...secure financing ...
...start reading and making a business plan. ...
Yep,
All it really takes to start a PP is about $50k-250k (depends on area COL, area competition, LOC/savings, etc).
All you need is a bit of a space, supplies, one employee, a bit of marketing early.
XRay and nicer furniture and big marketing campaign and bigger office(s) and all that are optional... they can come later on.
It can cost a lot more if you do buyout... but that can occasionally be worth it to do it that way also (busier much quicker in some localities).
Make a plan. Make lists of supplies and costs. Do a budget.
Read
The Medical Entrepreneur, then read it again. Revise your plan.
Submit your plan and app for a med/biz loan from a bank or CU. Try a few of them.
Fyi, you will get rejected offhand or after a cursory glance due to your student loans (but you will have learned!).
But yeah, those days of pre-2007 where banks gave grad docs - even podiatrists - a big bag to go start or buy a practice are LONG gone.
Plan to save and save and save until you can do it. Learn all the way.
Like
@heybrother and others, I get messages all the time from ppl who want to do solo startup (aka want better income and ROI on their degree and are sick of having a boss). Problem is, many have no money and don't want to save harder or cut costs ("can't"), won't (again, "can't") downsize or borrow against or sell house the never should've "bought," won't borrow from fam or make any move to get or save the $$ needed. Well, then keep enjoying that associate gig... maybe you'll eventually start saving? If you want it, you'll make it happen. There is no miracle way to do it. The cavalry is not coming. You don't have to eat ramen every night, but you do have to find ways to save up if you want to start a solo PP (or any biz).
Just work a PP job or supergroup or PP MSG/ortho or whatever and learn every day. You will have to save hard.
[fwiw, I'm normally for paying student loans fast and hard with everything but max to Roth IRA... but saving HARD for startup PP is the only reason to pay low/minimum on edu debts or cash our retirement, because the PP will rocket your income and job satisfaction... but yeah, underpaying edu loans to buy house or consumer stuff is bonkers]
If you work a hospital job, you won't learn much about PP and will have to read a LOT, but you'll probably get to the startup $aving$ faster.
Either way, you'll learn as you go. You have to.
The steps to being rich are and always have been:
- Get a 100k+ job. ...podiatrists all have one of those.
- Learn to invest. ...biz, stocks, RE, part owner in biz, anything that makes regular income
- Start your own scalable business. ...for podiatrists, that's nearly always podiatry clinic(s), do what you know
- Scale up the biz, invest profits from business(es). ...unlimited potential obviously
Step #1 can be skipped if you have family wealth. Step #4 is obviously optional.But yeah, that's how it goes.
Employees can be comfortable, but they'll never get mega-rich like biz owners can. They just do step #1 and maybe some of #2 for decades.
...When you do start a pod biz, you will do tons. You will do ton of stuff you haven't done (but hopefully read about most).
You will learn a lot on your team (attorney, biller, accountant, buddy DPMs who have done it). Find good people and lean on them.
Hint: if you're asking if you should, you aren't driven. Keep reading.
Once you're nailing down
how, then
where, then
when... yaaaaaaa.
