Reasons To Use a Dental Practice Broker

Common sense says, yes, you could sell your house on your own, but you may not always attract the right type of buyer or even get the best price without the help of a real estate agent. The same could be said for buying a house; enlisting the help of a professional will only give you a competitive edge you wouldn’t otherwise have when browsing online for-sale listings.

So when buying or selling a dental practice, why leave one of the largest financial transactions of your life to chance? Just like your patients come to you for your experience, trust Professional Transition Strategies for our expertise. Established dental practice brokers are experts in the industry and have extensive market knowledge that will lead to a more seamless and possibly faster and lucrative sale.

Here, we break down all you need to know about dental practice brokers — whether you have plans to buy or sell a dental practice – and how we at Professional Transition Strategies can help.

We’ll also help you answer these essential questions along the way:

• Why is it important to promote service in a dental practice?
• How do I succeed at a dental clinic?
• How do you evaluate a dental practice for sale?
• What makes a great dental team?
• What personality type is a dentist?

What is a dental practice broker?

A dental practice broker is just one piece of your advisory-team puzzle. Hiring an experienced transition broker will help you expand your reach any and all potential buyers so you can relax and focus on your day-to-day responsibilities of tending to patients and running your business.

We will focus on the bottom line and vet potential buyers while alleviating stress for you.

An experienced broker like PTS will help facilitate transactions around the country and work with anyone from a single buyer to a dental service organization (DSO) or going direct to private equity. It’s one of the many benefits of working with a broker with established relationships and a reputation for informed and painless transactions based on proper data and knowledge.

Why should you hire a dental practice broker?

Selling a practice takes approximately 150 hours, which is why you’ll want to bring in a broker to do the heavy lifting rather than attempting to add that task to your already-full plate. Our brokers actively handle all your marketing needs to ensure the sale of your practice is put in front of the right eyes, often already knowing potential buyers looking for a practice in your area and presenting you with only qualified prospects. What’s more, we make sure non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) are signed to ensure confidentiality and due diligence is taken care of to put the sellers in a competitive environment. After all, the profitability of your practice would drop if you tried to take on all these responsibilities yourself.

Not only will dental practice brokers attract potential buyers and help you determine the right transition strategy, but they will guide the shift of ownership, from negotiating the sale and finding true market value to providing the asset purchase or stock agreement and assisting with the real estate needs.

What are the benefits of hiring a dental practice broker?

Most dentists enter the field because they want to help patients, not to handle seemingly endless loads of paperwork. As a buyer or seller, hiring a broker will only ensure a smoother transition in the long run. We will handle all the details, from providing contracts and handling the real estate to understanding the business valuation to get the most out of the sale of your practice.

We offer experience and knowledge along the way.

We’ll also handle all the marketing of your dental practice while keeping the transaction confidential until everything has been signed on the dotted line. With an NDA in place, the marketing will be descriptive enough to garner interest but never include enough information that anyone could decipher whose practice it is. That’s because knowledge of a potential sale can affect your business by increasing your attrition rate significantly and staff may take the opportunity to look for employment elsewhere.

Why hire a broker to sell your dental practice to a DSO?

We have personal experience with all types of dental service organizations (DSOs). Our great relationships with many (over 300) DSOs can be leveraged so you can get what you want out of your transition. It’s easy for us to predict which way the transaction is heading and negotiate accordingly. While being your advocate in the transaction, we don’t have any other skin in the game.

We have inside knowledge of the groups that actually practice clinical autonomy.

By having someone act as your fiduciary, you can feel confident your best interests are being represented rather than just the interests of the group. Not only that, but our strong relationships with DSOs all over the country allow us to bring in more prospective buyers. By creating more demand, you tend to have better negotiating power so that you can expect to receive higher offers and better terms by the end of the transaction.

Why you should use a dental practice broker when selling to a DSO — a case study

A single practice in a suburb of Portland, Oregon, approached us. With $2.5 million in collections, the practice had been approached by DSOs in the past, one of which offered $4 million for a joint venture (JV) model only. The dentist came to us to see how we could help lever up the deal and show him more options. We worked closely with the owner, and through our partnership, secured a JV deal for an enterprise value of close to $8.2 million with the exact same group that offered $4 million initially. By working with us, the dentist received six other offers that not only made offers more competitive, but also gave him the ease of mind to understand market comparisons and be excited and comfortable about his decision.

Which type of dental practice broker should you hire?

Not all dental practice brokers are created equal. We are the largest mergers and acquisitions (M&A) consultants with a focus on dental in the country. We believe every dental practice and each deal is unique and deserves a custom strategic approach rather than one size fits all. Our proactive approach has resulted in 99% of our clients receiving multiple offers to consider, thanks to a robust list of qualified individual buyers, large practice inventory and relationships with more than 300 different DSOs.

Whether you’re planning to put your investments toward retirement or another venture, you’ll want to ensure a smooth and lucrative transition. Take advantage of a complimentary prospectus offered by us to know the true value of your practice and which options are available.

Bottom line

In order to get the most out of your sale, both financially and personally, there are other considerations that can affect the entire outcome of transitioning your practice. After all, your time is money. Your primary focus during the selling process is to maintain the success of your practice. Both you and the buyer will suffer consequences if the value of your practice decreases with a decrease in production.

We will present all possible options so you can look at and compare all sides. This not only means selling to an individual, bringing on an associate or affiliating with a DSO, but also considering all options within each vertical. In the end, you’ll be left with a match that you, your staff and your patients will feel comfortable with.