Crown Point, Indiana
A full outsourced finance department for $500K–$10M growth companies across Lake County and Northwest Indiana — bookkeeping, payroll, tax, and fractional CFO.
Owned & led by Vince Petrescu, CPA, CGMA, MBA →
115 S Court St
Suite E, Crown Point, IN 46307
Under 2 weeks
Monthly close target
Triple ISO
Certified management system
Augustus J. Lonardi
Managing Director, NW Indiana
Accounting in Indiana carries rules a firm across the state line simply does not deal with.
Indiana has income tax reciprocity with Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin; Illinois is not on that list. A Crown Point employer with staff who live in Illinois withholds Indiana state tax and the county tax of the county they work in, and those employees claim the credit back on their Illinois return. Get that backwards and every Illinois-resident employee is under-withheld all year.
Indiana’s state rate is a flat 2.95% for 2026, dropping to 2.90% in 2027 — but every Hoosier also pays a county rate set by where they lived on January 1, and a nonresident pays the rate of the county where they work. Lake County is 1.5%, Porter 0.5%, Newton 1.0% and Jasper 2.864% as of January 1, 2026, and counties change them. Payroll here means tracking the county on every employee, every year.
Since 2022, an S corporation or partnership can elect to pay Indiana tax at the entity level at the individual rate, which moves the state tax above the line and out from under the federal SALT cap. Owners take a refundable credit for the tax the entity paid. It is an annual election, binding for the year, and it wants modelling against each owner’s own return before it is made.
Indiana still taxes business equipment. The exemption used to reach a taxpayer whose personal property in a county cost under $80,000 in total; under the 2025 property-tax reform, the threshold for the January 1, 2026 assessment is $2 million — so most small businesses in Lake County now owe nothing, but still file the return to claim it. The rules moved twice in 2025 alone (a $1 million step for 2025 was passed and then repealed), so a form filed the way it was in 2024 can be wrong.
Cost of goods, inventory valuation and job costing for the shops, fabricators and suppliers that feed the Lake Michigan mills and the plants along I-65 and I-80/94.
Fleet and warehouse cost accounting, multi-state fuel and sales tax, and nexus questions for the carriers and distribution centers working the I-65 / I-80/94 interchange.
Work-in-progress schedules, retainage, and prevailing-wage and county-tax withholding for contractors working Lake, Porter and Jasper counties.
Utilization, project P&L and owner distributions for the firms, practices and agencies working Crown Point, Merrillville and Schererville.
Meet your Crown Point contact
Managing Director, NW Indiana Location — Crown Point, IN
A local business should be able to put a name to whoever is keeping its books. Everything Crown Point runs on is backed by the firm's whole bench — the same close process, the same review, the same management system — and you deal with one named person.
News from the Crown Point office →Augustus J. Lonardi on LinkedIn →
Strategic finance leadership without the full-time hire.
Clean books, monthly close, audit-ready every quarter.
Federal, state, multi-state nexus. Filed on time, always.
Multi-state, 1099s, year-end W-2s. Done.
Invoice in, payment out. Cash flow visibility, every day.
13-week rolling forecast. Know your runway. Know your room.
A direct line for Crown Point is being set up. Until it is, the fastest routes in are the Discovery Meet and the free snapshot below — both reach Augustus J. Lonardi the same day.
Serving
Crown Point · Merrillville · Hobart · Schererville · St. John · Munster · Highland · Hammond · Gary · Valparaiso · Portage · Lowell · Cedar Lake · Lake Village
Across Lake County and Northwest Indiana. If you are just outside it, ask anyway.
No. Most of the work happens through a secure document exchange and the monthly close conversation happens on a call, so plenty of clients never sit down with us. If you would rather meet in person, 115 S Court St is on the courthouse square and you are welcome.
Our sweet spot is $500K–$10M in revenue with roughly 5 to 50 employees — big enough that the books matter, not yet big enough to carry a full in-house finance department.
Yes. Indiana income, county and withholding tax, the 7% sales tax, the pass-through entity election, and multi-state returns where you have nexus — including the Illinois withholding question that comes with sitting this close to the state line.
Full outsourced accounting starts at $650/mo with fixed monthly pricing — no hourly surprises. What it lands at depends on transaction volume, entity count and how far behind the books are, and we will tell you the number before you commit to anything.
Free · 10 minutes · Read-only
Get your free Peace of Mind Score — 15 automated checks on your QuickBooks file, a 0–100 score, and a report you keep. Access is revoked the moment your report is built. No card, no sales call.
Get your free Peace of Mind Score →Book a free Discovery Meet with the Crown Point team. We'll review your books, your structure, and your goals — and tell you what we'd actually do.
Book a Discovery MeetThe 10X Accountant® · 1901 N. Roselle Road, Ste 855, Schaumburg, IL 60195 · +1 847-231-2441
Not affiliated with or endorsed by Intuit Inc. QuickBooks and QuickBooks Online are trademarks of Intuit Inc. This assessment is a diagnostic of your QuickBooks file. It is not an audit, a review, or a compilation, and it expresses no assurance on your financial statements.