I wish I had a more thorough understanding of the process in terms of getting it started

I wish I'd known how much capital the business would suck up -- unforeseen expenses for my business keep popping up everywhere.

All the hidden costs and fees, all the inspections and red tape you have to go through.

Taxes. I wish I knew more about how they work, the records I need to keep, the laws behind, the standard deductions, and everything in between. It was a hassle in the beginning financially, but it's definitely getting better as I grow.

I wish I knew business tax law before starting my business

I wish I new more about the accounting involved especially for tax purposes.

How hard it would be. How much doubt and negativity you would receive from other people. How much time, money, and energy it would take.

All the permits I was going to have to get. Its ridiculous.

Learn to be patience. How to recognized a good opportunity. Don't be afraid of taking risk and always learn from failure

How to create a marketing plan.

How much of my personal time it would consume.

never tell loved ones and friends about what I'm doing until it's already done. They sometimes give off too much negative energy and can demotivate you.

How much annoying spam mail I would get from companies trying to sell me checks and other nonsense I don't need.

I wish that I knew more about the grants and loans that are available for people in my position. I think that they are very useful and helpful.

That the government and legal parts of if would be the hardest things to overcome.

I wish I had known how difficult it was to correctly price out different jobs. Learning how much to charge a customer for different jobs was massively difficult and had a huge learning curve. Charging customers per job instead of by the hour helped me tremendously. Focusing on setting a price for a job instead of bargaining with a customer was also a major game changer for me.

That taxes and credit are two of the most important pillars to understand and most people skip over these topics

How little customers understand about the overhead cost of running a business.

I wish I had known how competitive it is within the sector of my business.

How hard taxes were going to be every year. Its been a process and extremely difficult figuring out how to do taxes correctly but i finally figured it out after a few years.

How much effort, time, management and overall work would be needed.

Before I started a small business, I wish I would have known that finding a trustworthy partner was everything. The more I could find someone to even just bounce off ideas with in an honest fashion was more valuable than someone with impressive technical or other skills.

I have never started a business.

The start up costs. It's the little expenses that add up. Also not getting the deductions I could've qualified for.

Hire a payroll company to handle paying employees rather then do it myself.

How much it could cost, and how to attract more people

I wish I had known how much money I needed to have in reserve for payroll. I wish I had known how much payroll taxes were going to be.

I wish I knew exactly what amounts I should budget to certain components of my business. I had a rough idea but sometimes the costs of things surprised me.

I have not started a business before, but I assume that knowing how to form a budget would be rather key in making sure a business is run smoothly.

The one thing i wish i would of known before i started my business is the insane amount i would be taxed. we pay a business license, business personal property, also the federal taxes!

I wish I had known the amount of sleep I would lose because of how much time it takes to be in charge of something, organize everything, and solve every problem.

I wished that a lot of apps that now exist had existed when I started and all of the free online education tools, business services, numerous at-home jobs from the pandemic, etc. I wish those things had existed. As for knowing... I wished I had known I was going to get as sick as I have because if I had I would have applied for disability back when it was recommended rather than keep trying to push onward with my at-home business. Now, I'm struggling with everything.

I wish I new more about how to handle the hiring process. And where to find quality employees.

That finding hard working employees that are loyal is so hard.

I'd love to know the future of the market economy so i could make the right plan and the best decisions.

The in's and out's of shipping domestically and internationally. There's so many variables, it's difficult to decide what's best for my business. Including, what to do when things go wrong. When a package doesn't arrive, when something goes missing or is stolen, dealing with insurance etc.

How long before a profit is made

I wish I knew how much it would cost me financially in the long run

I wish I had known about how to advertise and market before I launched, it would have saved me headaches much later.

The total overall cost I would end up needing to put out in order to get it going. Compared to how much I am currently bringing in, I don't think it would have been worth it to me in the long run.

how to do all the boring back end stuff like permits and taxes

When you have your own business, you are never really off. You don't get vacation days, sick days, personal time, etc.

I wish I knew the challenges of dealing with local competition and how they affect my sales and customers.

how to properly set up logistics

I wish I known how much time it takes to get it going and how it can be stressful

I wish I wouldve known how to use better accounting practices.

I wish I would have known more about marketing. I am taking classes on it now to expand my reach

I wish I was wiser on how to estimate cost of repairs and renovations, and had more than 1 contractor crew available.

How much time it would take. I was having a child at the same time, and I found it difficult to spread my time evenly, which made my business opening time pushed out further than I expected.

I wish I had known how much paperwork and administrative tasks were involved in the day to day operations.

How hard it is to navigate local, State and Federal requirements for permitting, especially if the processes overlap or contradict with each other.

To hire people who are smarter than me. I was too competitive initially and needed to acquiesce in this manner, in hindsight.

I wish i had been trained on the accounting,tax financial side a little more. a lot of things go behind the scenes.

Filing taxes quarterly instead of getting a nasty surprise at the end of the year.

How much you have to work yourself before you can even think about hiring employees to make your job easier.

I wish I knew how much money I would make at my job before I went into this career.

How to track miles more efficiently. What line item/expenses are tax deductible and which are not.

I wish I knew how much effort it takes to start your own business. There is so much thought, time, and energy involved. Don't even get me started on the money aspect. You need as much cash as you can for a start up. Who knows when something will go wrong, break, or needs to be replaced. Always have a great chunk of money available before diving into a new business.

How much i would have to pay in debts and in taxes... knowing or having a basic concept of how much money would you have to invest or how much would go to waste is really important.

I wish I knew just how much stress comes with owning a business and that you are learning new things everyday.

While there are many particular details I wish I'd known beforehand, I think the thing I wish I'd known was more about taxes, tax brackets, what I could and couldn't deduct, and so on. That was like taking night classes to become a CPA while trying to run my farm. In fact, I kind of wish I would have had some course to take on the taxes side of running your own business.

I wish I knew the overall benefits that are required that are not usually seen and accounted for with a regular job.

I wish I had known that not all my employees would be as motivated as I was to work and succeed. I worked with mentors from the Small Business administration and that was helpful. I wish I had applied all the advice I got but some things you do have to learn for yourself. I wish I had known that while the customer is always right, you should remain vigilant of those trying to abuse that adage. Good luck.

I wish I had a better long term strategy and was both more goal oriented, yet also more flexible to new situations that arise.

I wish I knew more about designing and running a website.

That people are harder to find than expected. Finding good people is hard no matter how much you'll pay them.

How much of a slow start the business would be so that I would know better how to draw customers.

How to advertise.

I wish I knew what it really takes to endure the time it takes to start seeing success,

How to get a customer base. It is more difficult than it seems.

I wish I would have known more about the tax consequences and tax issues that a small business owner has to deal with. For example, I would want to know how I can reduce my taxes and get more benefits for my business through a proper accounting of the tax law.

Insurance costs for events and for myself, I do photography and sometimes I have to insure a venue.

I started a personal training and apparel line and have also done the research to open a gym. I wish I had know about actual start up costs, laws, and ways to save money. Knowing how to find manufactures for the clothing line with low order amounts (50-100 units). And knowing you can say no to clients that don't fit your coaching style.

I wish I would have known more about business and county tax requirements and protocols before starting our business.

The amount of kickstarter that is demand and expected.

I wish I had a better understanding of tax code and how the business structure changes taxation.

How much profit I will get and how successfully I will run the business

Investment, Type of Business, ROI, Strength, Weakness, opportunities, threats

I wish I knew how to handle bad times. A lot of the time when things aren't going necessarily well I tend to freak out and get bad anxiety I wish I had known how to handle that.

How much taxes I would owe.

How much work it would actually take to get it off of the ground

Having real estate knowledge so I did not get suckered into bad leases and business purchasing.

I wish I had known how much of a headache it would be

how to do taxes.

I would have loved to know how to properly fill out a business tax form. I have heard many jokes about them but its still frustrating to do.

The fact that here are loses to be incured.

How hard it would be to find new customers and how flexible you had to be with changing plans.

I wish I had known how to do all of the taxes involved with being self-employed. I figured it out eventually, but it would have helped to have a resource or someone to answer my questions. The IRS website is so confusing!

I wish I would have know that the customer isn't always right and sometimes you have to stick up for yourself.

Getting honest employers to work for you and not against you. I had lazy people who didnt either come in or didnt do anything except want that pay day

That I should've just started sooner. That I am more capable than I know - and to just keep believing in that.

I wish I had known how hard it is to marketing. Because even with the opportunities that exist for marketing using the internet it's stilly really hard to grab the attention of people.

Different types of tax for different businesses.

I wish I would have known how long it would take to get busy and to grow my customer base. It takes a lot of time, hard work, and patience.

there are a lot.. but probably the one thing I wish I would have known was how to communicate better with the people.

How everything I use for my business can be taxed, and what I should submit for tax deduction or not. Taxes in general became very confusing, very quickly. It was very difficult to figure out how much money I needed to set aside for taxes. Which was a huge problem, because I started in debt and needed every dime I made to reinvest in my business, but I was afraid to come up short on my taxes so I didn't know how much of my "profits" I could use to reinvest.

That running a business was mind bogglingly luck based for an initial startup and most small businesses that tend to have been run for years are run by people who don’t actually need the income. An example for each, there is no predictor for what items people are looking for in our industry of antiques and collectibles and its extremely reliant on impulse purchases rather than them coming in and asking for something we wont have. The longest running antique shops in town have been running for 30+ years by the same families, but they have already made their money long ago and do this job for a hobby where I do this job to feed my family. They can run their margin into the ground while I have to make a living. Its very frustrating but after committing to the industry for this long I have little other options to start a new career or improve existing cash flows.

I wish that I had been more knowledgeable about the financial side of things. I was not as prepared for the taxes that I needed to pay being self-employed. I also needed to study up on marketing a bit more to be more successful.

the political leanings of my colleagues

I wish I had spent more money on hiring a better CPA who knows the ins and outs of the real estate business and all of the tax implications concerned. This would have paid for itself and saved me a lot of headaches.