About Khatib Law LLC and Hani H. Khatib

Those three credentials describe the way he works more than any adjective would. A client rarely brings a purely legal question or a purely tax question. A parent asking for a will is also asking how the house and the retirement account will be taxed when they pass. A seller signing a contract is also deciding how much of the price will be capital gain. An owner who is behind with the IRS needs someone who can read the transcripts and the collection statute in the same sitting. Hani's practice is built around answering both halves of that question in one engagement.

In estate matters he drafts wills, revocable and irrevocable trusts, powers of attorney for property and health care, and prenuptial and postnuptial agreements, and he handles probate matters in the Cook County probate court at the Daley Center. He plans with the income-tax basis adjustment at death in view, and with the Illinois estate tax, whose exclusion amount is far lower than the federal exemption, so that a family that is not federally taxable is not surprised by an Illinois return.

In real estate he reviews purchase contracts during the attorney review period, attends closings, prepares deeds and transfer-on-death instruments, and advises investors on how to hold title and on the deadlines of a 1031 exchange.

In tax controversy he responds to IRS and Illinois Department of Revenue notices, represents taxpayers in audits and collection matters, including offers in compromise, installment agreements, liens and levies, and resolves unfiled years before the IRS files a substitute return for the taxpayer.

For businesses he forms LLCs and corporations, advises on the S-corp election and its timing, drafts operating agreements and buy-sell agreements, and handles the purchase or sale of a business, including the allocation of the price among the assets that both sides must report to the IRS, and succession planning for family-owned companies.

The articles on this site are published under his byline, and the attorney-CPA page sets out, with its limits, what the dual license changes for a client.

A tax problem and a legal problem are often the same problem seen from two desks. A CPA who is not a lawyer may prepare your returns and represent you before the IRS, but may not draft your trust, your deed or your operating agreement and cannot appear for you in Illinois courts: in Illinois that work requires a law license under the Attorney Act, 705 ILCS 205/1. An attorney without accounting training can draft the document, but the tax consequence is then checked afterwards by someone else, if it is checked at all. Hani reads the statute and the return himself, so the two analyses happen once, together, inside a privileged relationship. The attorney-CPA page explains what that does and does not cover.

Khatib Law LLC is a law firm. Tax-related work described on this site is delivered as part of the firm's legal services; Hani H. Khatib, the firm's principal, is also a licensed CPA.