A Free Driver, Bunny Beer Regret, and the $100K S Corp Test

Welcome back to RDTFM, where Dalton, Chad, and Chris crack a few IPAs and get into everything from charity scramble golf to the entity-selection conversation every CPA has had a hundred times. This week: a second-place finish that paid better than first, a rehab milestone at TopGolf, and a hard look at the worst business advice on social media.

Pop That Top & The Scorecard

• Chad's Blind Pick: A half-hour-old grocery run turns up Outer Range Brewing's Fresh Palette out of Frisco, Colorado — plus a live education on what "DDH" actually means. No bunnies on the can this time.

• Chris's Charity Scramble Circuit: Four events in a matter of days, including Tunnel to Towers at Port Royal and Palmetto Dunes. Then a pro-am in Columbia where he played the tips alone because everyone over fifty moved up a tee, finished six under, lost by a hair — and walked out with $647.50 in shop credit and a brand new TaylorMade Qi4D. Club championship is October 2nd. The stars aligned.

• Dalton's Full Bag: Every stick back in play and the second TopGolf round completely pain free. Carry numbers are returning (gap wedge 133, eight iron 163, driver 280), the wedge game is throwing darts from fifty yards, and the driver is still producing a massive slice that the three wood somehow doesn't.

• Chad's Ten Thousand Reps: A spreadsheet tracking reps-with-feedback against March 1st and the summer tournament, a full stroke off the handicap in three days, and the discovery that the public course in town has better greens than his club.

The Approach Scenario

Chris brings a question he's fielded twice in the last two weeks — including from a client trying to fund Broadway musicals: two people want to start something, so what do they open?

• Liability First: Dalton walks through why exposure drives the decision before taxes do, why an LLC preserves the S election either way, and why "go talk to an attorney" is never optional. Plus the cleanest analogy of the episode — LegalZoom is TurboTax.

• The $100K Test: Why the S Corp math only works once you're consistently clearing six figures after expenses, what payroll and a corporate return actually cost, and why one good year at $150K doesn't change the answer.

• The Stuff Nobody Budgets For: Chad on admin costs as the forgotten line item, and why the Wyoming-LLC-for-your-California-consulting-business advice floating around social media is among the worst things to come out of it.

• Partners and Allocations: Uneven splits kill the S Corp, and the hot take that if you don't need a partner, don't have one.

The Final Pour

A reminder of the scale — one and two, no thanks; three and four, only if it's free; five and six, solid; seven and eight, good beer; nine and ten, holy grail. Ratings land for Outer Range's Fresh Palette, Fiddlehead Brewing's flagship IPA out of Shelburne, Vermont, and El Segundo Brewing's Burnoff. Plus the confession that finally puts an asterisk on last week's marshmallow bunny beer: Dalton poured it down the drain and threw out the other two. No rescoring allowed. It's in the bylaws.