Big Four background, WBENC-certified

Engineering-based cost segregation for the buildings you build, buy and improve.

Cost segregation and tax fixed asset services for new construction and purchased properties, from a practitioner with almost twenty years in the work.

Cost Segregation Boutique is a WBENC-certified woman-owned firm founded in 2020 by Michelle Seagraves. We classify the real property and personal property inside constructed and acquired buildings, so the costs eligible for a shorter tax recovery period are identified and supported.

Services

Four services, one specialism.

All of it is cost segregation and the fixed asset work around it. There is no second practice area competing for the time.

A building under construction with a tower crane above the frame

Cost Segregation for New Construction

Ground up, expansions, renovations, interior build outs and leasehold improvements.

The metal and brick facade of an existing industrial building

Cost Segregation for Purchased Facilities

Single facility purchases and portfolios of purchased facilities.

Architectural drawings on a desk with a scale ruler and pen

Construction Tax Planning

Tax advantageous cost template creation, and coordination with construction teams, contractors and accounting professionals.

The interior of a commercial building showing exposed ductwork above a corridor

Qualified Improvement Property Identification

Identification of Qualified Improvement Property inside the capital spend.

What is cost segregation

A building is not one asset. It is many, with different tax lives.

Buy or build a facility and the whole cost tends to land in one long-lived bucket. Cost segregation goes back through the drawings and the cost record and separates out what belongs on a shorter recovery period.

Cost segregation is the classification of real property and personal property for acquired or constructed buildings, expansions, renovations and leasehold improvements, in order to receive tax benefit.

Benefit comes from using an engineering approach to carve out the costs eligible for a shorter tax recovery period. That approach relies on professional estimating techniques, and works from:

  • Construction drawings
  • Available cost information
  • Statistical sampling where the size of the population calls for it

  • New construction
  • Leased facilities
  • Qualified Improvement Property
  • Purchased facilities
  • Previous year facility construction and purchases

It applies to current year capital investments, and to previous year investments through an automatic accounting method change. A building put in service several years ago is not out of scope.

Industries we serve

Taxpayers in virtually any industry.

If the capital went into a building, the question is worth asking. These are the sectors the analysis has covered most.

Ask about yours

Manufacturing

New construction, expansions and renovations

Real Estate

Single facility purchases and portfolios

Retail

Interior build outs and leasehold improvements

Healthcare

New construction and renovations

Hospitality

Purchased facilities and renovations

Industrial

Ground up construction and expansions

Almost twenty years of engineering-based cost segregation, behind a Big Four National Tax background.

20+Years in cost segregation
Big FourErnst & Young National Tax background
WBENCCertified woman-owned business
ASCSPMember, American Society of Cost Segregation Professionals
Michelle Seagraves, Owner and Principal of Cost Segregation Boutique
About

Michelle Seagraves.

Owner and Principal. An architect before she was a tax practitioner, which is the reason the drawings get read properly.

Almost twenty years giving clients tax savings from engineering-based cost segregation of capital assets. Analysis delivered for new construction, renovations, expansions and purchased facilities across manufacturing, industrial, retail, restaurants, health care and real estate, including a large number of studies involving statistical sampling.

A leader in early involvement cost segregation analysis, working with construction teams through the project lifespan to maximise the benefit carved out. Previously Central and Southwest Area Leader in the Cost Segregation group at Ernst & Young LLP, in National Tax. Career started at Arthur Andersen, with time at Crowe.

BS Architectural Studies, University of Illinois Master of Architecture MBA ASCSP member
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FAQ

The questions that come up first.

If yours is not here, ask it directly. The answer comes from the person who would do the work.

Ask Michelle

An engineering-based analysis that classifies the real property and personal property in a building you constructed or acquired, so the costs eligible for a shorter tax recovery period are identified and supported.

New construction, leased facilities, Qualified Improvement Property, purchased facilities, and facility construction or purchases from previous years.

Not automatically. Cost segregation applies to current year capital investments, and to previous year investments through an automatic accounting method change.

The engineering approach works from the project record, so the useful starting set is:

  • Construction drawings
  • Available cost information for the project
  • Detail on any expansions, renovations or build outs inside the spend

Early involvement means a tax advantageous cost template can be set up before the costs are recorded, and the construction team, contractors and accounting professionals are coordinated while the information is still live. It is the difference between capturing detail and reconstructing it.

Start here

Tell us about the building.
Get a straight answer.

Tell us what was built, bought or improved, and when it went into service. If a study makes sense you will be told, and if it does not you will be told that too.