Selling your Dental Practice: Things to Think About

So you’re selling your dental practice, and you’ve agreed with the prospective purchaser on a purchase price. What’s next? Well, you need to think about these things:

• Assets vs. share sale;
• Deposit amount;
• Whether you (as Vendor) will be staying on as an associate, office manager, or consultant (and the basic terms of that agreement);
• Whether you will be terminating employees or the purchaser will be hiring all of them;
• What to do about employee termination costs (e.g. 50 / 50 split within the first 90 days);
• Whether you will be selling the property (if you own it) along with the practice;
• Whether a lease assignment or new lease will be required (and whether the landlord’s legal fees will need to be split);
• Whether the purchase is conditional upon things like equipment inspection, financing, chart audit, lawyer review, financial due diligence, getting the lease assigned, buying the assets or shares of another company (e.g. real estate corporation that owns a property where the practice is located);

Now, this isn’t a complete list of things to think about, but it’s a good start. You should speak with a dental lawyer who is familiar with these and other issues before signing any legal agreements!