Senior Accountant, Real Estate Taxes

Discovery Senior Living • Dallas, TX

1d • Hybrid

About The Position

The Senior Accountant, Real Estate Taxes is responsible for managing all real estate tax obligations across Discovery Senior Living's growing portfolio of approximately 450 senior living communities in 40+ states. Reporting to the Shared Services Controller, this role ensures accurate accrual and payment of real estate taxes, supports appeal and exemption strategies, and maintains strong controls and documentation across a complex, multi-jurisdictional property portfolio. The role works closely with property management, ownership groups, and external tax consultants, with Yardi 8 and Excel as the primary platforms. The position will start remote but then transition to onsite work in Dallas three days per week, working alongside the accounting and asset management teams with regular exposure to senior leadership.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Accounting, Finance, Real Estate, or a related field required.
• Minimum of 3-5 years of progressive accounting experience.
• Proficiency in Yardi 8 or a comparable real estate accounting platform required.
• Advanced Microsoft Excel skills, including complex reconciliation models, pivot tables, and multi-year trend tracking.
• Familiarity with real estate tax appeal processes, exemption programs, and multi-jurisdictional compliance.

Nice To Haves

• Experience in real estate tax accounting or property tax compliance strongly preferred.
• Experience working across multi-state, multi-entity property portfolios in senior living, healthcare, or commercial/multifamily real estate preferred.

Responsibilities

• Maintain the real estate tax calendar and accrual schedule for 450+ community properties across 40+ states, ensuring accurate and timely payments.
• Prepare and post monthly real estate tax accrual journal entries in Yardi 8 for all entities and properties.
• Reconcile real estate tax accruals to actual assessments and invoices; investigate and resolve variances.
• Process and track real estate tax payments, including installment schedules, and coordinate with Accounts Payable as applicable.
• Review real estate tax assessments for accuracy and reasonableness relative to portfolio valuations.
• Identify over-assessed properties and coordinate with external tax consultants and legal counsel to initiate appeal processes.
• Track appeal status, settlements, and refunds; record outcomes in Yardi 8 and reconcile to accruals.
• Monitor new acquisitions and dispositions to ensure real estate tax prorations and ongoing obligations are properly recorded.
• Research and maintain documentation of tax exemptions, abatements, and incentive programs applicable to DSL communities by state and municipality.
• Coordinate filings and renewals for applicable exemptions with community teams and external advisors.
• Maintain an exemption tracking register and ensure timely reminders for renewal deadlines.
• Prepare real estate tax schedules, accrual reconciliations, and trend analyses for the Shared Services Controller and finance leadership.
• Support annual audit preparation, including providing real estate tax workpapers and responding to auditor inquiries.
• Produce reporting from Yardi 8 and Excel for ownership, management fee structures, and CAM reconciliation purposes as applicable.
• Provide functional guidance to junior accounting staff, community-level accounting personnel, or cross-functional teams as assigned.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Senior