tax or similar.
Source: have done my own semi-complicated taxes (multiple businesses, multiple states, real estate investments, mix of retirement accounts) for 20+ years, never been audited. Had a CPA do them for a few years, it was fine, but nothing I can’t easily do myself.