Taxes, Deductions, and Retirement: Build a Foundation for Your Future

Camille McDaniel, LPC (00:05.106)
Welcome back and welcome to anybody who happens to be new to the Christ in Private Practice podcast. I have the honor of being able to speak today to Jennie Schottmiller, who happens to be somebody who has been super helpful to a lot of us in the mental health space. And I first saw her online where she will talk about it in a little bit where she was very helpful.

and even helpful to myself and she continues to be very helpful. So I was glad to be able to coordinate time with her because she’s going to talk to us a little bit about what she does with regards to finances and how she helps others in the accounting space. But before we get into that, let me just introduce you all to Jennie. So Jennie is a licensed marriage and family therapist and she’s also a licensed certified public accountant. So

I believe she started off as a CPA. Is that correct Jennie? You did. Yeah. In 2007, she left accounting to focus on health and family. And then after that, she became a marriage and family therapist after some time. And then she opened up her therapy private practice. Well, while she was in that practice, she kind of started realizing that some of her peers were struggling as it related to their own finances. So their accounting, their taxes and budgeting and all of the…

cash management responsibilities that go with having a practice of your own. So then she kind of decided, okay, maybe I’m not going to all the way leave the CPA behind, but she decided to, in addition to her clinical practice, start running something for us called Simple Profit, which offers free resources and low cost educational services to just support small business owners.

And like I said, that’s how I found her online while she was in the process of helping many of us. So thank you so much, Jennie, for taking the time to show up on this podcast with us. Absolutely. So then we’ll jump right on in and I’ll ask the first thing is really like what inspired you to create the Simple Profit Facebook group? Because that group is huge, but I mean, it didn’t start huge, right? It just has grown over some years.

Jennie Schottmiller (02:06.946)
Thank you for having me.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (02:24.314)
What was kind of the inspiration that led you to create this community?

Jennie Schottmiller (02:29.998)
So there were kind of a couple domino effect kind of things where when I first went into private practice and I started realizing that my peers were struggling as you mentioned, as many people in private practice do because we don’t usually have a business background before becoming therapists and going into private practice. And the same is true for most small businesses. Most small businesses that start out…

those business owners did not get a business degree before they became business owners. They learned a skill or they developed some knowledge or they got a degree in an area where it lends itself to starting a business, but that doesn’t mean that they had a business degree before doing so. And at first, when I started hearing my peers’ struggles, I was on the mindset that I had switched careers. And so I wasn’t really at first

Camille McDaniel, LPC (03:00.668)
Right.

Jennie Schottmiller (03:25.384)
super open to it but as I kept hearing these things from people I realized that I needed to change my thinking in terms of what I was sort of here to do and there people basically saying I need help. I have the skills to help and so I started looking for ways to help and one of the ways to help is to develop like a course.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (03:38.802)
Okay.

Okay.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (03:45.812)
Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (03:52.31)
And so I was learning how to do a course and they said start a Facebook group. So I started the Facebook group at first to give a place for people to gather so that then I could offer free resources and point them in for my course if they wanted additional help, support and learning because you don’t really have time to go back to school. Nobody’s gonna go take an accounting class and maybe a marketing class at community college.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (04:02.845)
Okay.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (04:15.452)
No!

And raising kids or, you know, whoever, taking care of elderly parents and all that. Yeah, no, we don’t. So we’re so glad we

Jennie Schottmiller (04:19.874)
while I’m running my small business. That doesn’t happen.

Jennie Schottmiller (04:29.07)
Great, great. So you need an easy way to learn that isn’t necessarily the traditional way.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (04:36.913)
Okay, okay so now

With all of that though, there was something else that kind of came up because when I initially reached out to you, I was just reaching out because I thought, okay, this would be a wonderful skill to talk about and allow the community that listens to this podcast to hear about. I didn’t even actually know that you were a believer in Christ. Because I remember when I wrote it, I was just like, I wrote you a message and I’m like, you know what, whether you believe or not, you know, folks need to know how to handle their finances and their taxes. So that’s across the board. doesn’t matter what your belief is.

Jennie Schottmiller (04:56.846)
Mm-hmm.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (05:09.286)
And it just turned out that you were like, actually, I am a believer in Christ. And I’m like, wow, look at that. I had no idea. So, so with that, though, I’m like, well, let me let me ask her about her journey, you know, in our faith. So, you know, how does like your faith actually shape the approach that you take, you know, like, I guess, as a CPA and as a therapist?

Jennie Schottmiller (05:10.094)
you

Jennie Schottmiller (05:32.344)
Well, as you said, everyone needs to know the information that I’m teaching and helping and whatever anyone’s belief, they can use therapy and they can use CPAs. But, and I don’t talk about this a lot, but I thought I’ll go ahead and share it here. So I come from a family of some ministers. We have ministers in our backgrounds. My great-grandfather was a minister and his son, my uncle was, great-uncle was a minister. And so my grandmother is the daughter of a minister.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (05:37.78)
Mm-hmm.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (05:59.495)
Okay.

Jennie Schottmiller (05:59.674)
And I have not always been the same denomination of Christianity. We’ve evolved. family, had like, we went to my family’s church when I was little. And then my mother who was divorced didn’t feel very supported in that community. And so we went to another, you know, Christian community where I spent high school, junior high and high school and great.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (06:06.0)
Okay.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (06:19.87)
Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (06:24.192)
just youth groups and choir and really a time in your life when you really can use that kind of thing. And then I became a different denomination when I got married the first time and then now I am a different denomination as in my second marriage. So I have always had Christianity and belief in Jesus and Christ and in core values related to

Camille McDaniel, LPC (06:30.862)
Okay.

Jennie Schottmiller (06:54.222)
helping and wanting to do good in the world, regardless of where I’ve actually attended services. And in looking at your questions before today, I thought, okay, well, what kind of represents who I am? And I found Proverbs 3.27, do not withhold good from those to whom it is due when it is in your power to do it. And I think that really fits with where I was when I started Simple Profit, where I wasn’t

Camille McDaniel, LPC (06:57.722)
Okay. Mm-hmm. Yes.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (07:18.132)
okay. Okay.

Jennie Schottmiller (07:23.874)
hearing the struggles. I was focused on what I had thought was my focus and then I needed to shift and it was important for who I am to shift and say I have this knowledge and ability and in addition to knowledge and ability I have a weirdly large capacity for helping and I work a lot of hours. I have a large family on top of that and people will say do you sleep? How do you do it?

Camille McDaniel, LPC (07:29.181)
Yes.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (07:45.574)
Okay.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (07:52.873)
Right. Now I will, I’m not gonna lie. I have wondered that. Cause I’m like, how is she everywhere?

Jennie Schottmiller (07:53.708)
don’t know how I do it.

Jennie Schottmiller (08:00.066)
How is she everywhere and how is she so responsive? And I try to be very responsive to, you know, messages and I’ve had to develop some to manage my ADHD so I can manage it, but I just have a large capacity and I think that comes from just what I was blessed with. Just that’s what I got. That’s what I got. And my single mother who just couldn’t stop.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (08:04.882)
Yes.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (08:13.651)
Okay.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (08:21.236)
Okay.

Jennie Schottmiller (08:27.203)
She had to do what she had to do and she was a great inspiration and example for me. So that’s sort of where my journey has led me here.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (08:35.474)
Thank you. That actually, that’s a wonderful journey. I mean, definitely multi layered, but like at the end of it, I love the scripture that you shared with that because it’s saying where you can do good, do it. Don’t withhold the gifts and talents that you have from the world around it, around you, because we definitely do need it. Okay. So then tell us about, you know, the financial wisdom. Like so, because we…

We definitely, we need to know more about, especially I’ll say for those who who do have a belief in Christ, it’s also important for us to be able to bring things back to our belief. So it kind of makes sense as to why should you do a certain thing this way, if you happen to be aligning yourself with Christ? So like, what do you see as far as faith and financial wisdom, when it comes to business owners that

maybe Christian business owners or Christian counselor mental health professionals.

Jennie Schottmiller (09:35.886)
So think one of the things that’s important is to think about why you’re in business. So we know that we go into business because we think we can support ourselves and our families with that. But for most of us, there are other secondary reasons to help, to reach more people, to create a business that has the accessibility to the population that we want to reach. Whatever it is that is your individual goal, if you have that

written down on a post-it somewhere maybe in the front of your mind although it’s probably better if it’s written down somewhere where you can regularly check it and say are the decisions that I’m making aligned with why I’m doing this because it’s just so easy to get off track. It’s life gets in the way we get busy we get focused on what we think our goal is and sometimes we lose track of these secondary or you know they might be primary for you goals of why you’re doing it.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (10:22.195)
Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (10:34.594)
And I think one of the biggest challenges for business owners is being overwhelmed. Because we’re talking about topics when we think about taxes and accounting that aren’t familiar. And if you think back to the very first time you sat in a session with a client, and before you walked into that session, the things that were going through your mind were not, I got this, probably, maybe, but it wasn’t for me, not like,

Camille McDaniel, LPC (10:39.219)
Yes.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (10:59.965)
Right.

but

Jennie Schottmiller (11:04.022)
I know exactly what I’m gonna do if this or that happens. It’s literally like, okay, I think I’m walking into a situation that I’m potentially gonna have no idea how to respond or what to say that will be useful, helpful, therapeutic. And I’m gonna hold my breath and hope for the best. So when you think about accounting and taxes, think about the fact that you now potentially are a comfortable clinician who knows you can handle a variety of scenarios.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (11:06.654)
Yeah, yes.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (11:22.407)
Yes, yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (11:32.888)
but you haven’t always felt that way. And so when you’re learning initially accounting and tax topics, they’re overwhelming because they’re new and they’re unfamiliar. Not because you’re incapable of learning them. We can break it down. We can find ways to make it make sense. I one time had someone tell me that their parent who was a CPA had been trying to explain to them accounting for their entire lives. And I did a video using Red Solo cups.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (11:35.633)
Absolutely.

Jennie Schottmiller (12:01.88)
to explain account and she said, I get it now, I get it now. So one of the things about learning is that we need to find the way that you learn it and then it makes sense to you and everyone can learn these topics.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (12:02.216)
Wow.

Okay.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (12:12.54)
Yes, that’s perfect.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (12:18.99)
Okay, that sounds good. okay, but you mentioned, as you mentioned taxes, that kind of like feeds right into the next thing I wanted to ask because taxes are kind of overwhelming. Not even kind of I mean, they they’re just not like you going back to what you said before, we didn’t go to school for that. That’s not generally where our gifts and talents lie. Although for some of us, this is a second go round job.

Jennie Schottmiller (12:23.49)
Bye.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (12:41.766)
but for others it’s not. So we really do lean on and trust those individuals that we’re going to. Some of us have wonderful experiences with that and some of us do not, right? So, you know, for a lot of us who are, you know, owners and contractors, what are some things we need to be aware of when it comes to deductions or when it comes to like tax benefits that people in our field may not always be aware of but could really benefit us if we were?

Jennie Schottmiller (13:12.034)
Right. kind of what you, what’s important about what you just said is that sometimes you have a good experience with an outside professional that you hired to help you, sometimes you do not. And the, everyone needs to know a few basics because if you know a few basics, you can determine if the person that you have hired to help you is giving you good advice. And if you don’t know a few basics, then you don’t know if you’re getting good advice. And in any profession, there are people who will give

Camille McDaniel, LPC (13:19.7)
Mhm.

Jennie Schottmiller (13:41.368)
good care, good advice, good treatment, good help, good support, and there are those who do not. So there are two things you need from a tax professional or an accounting professional. One is you need to be treated with respect and you’re treating others with respect and you deserve treatment with respect. So if you’re not getting respectful professional treatment, it doesn’t matter how good they are at what their other skills are. And then you also need them. You could have someone that’s very, very nice.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (13:55.002)
Yeah.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (14:04.18)
Thanks.

Jennie Schottmiller (14:10.028)
and just doesn’t know what they’re doing. particularly with deductions, the main thing that people miss with deductions is the general concept of how do you know if it’s a business deduction? And the general concept helps us then determine, well, if I buy this, it going to be a business deduction? We might still need to ask a more specific question, but if we have the general concept, we usually can navigate the nitty gritty stuff a little better. So the general concept is business deductions are things that help you run your business that aren’t

Camille McDaniel, LPC (14:10.344)
Mm-hmm.

Jennie Schottmiller (14:39.598)
Personal so the IRS views us taking care of ourselves self-care medical care grooming Dressing those kinds of things are things we would have to do whether we had a w-2 job or a business or whether we didn’t even work We would still need to do those things. We would still get haircuts. So We those things are considered personal. So I usually think about if it’s for your mind or body It’s probably most likely personal with a couple exceptions. For example self-employed people candid

many times deduct their health insurance premiums. So there’s a few exceptions, but then we say, so we take out the personal stuff. What helps me run the business? Software, advertising, insurance. I wouldn’t buy malpractice insurance if I wasn’t in business. Office supplies, my training, all those kinds of things are gonna be, does it help me run the business? And is it not personal? I can usually then determine whether it’s a deduction. And then I might have to learn a little

Camille McDaniel, LPC (15:24.552)
Right.

Jennie Schottmiller (15:38.338)
beyond that, but that’s the basic concept.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (15:41.1)
Okay, that’s good actually, because when you even mention things that are personal, I see where sometimes there are questions that go out like, hey, you know, I felt like I needed a massage after a rough week with work. Can I take the massage as a tax deduction? Or can I take my outfits if I had to buy new clothes for work? Like, can I take that as a tax deduction? And so it’s good to help us to know so that we’re not committing unintentionally fraud.

Jennie Schottmiller (16:08.46)
And you can think about too, if I worked for let’s say a large mental health community, you know, a community mental health center, or if I work for a hospital system, would they pay for me to have those things? Like I would definitely, if I worked for hospital, have a rough week, now and again. And I would probably need a massage or therapy session or something like that.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (16:26.068)
Yeah.

Jennie Schottmiller (16:30.552)
But would they pay for me to do that? No, they’re not gonna pay for my outfits unless I have to wear scrubs and then it’s a uniform, which is different. We don’t usually wear uniforms in private practice. And so would they pay for that? No. But would they potentially reimburse me if I had to drive from the hospital to a client location or a community center? Yes, they would reimburse me for that drive because I am doing that drive specifically for my job. Would they potentially buy food for a meeting? Yes. So there are…

Camille McDaniel, LPC (16:54.31)
and it it.

Jennie Schottmiller (16:59.476)
That’s one way you can kind of benchmark it.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (17:01.438)
That’s a good way of looking at it. Yeah, that makes it a lot more clear too. Because if especially when you just gave the last example, like, yeah, jobs actually do pay for food when we’re having meetings or when we’re having certain gatherings. But no, they don’t generally pay for like, okay, you know, my my massage or my whatever other service to make me feel better. So that’s okay. Now, when it comes to still along the lines of like, you know,

whether we’re a W-2 or 1099, this one is 1099, because the contractors, we kind of have some different tax challenges there. So with regards to 1099 contractors, like what tips would you give us for the independent contractor so that we can really maximize our deductions?

Jennie Schottmiller (17:46.402)
The independent contractor’s biggest challenge is thinking of themselves as in being in private practice and being business owners because you know that you’re working for someone and getting your revenue there. So you tend to think of yourself more like I’m working for somebody rather than I am independent. So the independent part gets lost in the contractor part. So it’s independent contractor. Even if you’re getting your revenue for someone from some other group or company.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (17:57.235)
Yes.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (18:02.696)
Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (18:14.562)
want to think about it is you’re in private practice. just that you get your revenue from this source, just like maybe a group practice might get their revenue from an insurance company. You’re getting your revenue from a group practice. Everything else after that is the same and you’re entitled to all the same deductions as any private practice owner. So when you’re researching or Googling or trying to learn about it, you need to think of yourself as a private practice owner so that you’re thinking, I get all these deductions. The other thing is that

Contractors have a lot of things already covered. They might not have to pay for a separate EHR They might not have a lot of expenses outside of maybe malpractice They might not have to buy office supplies or clinical supplies but you can think about what are your needs as a private practice owner that works as a contractor and training your own professional development Joining professional organizations that are aligned with your business goals for now or in the future

Camille McDaniel, LPC (19:09.64)
Okay.

Jennie Schottmiller (19:11.616)
are things that you can deduct and you can enhance your clinical work if you do need to buy clinical supplies you can deduct those anything used in sessions so thinking about you are in control of your contractor practice and what do you need along with what are your goals

Camille McDaniel, LPC (19:26.801)
Okay.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (19:31.002)
Okay, that makes sense. Okay, and thank you for clarifying that because that does make sense. Okay, so then the next thing that we all kind of need to know as we are running our business is how to set ourselves up right for retirement. And obviously, I know this is not a retirement planning session, but just, but just on kind of a high level, like, what are some of the options out there? You know, could you just kind of walk us through some of those key considerations that we really do need to think about when we are planning for retirement?

Because I feel like we’re sometimes so focused on trying to run our business that we don’t always, not to say that we never, a lot of us think about retirement, we understand what that is, but we don’t always plan for it the way we need to. So like, what are some things that we need to consider from your perspective?

Jennie Schottmiller (20:17.87)
So there are a couple things I think are things to consider. One is that you can just save $1,000 if that’s all you have. It’s okay to just save $1,000. If you save $1,000 every year for the next 30 years, you’re gonna have some money, and especially if it’s invested. And if you start with $1,000, the next year maybe it’s 1,500, and the next year maybe it’s 3,000. And starting small and building is better than not starting.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (20:33.567)
Right. Okay.

Jennie Schottmiller (20:47.32)
but we also don’t want to beat ourselves up if we haven’t started. So if we look back in the past and we say, wish I would have started 10 years ago, well, it’s not going to be really helpful for us to think about that, even though it might be true. And even though I want to spend a minute on it, we don’t want to dwell on that. We want to think about now and going forward, what will make me feel good in 10 years that I started today? So a couple of things. One, there are personal retirement plans and business retirement plans.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (20:58.706)
Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (21:15.17)
The personal retirement plans are a traditional or a Roth IRA. And you can usually put like seven ish thousand dollars, a little more if you’re age 50 and up, a year in one of those plans or a mixture. Like you could do three thousand one, three thousand and the other. And the difference between them is a traditional IRA saves taxes now and a Roth IRA saves taxes later. So you don’t you pay tax now, but you don’t pay tax in retirement. My opinion from a tax perspective is it’s good to have some of both. If you are

Camille McDaniel, LPC (21:44.253)
Okay.

Jennie Schottmiller (21:45.798)
The more you make, the harder it is to put money in a Roth. But if you can put a little money in a traditional little money in a Roth, then that means you have tax benefits now and tax benefits later and that’s a nice thing to have. And that means that in retirement, when you’re looking at your finances, you’d be like, well, I’ll take this money out and I’m going to pay tax on it. But I have this other pot of money that I can pull and I don’t pay tax and I can manage my taxes in retirement. So that’s why that’s helpful.

Now, if you’ve maxed out what you can put in there, and it changes every year, so you have to look at what, you know, when you listen to this podcast, what’s the, what’s the amount that you can save for this year based on your filing status and your age. But if you max out the personal retirement, which I would recommend doing that first, then, and if you have a little more, you can put open a business retirement. And the main business retirements are SEP IRA, Simple IRA, and 401k. And I’m saying them in those order because that’s simplest to most complex. And you want to pick.

the simplest plan that meets your needs. So a SEP IRA is great for any business owner that doesn’t have employees that have worked for you for three or more years. So that’s most contractors. Most contractors don’t have other employees working for them. And so a SEP IRA lets you save up to about 18 and a half percent of your business profit, which is kind of a lot of money. And it’s like opening a bank account. It’s super easy. It’s the same as your traditional IRA. And so if you

Camille McDaniel, LPC (22:46.429)
way.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (23:05.649)
Yeah, it is.

Jennie Schottmiller (23:11.746)
can say, I happen to max out my traditional IRA and then I’m going to open a SEP, great, you’re done. If you have a practice where you have employees or you want to save more than the SEP allows, then you look at the simple IRA, which lets you save a little more, but has a little more complexity to it. Or if you want to save the most, it’s a 401k, which has the most complexity, the most cost, but it lets you save the most too. So the main thing is max out one of those personal retirement plans first. And after that,

simple IRA or SEP IRA first. If that doesn’t cover what you need to save, then think about a simple. If that doesn’t cover it, think about a 401k.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (23:51.214)
awesome because that’s exactly what I was going to say like okay now what what do all of these mean and what are okay okay and

Jennie Schottmiller (23:59.502)
The more you can save, the more complex and costly the plan is. So if you have that, I’m going to do these two first and then I’m going to think through these three. At least you have a little bit of a roadmap.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (24:10.408)
That sounds good. And then as it relates to those accounts where you do have taxes once you take it out later on in retirement, I know that sometimes that is a concern for people, but isn’t it also the case where by the time you get to retirement age, the amount of tax you’d have to pay is lower?

Jennie Schottmiller (24:28.262)
Usually your income is lower in retirement and that means less tax. So the more earned income you have, the more taxable income you have, the higher your taxes. And so what confuses people is like, but I know there’s all these billionaires out there that aren’t paying taxes because they earned their money in the past and they’re off investments and they’ve already bought their, you know, gigantic mansion. And so they paid taxes when they earned it and now we don’t tax wealth in this country right now. We just tax income.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (24:30.942)
Mm-hmm. Okay.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (24:46.694)
Mmm, yeah. Yeah. Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (24:57.816)
So whatever your taxable income is, the higher your taxable income, the higher tax. So usually in retirement, yes, your income is lower. So your tax rate is typically lower. But again, it depends on personal circumstances and what people’s finances are. People who have inherited money or if over your career you do save a lot, you might have a decent amount of retirement income. But yeah.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (25:20.852)
Okay. Now, just real quick. Now, Jenny, you don’t personally do that. Like said, you have all the knowledge, but when people listen to this, I know people have asked in the group, so I wanna just clarify it on the podcast episode. They’re like, Jenny, can you help me? Can you be my CPA? Like, that’s not what you do though, right?

Jennie Schottmiller (25:39.318)
I do education and support. I help you run your daily business operations and I help make decisions. All the things that your tax professional will not really have time for most of the time to do for you. So for example, I have places people can ask questions. Free questions are limited of course, but then I have other resources where you can ask unlimited questions. And I want people to help.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (25:41.734)
All right, everyone.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (25:48.487)
Okay.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (25:53.971)
Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (26:07.202)
help with that navigation of these issues and questions and making decisions. So I have spreadsheets and things that help people get numbers together so they can decide like should I leave my W-2 job and go full-time into private practice? So I have a spreadsheet that helps people see well after taxes you would have you know this money at an option A and this money in option B. There’s not a lot of people who prepare taxes who take the time to do that kind of detailed analysis as accurately as

Camille McDaniel, LPC (26:18.078)
Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (26:34.03)
they possibly can because they’re busy doing taxes. And if I did taxes, I couldn’t do this. So I’m filling a gap of something that is out there not getting done by very many people. So then I leave it to lots of people who do taxes.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (26:39.027)
Right.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (26:45.318)
Yeah, it’s not. And I think because it’s not being done by very many people when people encounter all the resources that you are providing, I notice sometimes I don’t know if you get the question as much anymore, but sometimes they’re like, well, Jenny, is that something you do? Can I can I be seen by you? Can you help me? Because, you know, when people find someone that they trust, and that is very helpful, then they’re just like, we never want you to go away. Let’s just hold on to the resources. Okay.

Jennie Schottmiller (27:09.59)
No, I get the question every day. Pretty much every day.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (27:13.118)
Okay, so we’re making it clear. Anyone listening to the episode? She has phenomenal resources though, phenomenal education structures for you to take advantage of, but no, she cannot be your personal CPA. So I guess with that, you tell us like, where can we find all of the information that you’re talking about? So you do have the Facebook group, but you also have a website.

and so can you tell us a bit more about how people can connect, how people can learn more about what you’re offering?

Jennie Schottmiller (27:37.272)
Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (27:43.566)
Yes, so the Facebook group is Simple Profit for Mental Health Clinicians and in the Facebook group it’s just clinicians. And it’s limited, it’s grown to such a large group that think of it kind of like as a Dear Abby place. You can ask articles, you can submit a question and then I pick questions to answer, I can’t answer every question because it’s Facebook and it’s very, very, very time consuming. But on my website I have a free guide, simple guide with frequently asked questions, you can post a question in there, I’ll answer it.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (27:59.432)
Yes.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (28:03.964)
Yes.

Jennie Schottmiller (28:13.334)
not, I can’t do like significant research questions or things that might take an hour to answer, but there are basic questions already answered in there and you can ask further basic questions in my simple guide, which is free to anyone. And that is not only for clinicians. So if you have a friend who is a fitness instructor and a physical therapist, you can refer them to the website. And then if you need more than that, I have a low cost membership also right on my website.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (28:16.105)
Mm-hmm.

Jennie Schottmiller (28:39.682)
that can ask unlimited questions, can get the tools, the spreadsheets, the help support with QuickBooks or Wave apps or other accounting options and you know, cash flow, budgeting, and I have web and educational webinars every month.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (28:53.012)
Yes, awesome. Thank you so much. And I do know and I’ll just add that for the Facebook group, even though it’s grown so big now you’re really not able to get to all of the questions. However, since your group has been around for such a good period of time, if people go to the search function, there are so many things that you have answered that people have, you know, asked under almost any category, I feel like, you know, and all you have to do is just

type in a little word and just see what people have already asked and see what Jenny has already answered. that’s super helpful.

Jennie Schottmiller (29:24.94)
And on that too, in the top of the Facebook group there’s a thing that says guide. And in the guide I have organized main posts that answer a lot of the questions. And then those guides are what I moved over to also the simple guide on my website too. wherever you need to go, wherever you feel most comfortable going, there’s a lot of information.

Camille McDaniel, LPC (29:44.712)
Awesome. Well again, thank you so much Jenny for taking the time. This has been very helpful. You are very helpful in general and I appreciate being able to talk to you today.

Jennie Schottmiller (29:56.056)
Thank you so much.

Ep. 18 Taxes, Deductions, and Retirement: Build a Foundation for Your Future