# 1 choice for accounting, audit, tax, consulting and analytic services

Bridgers, Goodman, Baird & Clarke not only to help you manage and grow your business, but to help you achieve your business and personal financial goals, so that your business can be a means to enjoy all of your life’s passions.

Over 40 Years of Quality Service in Certified Public Accounting

We are committed to providing close, personal attention to our clients. We take pride in giving you the assurance that the personal assistance you receive comes from years of advanced training, technical experience and financial acumen

Services

Business & Tax Consulting

Bookkeeping, Computerized Payroll Processing, Cash Management, General Ledger Preparation and Payroll Tax Preparation and Reporting.

Tax Services

Tax Services

We assist our tax clients through efficient compliance and effective planning to help them realize substantial savings.

Auditing Services

Auditing & Assurance

Our goal is to improve information or the context of information so that decision makers can make more informed, and presumably better, decisions.

Peer Review Services

With our depth, expertise, and flexibility, Bridgers CPAs is uniquely qualified to deliver any external peer review services you require.

Business Services

Bridgers is the perfect choice for your small business

We provide more than accounting and bookkeeping services; we take an active role in increasing profits for your business. We’ll deliver the accurate financial reports you need to watch expenses and the inventive strategies to manage your tax obligations. At Bridgers CPAs, we know that how you handle your money can make or break your business.

Business Services Experts

Certified Public Accountants

BookKeeping

Bank Reconciliations, Sales Tax Filings, Other Tax Filings

Payroll Services

941, 940, State Unemployment, State Withholding, W-2s, 1099s

General Ledger

The “core” of your company’s financial records

Let us do your Accounting

Spend More Time Doing What You Love

By allowing Bridgers CPA’s to take care of your Accounting needs you can spend more time focusing on your business.

What you need to Know About

Auditing and Assurance

What is Auditing and Assurance

(Roll over to find out more)
Assurance services are audit activities that provide an independent, objective assessment of financial statements or compliance efforts. ... These compliance, regulatory, and financial statement audits are all considered assurance services.
Contact Us

Why do I need a tax accountant?

(Roll over to find out more)
An accountant is best utilized when you have a very specific tax situation, such as owning your own business, making above $200k, expect to give money to your children, owning rental properties, or anticipate receiving a large capital gain.
Contact Us

Preparing for an Audit?

(Roll over to find out more)
Understand the standard. ... Identify your Subject Matter Experts (SMEs). ... Make sure to allocate sufficient resources to your experts. ... Determine your internal procedures. ... Gather documentation for your procedures.
Contact Us
pexels-photo-4386324-4386324.jpg

The Hidden Tax Trap Keeping America’s Housing Market Frozen

America’s housing crisis has reached a breaking point. With median home prices soaring past $400,000, the National Association of Home Builders reports that 60 percent of U.S. households can’t even afford a $300,000 home. The math has become impossible for most American families. While we often blame high mortgage rates, restrictive zoning laws and rising construction costs for the housing shortage, there’s another culprit hiding in plain sight: a decades-old tax rule that’s trapping millions of homeowners in houses they’d rather leave. The $500,000 Problem When Congress overhauled capital gains taxes on home sales in 1997, they created what seemed like a generous benefit: homeowners could exclude up to $250,000 in profits from taxes ($500,000 for married couples) when selling their primary residence. This replaced a complex system of rollovers and age-based exemptions with something simpler and cleaner. But Congress made one critical mistake – they never adjusted these limits for inflation or housing price growth. Nearly three decades later, these same dollar amounts remain frozen in time, even as home values have skyrocketed. According to new research from Moody’s Analytics, if the exclusion had kept pace with home prices, it would now stand at $885,000 for singles and $1,775,000 for couples. Even adjusting for general inflation alone would double today’s limits. The Senior Squeeze This outdated tax rule hits empty-nesters particularly hard. Consider this: nearly 6 million households headed by seniors live in homes larger than 2,500 square feet. Many would gladly downsize to something more manageable, but selling could trigger six-figure tax bills on homes they’ve owned for decades. The result? They stay put, waiting until death when their heirs can inherit the property with a stepped-up basis that erases all capital gains. Meanwhile, these oversized homes remain off the market, unavailable to growing families who desperately need…
pexels-photo-4386324-4386324.jpg

Understanding The Q Ratio

When it comes to evaluating a business, there are many ways to perform a valuation. One way to do so is to use the Q Ratio. Known as Tobin’s Q Ratio or simply the Q Ratio, this method looks at the proportion between the values of a physical asset and its replacement cost. Developed by Nobel laureate economist James Tobin, this ratio presumes a single company; for public investors, if asset values can be estimated, the company’s market value of a publicly traded company may be approximately estimated. The original formula is as follows: Q Ratio = Market Value of Assets / Replacement Cost of Capital While this formula is the original iteration, approximating an asset’s replacement value is complicated and oftentimes not 100 percent realistic to analyze. The more realistic way it’s calculated is by using book values in lieu of the asset’s replacement costs. The new way to calculate it is as follows: Q Ratio = (Equity Market Value + Liabilities’ Market Value) / (Equity Book Value + Liabilities’ Market Value) When it comes to calculating the overall market’s Q Ratio: Q Ratio = Value of the Stock Market / Corporate Net Worth Putting the Q Ratio in Practice Essentially, it’s used to value a company. Once calculated, the Q Ratio provides internal stakeholders and outside investors with one way to evaluate a company. Above 1 If the Q Ratio is more than 1, the business’ market value is higher than its booked assets. It means a company’s valuation is overestimated in the eyes of the market since there is some portion of the company’s assets that are either not documented or valued fully. When the Q Ratio is above 1, a business’ earnings are worth more than replacement costs for the assets. At this level, entrepreneurs are…
pexels-photo-4386324-4386324.jpg

New Rules for Inherited Traditional IRA Distributions

The rules for IRAs inherited after 2020 changed when Congress passed the Secure Act in 2019. The new rules eliminated the opportunity for non-spousal beneficiaries to “stretch” inherited IRA earnings over their own lifetime. Up until this year, required minimum distributions (RMDs) and associated penalties were waived while the IRS clarified the new rules; but in 2025, they are in full force for most inherited IRA beneficiaries. For clarity: Non-spouses who inherited IRA assets after 2020 MUST take RMDs starting this year. RMD Rules For Non-Spouses For Traditional IRAs inherited after 2020, the first thing a non-spousal beneficiary must do is transfer the inherited assets into an inherited IRA under his own name. Note that RMDs are then required only if the original owner had reached their RMD age before dying. Under this scenario, the beneficiary must take required minimum distributions going forward, including any RMD not taken in the year the original IRA owner died. Over the next nine years, the new inherited IRA owner must take annual RMDs based on his own life expectancy and deplete the account within 10 years of the decedent’s death. However, if the original account owner was NOT required to take minimum distributions as of the time he passed, the inherited IRA beneficiary is NOT required to take them – unless he reaches RMD age during the 10-year holding period(starting at age 73, or age 75 effective 2033). Either way, he still must empty the account and pay the requisite tax bill within 10 years of the original account owner’s death. In addition to paying taxes owed on RMDs, inherited account owners are subject to a 25 percent penalty on any amount shy of that year’s required distribution. Should you miss an RMD, you may be able to reduce the penalty to 10…
pexels-photo-4386324-4386324.jpg

Get a Jump on Holiday Shopping: Key November Dates

For some of us, last-minute holiday shopping is just what we do. That said, it’s probably never fun, and two things invariably seem to happen: The gifts you want aren’t available, and you end up paying too much. That’s why shopping in November to get the best savings on what you want just might be the right thing to do this year. Here are a few sales dates to put on your calendar. Singles Day, November 11. Originally started in China as a humorous “anti-Valentine’s Day” event, it’s become one of the biggest shopping days of the year, surpassing Black Friday and Cyber Monday. To top it off, the date, 11/11, was chosen because it symbolizes, you guessed it, four ones – aka singles. On this day, you can find huge discounts at a lot of high-end clothing stores like Athleta, Nordstrom, Lululemon, Abercrombie & Fitch, Madewell, Neiman-Marcus, and J. Crew, to name a few. Pre-Black Friday, November 20-27. Yes, there is such a thing, as if Black Friday isn’t enough in and of itself. Nevertheless, lots of retailers get in on this. This year, you’ll want to check out early access on holiday deals at Costco, Lowe’s, Best Buy, as well as Kohl’s, GameStop, and PetSmart. You can find other merchants who offer deep discounts here. Black Friday, November 28. It’s probably the most famous shopping day of the year, where you’ll find huge price cuts across all categories. If you’re into tech stuff, head to Apple, AT&T Wireless, Dell, Google, HP, Lenovo, or Micro Center to start. The big box places to hit are Walmart, Target, and Sam’s Club. For home goods, you’ll find savings at Bed, Bath & Beyond, Ashley Furniture, and Crate & Barrel. If you want a comprehensive list, go to blackfriday.com. (See? There’s even…
pexels-photo-4386324-4386324.jpg

Why Authorization Sprawl Is the Next Big Security Blind Spot and How to Fix It

Despite major investments in cybersecurity, organizations continue to face breaches. Most security mechanisms implemented guard against threats such as password theft. However, there is a growing concern with the unchecked expansion of user access, permissions, and tokens across apps, clouds, and systems. This growing challenge is known as authorization sprawl, and it is becoming one of the most dangerous and least visible threats in modern enterprise security. According to insights from the SANS keynote at the RSAC 2025 Conference, attackers are increasingly exploiting this sprawl to gain legitimate, persistent access that bypasses multifactor authentication (MFA), security information and event management (SIEM) alerts, and endpoint detection and response (EDR) visibility altogether. What is Authorization Sprawl? Authorization sprawl occurs when access permissions multiply uncontrollably across systems, users, and applications. Every time a team or department adds a new SaaS integration, service account, or API key, another layer of permission is introduced. In an attempt to make access to multiple applications easy, users also have single sign-on (SSO), designed to help log in once and access multiple applications securely. Here, users are granted access to several connected systems through SSO, adding to the authorization sprawl problem. Over time, all these factors create a complex ecosystem that even security teams have a hard time tracing who can access what. Unlike authentication, which verifies who someone is, authorization determines what one can do. When permissions expand without review, attackers take advantage of forgotten tokens, dormant accounts, or outdated roles to move freely inside systems. Why Traditional Defenses Miss It Most defenses focus on identity verification, such as MFA, conditional access, and endpoint protection. But once a user is authenticated, there is no monitoring. This is the blind spot that attackers exploit. Instead of breaking in, they log in using legitimate session tokens, application programming interface…
pexels-photo-4386324-4386324.jpg

Understanding Contribution Margin After Marketing

Contribution margin after marketing (CMAM) measures how much money is generated per unit retailed after factoring in a company’s variable costs, along with marketing costs. It’s analogous with contribution margin, however, a business must factor in marketing costs the company experiences when publicizing a good to likely consumers with details on the business’ wares. This metric determines how well net sales can satisfy expense obligations and what percentage of net sales may remain to satisfy fixed expenses. Comparing Variable Versus Fixed Costs Variable costs, as the name implies, are expenses that rise and fall according to output quantities. Fixed costs, conversely, are expenses that don’t change despite variation of production quantities. Understanding these concepts is helpful when calculating CMAM to see how both types of expenses impact the different calculations. CMAM = Sales Revenue – Variable Costs – Marketing Expense It can also be determined on a per-unit basis to help a business understand how a single product unit contributes to the company’s comprehensive profits. One can calculate the CMPU (contribution margin per unit) as follows to provide a more granular analysis: CMAM/Unit = Sales Revenue/Unit – Variable Expenses/Unit – Marketing Expense/Unit What separates variable costs (including marketing expenses) from the sales revenue is CMAM. The balance is profit along with fixed costs. To calculate if a business saw a net loss or profit, the formula is: Net Operating Profit = CMAM – fixed costs If a profit is reported after subtracting variable costs, costs to market, plus fixed costs, it means a business or specific department is profitable. If it’s negative, the business sees a loss that won’t enable it to pay its bills. Illustrating CMAM When it comes to a company producing widgets, the following is already known. Variable costs for production for a single widget are detailed…