Property Management Firm Owes Washington Business Tax on Wages

An apartment management company isn’t entitled to a half-million dollar refund because Washington properly imposed business and occupation tax on wages paid to employees at its clients’ properties, a state appeals court ruled.

Apartment Management Consultants LLC argued that the property owners employed the workers for jobs including maintenance and leasing units, so the wages weren’t part of its gross income subject to B&O tax. But AMC is their employer, and therefore their wages constitute part of the “total money or money’s worth received in the course of doing business” under the B&O statute, Judge Linda Lee wrote for the ...