Ministry payroll & housing allowance
Clergy payroll handled correctly, including housing allowance designation and the dual tax status that general payroll services routinely get wrong.
Your team is called to ministry, not bookkeeping. We handle the financial clarity, the compliance, and the planning, so leadership can lead.
Churches and ministries run on a distinct set of rules, and most accountants never learn them. Restricted funds, designated giving, unrelated business income, ministerial payroll: each one is easy to get wrong, and the consequences land on the people you can least afford to let down.
The deeper problem is usually quieter than a compliance slip. Finances become the thing no one wants to own, handled by one faithful volunteer with a spreadsheet, and leadership spends energy on money that should have gone to mission.
We take that weight off your team. We keep the books and the filings clean, set up controls and policies sized for your organization, handle clergy payroll and the housing allowance correctly, and give your board financial reporting it can actually understand. We know the terrain, and we share your convictions.
The financial function your mission needs, without pulling your team away from it.
Clergy payroll handled correctly, including housing allowance designation and the dual tax status that general payroll services routinely get wrong.
Keeping your exempt status clean, and preparing the Form 990 for the ministries, schools, and nonprofits that are required to file it.
Practical financial controls and policies sized for your team, so good stewardship does not depend on one trusted person and a spreadsheet.
Accounting for designated gifts and restricted funds the right way, so money given for a purpose is tracked and honored.
Planning operating reserves and endowment or long-term funds, so the mission is steady through lean seasons, not just the full ones.
Finance leadership for larger ministries: budgeting, reporting to the board, and the forward view a bookkeeper is not there to provide.
Most churches are exempt from the annual Form 990 filing, but affiliated ministries, schools, and other nonprofits often are not. We help you know which rules apply to which entity, so nothing is missed or filed unnecessarily.
Carefully, and in writing. Money given for a specific purpose has to be tracked and used for that purpose. We set up the accounting and the policy so designated giving is honored and defensible.
Unrelated business income tax can apply when a ministry earns income from activities outside its exempt purpose. It surprises a lot of organizations. We help you spot it early and handle it correctly.
Yes. The housing allowance has to be designated in advance, kept within limits, and substantiated. Done casually it creates risk for both the church and the minister; we make sure it is done right.
That is much of who we serve. We can be the finance function you do not have room to hire, scaled to your size, so your team can stay focused on ministry.
A fifteen-minute call is enough to find out. No pressure, and no second meeting if the answer is no.
Schedule a discovery call