Accounting for coastal and tourism businesses
Twelve months of bills against five months of revenue. We help you plan for the gap.
We work on this coast, so this isn't a category we adopted from a marketing list — it's a large share of what we actually do. Charters, vacation rentals, marinas, watersports, seasonal retail, and the trades that keep all of it running.
Every one of them shares the same structural problem: the bills arrive in twelve monthly installments and the revenue arrives in about five. Insurance, dockage, loan payments, and property taxes don't pause in January because the visitors did.
That single fact should drive how a seasonal business keeps its books. Ordinary monthly reporting is close to useless here — of course October was worse than July. What matters is whether the season produced enough to carry the whole year, and whether you know that in August rather than in February.
The real issue
Planning for the quiet half
The pattern is common: a strong season, an optimistic fall, and a February with more month than money. Not because the business is bad — because the money was measured before the off-season was subtracted from it.
The fix is unglamorous and it works. Know your fixed annual costs, know what the season truly nets after taxes, and set the difference aside on a schedule instead of by feel. Weather adds risk here too, and a business that keeps reserves handles a bad stretch far better than one that doesn't.
What we handle
- Cash-flow planning built around a compressed earning season
- Bookkeeping for rentals, charters, marinas, and seasonal retail
- Payroll that scales up in spring and down after Labor Day
- Quarterly estimated taxes timed to when income actually arrives
- Occupancy and sales tax compliance for lodging operations
- Reserve planning for the off-season and for weather disruption
FAQ
Questions we hear
It comes down to your fixed annual costs and how long your quiet period runs — which is why we start by working out what the business actually costs to keep alive for twelve months. Once that number exists, the target sets itself.
They don't have to be four identical payments. Estimates can be planned around when income is actually earned, which usually fits a seasonal business far better than an even split.
A down year affects your position in several ways, and it's worth reviewing rather than assuming. Bring us the year and we'll go through it with you.
Make the season carry the year
Book a consultation and we'll build a plan around your real calendar.