Esshaki & Associates is the Metro Detroit CPA firm built for owners whose decisions sit at the intersection of finance and law. Led by Justin Esshaki — both a CPA and an Attorney — under one Southfield roof.
Founder
Justin Esshaki
CPA & Attorney
Justin Esshaki founded the firm to be the one call a Metro Detroit business owner makes when a decision sits at the intersection of finance and law. A graduate of Central Michigan University in Accounting & Finance, and a Juris Doctor from Detroit Mercy School of Law, he is dual‑credentialed as a CPA and an Attorney — and brings both lenses to every client conversation.
CPA
Tax strategy, accounting, IRS representation, financial advisory.
Attorney
Entity structure, asset protection, contracts, succession.
Business Advisor
Decision‑level counsel for owners across Oakland County.
Trusted Guide
A direct line — not a portal ticket — when something real comes up.
"The same values I bring home to my wife and two children are the values I bring into every client relationship — patience, honesty, and the long view. Business owners deserve an advisor who actually understands the whole picture."
— Justin Esshaki, CPA & Attorney
Business decisions rarely live in a vacuum. The way you structure an entity affects your taxes. The way you handle a tax dispute affects your liability. The way you transfer a practice affects both. Most owners have to coordinate two advisors who quietly disagree. Our clients have one.
LLC, S‑corp, PLLC, holding company — chosen and documented for both tax efficiency and legal protection.
Year‑round projections written with awareness of how each move affects exposure, ownership, and risk.
Hiring, partnerships, locations, acquisitions — modeled financially, structured legally, before you commit.
Notices, audits, back taxes, installment agreements. Quiet, direct representation by someone qualified on both sides.
Where the books, the contracts, and the operating agreement all need to tell the same story.
Transitioning the practice or business to a partner, child, or buyer — without surprise tax or legal fallout.
Layering entities, ownership, and titling so personal wealth is insulated from business and professional risk.
Reasonable comp, distributions, and benefits structured the way both the IRS and your operating agreement expect.
Pulling the financial implications out of every operating document — before the next negotiation.
Different industries face different financial and legal realities. We work with the four sectors that anchor the Southfield and Metro Detroit economy — and we know the way each one actually operates.
ConstructionProgress billing, retainage, change orders, equipment financing — the financial mechanics that decide whether a project actually nets what the bid promised. Plus the entity structure to keep one bad job from threatening the rest of the company.
Law FirmsTrust accounting, partner distributions, contingency cash flow, and tax planning for a profession that already speaks the language. A peer at the table when the firm is restructuring, adding partners, or planning succession.
Medical PracticesPLLCs, owner compensation, equipment depreciation, retirement plan design, and the multi‑entity structures that separate the practice, the real estate, and the personal balance sheet — the way medical practices in Oakland County actually run.
Real EstateCost segregation, 1031 exchanges, partnership accounting, syndication K‑1s, and entity layering for Metro Detroit real estate — done in coordination with the legal structuring so it all actually holds together.
Every service exists for an outcome — clarity, protection, growth, profitability, confidence. Here is what those outcomes look like in practice.
Accounting
Books that close cleanly, monthly reports an owner can actually read, and the financial picture a real decision depends on.
Tax Planning
Mid‑year and Q4 projections so every move — hiring, equipment, distributions, growth — is made with the tax picture in front of you.
Bookkeeping
Categorization, reconciliation, and the steady financial discipline that growing companies actually need to scale.
Payroll
Runs, filings, year‑end forms, and the kind of compliance that just works without becoming an owner problem.
Outsourced CFO
KPI dashboards, forecasting, cash modeling, capital decisions — the CFO seat without the full‑time CFO cost.
IRS Representation
Notices, audits, back taxes, payment plans, and disputes — handled directly by someone licensed on both sides of the table.
Business Consulting
Entity moves, expansion, partnerships, succession — modeled and discussed before anything is signed.
Asset Protection
Structuring ownership, titling, and entity layers so personal wealth and business risk live in different containers.
Succession & Exit
Selling, transitioning to a partner, or moving the practice to the next generation — financially modeled and legally documented.
Personal. Responsive. Strategic. Proactive. Relationship‑driven. The way a long‑term advisor relationship is supposed to feel — not the way most CPA experiences actually go.
A real conversation — not a sales pitch. We listen to where the business is, what's on your mind, and where the financial and legal pictures intersect.
Records, entities, prior returns, and operating documents reviewed together so the full picture is on the table before we recommend anything.
A written plan that integrates tax projections with entity structure, ownership, and the legal realities of how your business actually runs.
Monthly close, payroll, and reporting handled in the background — with reports built for the way owners actually read financials.
Quarterly reviews and the on‑call advisor seat for decisions: hires, partnerships, expansions, exits, IRS notices, the question that came up at 4pm.
Direct phone, direct email, direct answers. No portal black hole. The whole point is that you don't hesitate before calling.
Not just the tax return. Not just the legal document. Not just the numbers on the page. The work we do for Metro Detroit business owners is grounded in one conviction: that real financial guidance is inseparable from real legal understanding, and that the firm you trust with one should be qualified to handle the other.
That is what shapes how we show up. Direct relationships instead of portal tickets. Strategic conversations instead of compliance hand‑offs. The same advisor for the tax projection, the operating agreement, the IRS letter, and the conversation about what comes next. One firm. One roof. The whole picture.
Integrated
Tax, accounting, and legal insight under one Southfield roof.
Personal
Justin is the relationship — not a department directory.
Proactive
We reach out before deadlines and before decisions get made.
Local
Built around the realities of Metro Detroit business ownership.
Southfield isn't a market we sell to — it's where we are. Oakland County is where our clients build, treat patients, litigate, develop, and grow. We sit inside the same business community we serve. We know the law firms on Northwestern Highway, the medical practices off Telegraph, the contractors working sites across the metro, and the operators turning real estate into long‑term wealth across the suburbs.
Plain‑English thinking written for Metro Detroit owners — the questions we get from clients more than any others.
Entity Structure
Why most physicians shouldn't operate inside a generic LLC — and what changes when ownership, payroll, and real estate enter the picture.
Read the noteTax Strategy
What the IRS actually looks for, how Oakland County professionals tend to get it wrong, and the documentation that protects you.
Read the noteConstruction
Tracking labor, materials, and overhead so the P&L actually reflects which projects are making money — and which ones are quietly costing you.
Read the noteReal Estate
When the math works, when it doesn't, and how to coordinate the study with your broader tax and entity plan.
Read the noteLaw Firms
The accounting gaps that cause Michigan firms the most trouble during transitions, dissolutions, and bar audits.
Read the noteIRS
The three‑step response that almost always changes the outcome — and the one thing that makes it worse.
Read the noteIf you own a business in Metro Detroit and want an advisor who understands both the financial and legal side of the next decision — start with a conversation. No obligation. No pitch. Just clarity.
Southfield · Oakland County · Metro Detroit
