Small Time Operator: How to Start Your Own Business, Keep Your Books, Pay Your Taxes, and Stay Out of Trouble

This is a good book to get you thinking about what you need to consider in starting a business. No one book is going to give you all the answers but I have found this one has got me thinking about things I had not considered. Best of all it is an easy read, covering the highlights and letting you drill down to the areas you don't know enough about and seeing some of the things you don't need to consider. Where it covers thing about health inspections and you are not selling food you can skim over and may pick up something useful but again this is not the only book you will need but it will provide the ideas.

If you're considering starting a business but you don't know the first thing. This is the book for you. It breaks everything down into layman's terms and it's a very easy read. It also explains to you how to start up your business without needing a lot of expensive computer programs or even a computer. Many of the business startup books out there over complicate how to start a business. This is a perfect book.

We purchased this book for my husband's friend and co-worker that is a welder who is interested in possibly branching out and starting his own business. The reviews appeared to be mixed on this book so I was a little hesitant to place the order, but per the description the book seemed to contain everything that we were looking for. Once the book arrived I flipped through and read a few snippets and to me, someone who is not a welder but does have a great deal of background in small business, the book seemed to give sound advice. We gave this to my husband's friend a few days ago and he was thrilled with the gift. If you know of any welders that are interested in learning more about having their own business opportunity then I would say this book is the perfect gift for them. We are very pleased with our purchase. If you like my review, or found it helpful, please click the " Helpful " button below.

This is coming from someone who wants to start a blog/online/home business. Let's start with the positive: lots of extra and detailed tax write off information for sole proprietors. I'm using this book mainly to reduce my taxes since I have a relatively high income with high income taxes and this book seems to contain the most detail and various ways I can deduct my taxes. I'm using this book more as a reference than a read thru - which brings me to the negative side of this book . . . it's hard to read chapter by chapter. I feel like there's a lot of fluff, but with a few really good legal/tax points throughout the book. I don't own or plan to own a brick and mortar business - so a lot of the advice is not for me. I want to keep my operations really small, strictly staying online, collecting no sales tax, and not employing anyone (my main motive in business is to get tax-deductions for following my true passions - something I would do for free and in fact spend and lose money on). If my passions are profitable in some way, then HOORAY! But if not, at least I got tax-deductions doing something I enjoyed. Therefore, I still meet the criteria for my intention to make a profit. But as we all know, profit is not guaranteed in any and every business. The getting started chapter goes over business types (service, retail, manufacturing), business success info and advice, business location (mall, home, rural, industrial, zoning), financing (business loan types, grants, raising capital), legal structures (sole proprietor, LLC, etc.), legality of business names and trademarks, licensing permits, and liability insurance. I never plan to go in debt for business unless expansion would guarantee massive profits - in this case taking a loan is justifiable. I want to keep my liabilities naturally low and stay smart about risk to avoid buying insurance and avoid any catastrophes. Besides info about business names and trademarks, this chapter was a wash for me. I hate the bookkeeping chapter because it's too complicated. I was hoping for a simple and easy solution to keep track of everything. But there are a few useful tips and pointers if you're willing to dig through all the words. The growing up chapter explained the details in hiring employees and solidified my opinion that hiring employees is never worth it and if I were to ever hire, I would use contractors. The taxes chapter is the main reason I bought the book and it didn't disappoint - the gold is here. Unfortunately for me (but fortunately for you?), I just found out he wrote a different book that only covers tax deductions - had I known this, I would have bought that book. I'll probably check it out at the library. I advise you to look into it too if you're like me. There are so many deductions that are explained, I'm glad that I bought this book so that I don't have to hire someone to tell me and do my taxes for me. LOTS of tax intricacies I never even guessed existed were explained. Now I can and will deduct things confidently. The home business chapter is my second favorite since it also has tax-specific advice about home business. The only things in the last chapters which caught my eye are the legal aspects of publishing and trademarks. Also talks about websites and the internet. This is a great book for people who already have a pretty solid traditional small business and hope to improve upon it by expanding their business through expanding sales and hiring employees. It does have good nuggets for sole proprietors as well. Taxes are a headache, reading this book is a headache - but that is mostly because taxes are a complicated issue for most laypeople trying to start a business.

This book is very thorough and seems to cover every topic of being a solopreneur!

Purchased this so I can learn how to keep books. If you're starting a business, no matter what kind of small business it is, get this book. Period. Even if you've taken college classes it can serve as an excellent refresher, and reference resource. For folks doing home businesses this is even better. It's written in plain English. The tone isn't condescending, and the instructions and explanations are concise and clear. It's a dense book and definitely not "light reading" even for Hermione Granger but it's damn useful.

I started driving for Uber as a contract worker, which means I have to pay my own taxes and Social Security. This book helped me out on what to do with taxes, but there wasn't much info on how to file quarterly reports to Social Security for FICA (Social Security/Medicare). It is OK, but not the go-to book I was looking for to assist someone with no business background. I guess I'll pay an accountant to spend an hour explaining to me what gets filed and when. This book is OK for an overall perspective, but really wasn't helpful regarding Social Security/Medicare payments and how I make them, how often, and where I send the 15.3% I'm setting aside.

Small Time Operator is a great read, packed with beneficial information for anyone considering starting a small business. Personally I found the sections on financing, structuring advice, bookkeeping and taxes clear and informative, and I will be referencing them frequently. The tone and writing style of Mr Kamoroff is direct and to-the-point, which gives his readers lots of meat (and little fluff) on the more complicated aspects of starting a business, a great plus. Highly recommended.

Very thorough book, fully recommended