That’s Judge Christian N. (“Speedy”) Weiler’s advice to buyers of Dixieland Boondocks. If you can find land cheaper than the high-priced Boondockery the dodgefloggers are pushing, in the same neighborhood, go to it.

That’s the truism that sinks the $47.5 million raid on the fisc, and ends the story of Buckelew Farm, LLC f.k.a. Big K Farms LLC, Big K LLC, Tax Matters Partner, T. C. Memo. 2024-52, filed 4/25/24. This is the fourth appearance of the Big Bucks in this my blog, but as their previous appearances were mere prologue, you needn’t note them, so neither will I.

Judge Speedy Weiler gives a vivid anatomy of a dodgeflog, showing how parties stuck with dubious Dixie Boondocks retain paperhangers (writers of appraisals, evaluations, tax-opinions-that-aren’t, and return preparers), engage whalers (hunters of highrollers needing big write-offs), and finally market the stuff. See T. C. Memo. 2024-52, at pp. 2-23.

The Big Bucks dodge the Section 6663 civil fraud chop, because they told the whole story in the 1065 and attachments.

“Although respondent has proffered some evidence of conduct that might give rise to a suspicion of fraud, most of the evidence concerns conduct unrelated to the Partnership’s tax return. Respondent must prove by clear and convincing evidence that the Partnership intended to evade tax in filing the return. On the basis of our review of the record, we find that respondent has failed to prove by clear and convincing evidence that the Partnership had the specific intent to evade tax when it filed its …return.” T. C. Memo. 2024-52, at p. 60. (Citation and footnote omitted).

The key here is that there’s lots of Dixieland Boondocks (ask any Third Army alum, or graduate of Fort Jackson, Fort Gordon, et hoc genus omne), so to show yours is worth telephone numbers, it had better be different from all others. And Judge Speedy Weiler finds the Big Bucks’ ain’t.

“…Mr. R selected these vacant parcels on the basis of the principle of substitution, which stands for the proposition that a hypothetical buyer will not pay more for a given property when an alternative property is available for less. This simple proposition undermines petitioner’s ‘before’ value conclusion since a willing buyer would not have paid roughly $32,600 ($50,480,000 / 1,545.79 acres) per acre for nonunique vacant land in Jones County when the price per acre for substitute properties identified by respondent’s expert was between $1,602 and $4,971. Mr. R likewise made qualitative adjustments to the selected properties and arrived at a per-acre value of $4,750 as appropriate for the Subject Property. T. C. Memo. 2024-52, at p. 55. (Name omitted).

Of course, the 40% overvaluation chop is thoroughly Boss Hossed.