When you’re purchasing a dental practice, don’t fall into the “average practice value” trap. This trap has to do with a number that’s both simple and helpful … right up until it isn’t. Let me explain. After analyzing over a thousand dental practice sales nationwide, I can tell you the average sales price — as […]
The largest cost in any dental practice is the money paid to staff. So when you are looking to buy a dental practice, the number one expense to pay attention to is staff costs. Staff costs include not just salaries, but also payroll taxes and any benefits or perks paid to staff like bonuses, vacation, […]
Some dentists think there is a “right” price for every dental practice on the market. They assume dental practices are like home values, where someone out there with the right formula can input some numbers into a calculator and get the “fair appraised” value for any practice available. The appraisal is therefore the gospel truth. […]
If you’ve ever caught yourself worried about a negative headline as it relates to your career prospects in dentistry, let me explain what’s happening. Perhaps this will help a bit. Not a day goes by without reading about the upcoming disaster in private practice dentistry. Usually the implication is that private practice ownership is going […]
When buying a dental practice, one final piece of the transition a seller is involved in is sending an announcement letter to patients. The message is pretty simple: “Hey! There’s a new dentist at your office!” And…these letters are usually pretty bad. Often really, really bad. Why? There is a fundamental misunderstanding about what the […]
I was talking to a broker recently and learned something so mind-blowingly stupid that I was literally speechless. You should know about it, too, in case it comes up in a transition you’re involved in. In almost every dental transition the decision of whether or not to purchase the accounts receivable (or “A/R” – the […]
In this article, I’m going to talk about business insurance – not personal stuff like life and disability. (I shared thoughts on life and disability insurance in separate posts you can read here and here). The bottom line with insurance: as a business owner you’re going to feel like you have insurance coming out of […]
As of Tuesday of this week, Bank of America is back open for the business of lending on dental transitions. This is a big deal, and if you’re in the market for buying a practice anytime in the next few years you need to pay attention to this development. In 2019, Bank of America had […]
<My imagined dental school commencement address, if I had the opportunity to speak at a dental school graduation today.> To those of you graduating and finishing your various dental school and residency programs…I won’t sugar coat things: you’re going to need a little luck out there. I’ll begin my remarks by quoting the most famous […]
I firmly believe that owning your practice is the best career move a dentist can make for both their career satisfaction and your wallet. You’re likely to spend at least as much time in the practice you own as your own house. So pick a good practice! But…where? Finding a good practice to buy is […]