Ledger & Lime · est. 2024 · Columbus, Ohio
No affiliate-driven advice — just the math, sourced and stamped: VERIFIED for cited data, MY OWN MONEY for my own ledger.
Currently reading the numbers: U.S. median household income $83,730 (Census, 2024) · personal savings rate 4.6% (BEA, Dec 2025)
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After eight years of preparing other people's tax returns, I can tell you exactly which three figures predict your financial year — and the fourteen you can safely ignore.
This post cites external data — Census, Federal Reserve, BEA. Sources listed at the bottom.
Floor-first budgets, real rent numbers, and emergency funds sized to actual failure modes.
2 posts
The most famous budget in America was written for a household income that no longer matches the median. Here's the arithmetic of where it breaks, using real 2024 Census data.
· 9 min read
Not three-to-six months of expenses — a specific dollar figure built from my own ledger, with every line item shown. Emergency funds should be sized to your failure modes, not a rule of thumb.
· 6 min read
Expense ratios computed to the dollar, index-fund receipts, and no third question.
2 posts
Everyone says fees matter. Almost nobody shows the compound-interest receipt. Here it is, computed to the dollar, with the SPIVA data that explains why the cheap fund also usually wins.
· 8 min read
Six years, three Vanguard funds, zero trades beyond rebalancing. My actual account statements, my actual returns, including the two years I wish I could delete.
· 7 min read
Deadlines with penalties behind them, extension traps, and the January folder.
2 posts
The exact checklist I've used since my second busy season — fifteen documents, one folder, twenty minutes every Saturday in January. Filed on February 22 for the last three years running.
· 5 min read
A CPA's calendar for 2026: the dates with penalties behind them, the dates that are really suggestions, and the two extension traps I watched clients walk into every single year.
· 6 min read
Marcus Webb
Former CPA · Author
About
"I stopped giving advice the week I stopped preparing returns. Everything here is what I'd have told my own clients if the firm had let me."
Marcus prepared individual tax returns for eight years at a mid-size firm in Columbus, Ohio — about 300 households per season, from W-2 families to Schedule C freelancers. He holds a CPA license, currently inactive, and has never accepted a dollar from a fund company, a bank, or an app.
Every concrete financial claim on this site is flagged one way and one way only: a rubber stamp in the margin. VERIFIED means the post cites external data and lists its sources at the bottom. MY OWN MONEY means the numbers come from Marcus's own bank statements and ledger — including the bad years.
The two stamps you'll see across the site. Nothing else flags a claim — no star ratings, no "editor's picks," no badges with sponsors behind them.
Get in touch
Every VERIFIED post is only as good as the sources behind it — if a number looks off, or you just want to talk through your own numbers, Marcus reads every message himself.