Lipsey & Associates

Since Jeff was 15, when he was first introduced to the accounting field by a high school teacher, Jeff Lipsey knew he wanted to be an accountant. Jeff’s high school offered honors accounting courses which he took as a Sophomore and Junior in school. His teacher recommended Jeff compete in the accounting nationwide testing circuit as part of the “Business Professionals of America” after school program.

As a sophomore, Jeff competed against hundreds of other future accountants and placed first in his hometown Aurora and second in the state of Illinois which earned him a spot to compete at Nationals in Anaheim, California where he finished tenth. In addition, he won a two-year scholarship to the local community college to which he turned down to attend the University of Illinois – the top rated accounting program in the country.

While Jeff completed college with two bachelor degrees – one in accounting and another in finance in 4.5 years, he lost his passion for accounting due to the lack of variety in the coursework. It is common to hear that Jeff quit his accounting internship working as a franchise accountant at Jimmy Johns Corporate headquarters to play online poker full time.

He continued playing poker full time for 5 years after graduation before eventually moving on to other ventures including: Restaurant manager, website management and design (gambling related) and online poker training instructor and coach. Jeff is honest in the fact he didn’t know what he wanted to do and none of the previous options were long-term solutions. He started dabbling in QuickBooks online as a determine his website management finances and learned to enjoy that work.

In 2012 he started to work with Robert Half and Accountemps to work on temp jobs in the area – even being offered a full time position as a staff accountant that he turned down due to a salary dispute as his wife Marlyn was expecting their first child. His next temp job later became his first client and that is where he met Elizabeth Quist, CPA, EA who influenced Jeff to start his own business.

On December 31, 2013 Jeff Lipsey started Jeff Lipsey Bookkeeping LLC. He had his Enroll Agent certification less than 6 months later and passed his CPA exams by November 2016. Jeff took his knowledge and hard work and grew his business 5000% in the first 9 years of his business with the help of his family, staff, colleagues and other influencers.