Browse by Topic: DSO & M&A · Practice Operations · Hygiene Career Track · Practice Finance · Regulation & Compliance

Same Chair, Three Ages: What a $22,700 Operatory Does to Your Retirement at 38, 52, and 61 practice finance practice transitions & valuation retirement & tax Oct 09, 2026

The same chair is a different purchase at 38, at 52, and at 61.

Here's the direct answer. The break-even on a staffed operatory barely moves with your age. It lands between about 2.5 and 2.7 added visits a week whether you're 38 or 61. What moves is everything around it: how much the room can add t...

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What a Buyer Pays For When Your Equipment Is on the Table equipment & capital planning practice transitions & valuation retirement & tax Oct 06, 2026

A buyer pays for what your chairs produce.

Here's the direct answer. Practice valuations run mostly on collections and cash flow, and equipment sits inside that number as a supporting cast member. New equipment bought right before a sale rarely comes back dollar for dollar, though a room that's ful...

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North Carolina Just Opened the Gate — And Park Dental Walked Through It in 34 Days dso & m&a practice transitions & valuation Aug 12, 2026

Thirty-four days.

That's how long it took. North Carolina's new law killing the dental board's pre-approval requirement for management agreements took effect on July 7, 2026. On August 10, Park Dental Partners announced it was buying Village Family Dental — twelve locations, forty-eight doctors, ea...

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Going Independent: What Every Dental Hygienist Should Know Before Leaving the Chair hygiene practice transitions & valuation Jul 31, 2026

Every state now permits some form of hygiene practice outside direct chairside supervision by a dentist — the scope varies widely, but the door that used to be fully closed is, in most places, at least partly open. What hasn't caught up is the business information hygienists need to actually walk th...

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Myofunctional Therapy as a Career: What It Actually Pays, and What It Takes to Get There hygiene practice transitions & valuation Jul 30, 2026

Myofunctional therapy has gone from a niche referral almost nobody in general dentistry had heard of, to a service line that orthodontists, airway-focused dentists, ENTs, and sleep clinics are actively looking to refer patients into — and increasingly, to bring in-house. For a dental hygienist looki...

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Myofunctional Therapy as a Career: The Book, the Toolkit, and Everything a Hygienist Needs to Launch hygiene practice transitions & valuation Jul 28, 2026

More hygienists are stepping away from full-time chairside work and building something of their own. Orofacial myofunctional therapy has become one of the most compelling paths for making that move — a cash-pay clinical specialty, in genuinely short supply, that draws on skills a hygienist already h...

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The Dental Practice Succession Planning Crisis Nobody Is Talking About practice transitions & valuation Jun 10, 2026

By Dental Strategy Institute | June 2026 | 7-Minute Read


The average retirement age for U.S. dentists is now 68.7 years. One third of dental assistants and one third of dental hygienists expect to retire within five years. Several states have more than 40% of their active dentists aged 55 or olde...

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There's Never Been a Kelley Blue Book for Dental Equipment. Until Now. equipment & capital planning practice transitions & valuation Jun 06, 2026

By Dental Strategy Institute | June 2026 | 8-Minute Read


When you search for the value of a used car, you go to Kelley Blue Book. There is a universally accepted reference point. The market has a number. Everyone — buyer, seller, insurer, lender — consults the same source, and transactions happen...

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The Retiring Dentist Wave: Why the Seller's Market Has an Expiration Date dso & m&a practice transitions & valuation Jun 05, 2026

By Dental Strategy Institute | June 2026 | 7-Minute Read Right now, in the summer of 2026, demand for dental practices is high and supply is low. DSOs are hungry. Sixty-nine percent of them expect to increase their acquisition activity this year, and many report relying more heavily on brokers beca...

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What Is My Used Dental Equipment Worth? How to Value What You Own equipment & capital planning practice transitions & valuation May 29, 2026

Let me tell you how most used dental equipment pricing works in a practice sale.

The buyer's team walks through the operatories. They take notes. They go back to the office and apply rough age-based estimates to the equipment list — numbers drawn from a dealer rep's memory and whatever feels right ...

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Dental Equipment Depreciation: What It Means, How to Calculate It, and Why It Matters in a Practice Sale equipment & capital planning practice transitions & valuation May 27, 2026

Walk into almost any dental practice transaction and you'll find the same blind spot. The seller has a number in mind — usually based on collections and EBITDA — and the equipment is essentially an afterthought. The buyer's due diligence team walks through the operatories, notes that the chairs are ...

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Dental Practice Exit Strategy: What to Do in the 3 Years Before You Sell practice transitions & valuation May 24, 2026

Most dental practice exits are reactive. An offer arrives, or a health event forces the issue, or the owner hits a point of professional fatigue and starts looking for a way out. The transaction happens under time pressure, with preparation that was done in a hurry, and the outcome reflects that. Th...

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