Real Estate Topics (E1505229)

Lisa Minniti, CPA is a partner in the Fort Washington office of WeiserMazars LLP. She has over 12 years’ experience in providing auditing, accounting, and tax services to clients in a variety of industries including construction contractors, rehabilitation and fitness centers, country club and banquet facilities, and transportation. Ms. Minniti specializes in managing audits of employee benefit plans. She has experience in preparation and review of Form 5500 and required schedules, representations of IRS and Department of Labor examinations, and consulting on plan administration and design. She facilitates continuing education courses on auditing employee benefit plans to the firm’s professional staff. Ms. Minniti holds a BA degree in Accounting from Holy Family University. She is currently a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and Pennsylvania Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

Donald Zief, CPA, JD, LL.M. is the managing director of the Tax/Real Estate Department in the New York office of WeiserMazars LLP. He possesses extensive experience in real estate transactions, with a subspecialty in REITs and opportunity funds. Most recently, he was a managing director of Taxation and REIT Tax Services for FTI/Schonbraun McCann. Prior to joining FTI, he was director - Real Estate Services for KPMG in the New York City office and spent a number of years in private practice with major New York City law firms. Mr. Zief has provided comprehensive tax analysis in connection with a broad variety of structured finance and real estate transactions. He has in-depth transactional experience in partnership taxation issues and structuring REIT and publicly traded partnerships, IPOs, and secondary offerings, and in the structuring of funds for tax-exempt entity investment in U.S. real estate.Mr. Zief also has substantial experience in advising clients with respect to joint ventures, UBTI, REIT and partnership issues. He is a co-author of the Real Estate Investment Trusts Handbook, which has been published annually since 1987. He is also an Adjunct Professor of Law at Rutgers Law School and recently completed teaching a course in the Taxation of Real Estate Transactions. He is a licensed CPA in New York and is licensed to practice before the New York and New Jersey Bars. He is a member of the American Bar Association and the New York and New Jersey State Bar Associations. Mr. Zief received his BA from Franklin and Marshall College, his MBA from Lehigh University, his JD from Rutgers Law School, and his Master of Laws (Taxation) from New York University School of Law.