You wouldn't know it from my posts......but I'm a very positive person overall.
The postive of optometry is you CAN help people AND make very good money at it. (But the first point is lost on 90% of your patients).
But only if you play your cards right.
1. You have to have little to no undergraduate debt.
2. Go to the cheapest optometry school you can find--(become a state resident if you must).
3. Don't waste your time doing a pseudo-residency.
4. Immediately open a practice right out of school or purchase a good one if you can find one that the owner is not trying to charge a rediculous amount. Write up a competent business plan and take it to a few bankers.
5. Learn as soon as possible how to bill medically AND DO IT.
6. Hope and pray you have a competent spouse who will handle the office for you while you 'do your thing'.
7. Hope said spouse doesn't divorce you and ruin all you worked for previously.
8. Hit the road running with your new practice and try to get as many referral sources as possible (family docs, PAs, nurses, schools, nursing homes, etc.......you'll need everyone you get plus their brothers and sisters).
And now we are getting to the important stuff:
9. Don't go out and buy a new BMW or Lexus. If you must have one for image, get a used one that you can pay off in a few years.
10. Buy a modest house.
11. Immediate start a Roth or other IRA.
12. Work to pay off your school loans as quickly as possible (hopefully you followed the eariler advice and didn't rack up too much).
13. As soon as possilbe, purchase the real estate your practice is located in.
14. Don't think you can lose money on every patient but make it up in volume (ie. don't accept crap vision plans). That's a mathematical impossiblity but it's what the crappy insurance companys will tell you will happen.
15. Work like a dog getting patients because unlike some professions, we have to find the patients.......they don't find us. I mean things like work outside your office (alot), working in smelly nursing homes, find a space-share with a family doc or similar, contract to do exams in a prison, teach a class at a community college, visit every provider in your area, visit OMDs so they know who you are, etc......
THIS is what it takes.............along with a few hundred thousand dollars, very thick skin and maybe 10 years AFTER graduation.
The GOOD NEWS. You CAN make enough money to pay off your school loans, pay off your home, have nice cars, vacation and live better than most people.
THE BAD NEWS: 90+% of graduating optometrist WON'T DO ALL THIS.
Here's what most will do:
-Take out whatever loans the school will give them. They know best, after all.
-Graduate owing $200,000. Say, "oh shi_t" when the first bill comes after graduation. As soon as you graduate, I mean after mommy and daddy or MasterCard pays for your graduation trip to Hawaii, you will be working at some ODs office (for $150/day) under his license waiting for yours to come in the mail so you'll be "official". You get tired of 'working for the man' making peanuts so...............
You will remember The Walmart rep that came to your school mentioning how you can "have your own practice and make six figures with no risk". Hey, you've got bills to pay. Why not don the blue vest and sock away a little money 'until your ready to open your own place?
You'll stay there 2 years, all the while hiding the fact that you work at a discount warehouse, seldom mentioning it to friends and only to colleages if they ask you specifically. You get used to the nasty customers trying to bring their shopping carts into your 10x10 sq ft "office". You learn to accept the wink-wink "suggestions" (ie. demands) from your optical manager, who the month before was working at the local hog slaughter factory. But whatever,.... the money is good and you get a Walmart discount so hey...........
Another year goes by and a new district manager moves in and decids he'd like all the optical staff to wear giant eyeball hats and oh yea, "we need to pick up the optical sales so you will drop your exam fees from $55 to $43". You have one more "ALWAYS LOW PRICES" Cheer with the gang AND get into a disagreement with the district manager. He pretends to give a crap abour your concerns and walks back to his office to call and get the next warm body OD on deck. So you get tired of all the crap and quit before getting fired. You find out, against state law that "Your patients" are really 'Walmarts patients'..........but what'cha gonna do, sue Walmart?? But in reality, do you really think they went there to see you or the 'warm body' that can refract them for $59 glassess?
So now your 3+ years post graduation and no bills have been paid. You've paid the minium on the school loans and are paying $940/month on a new Lexus LS460.
So you're a bit panicked. You have a house/apt payment, a car payment and $2,000 in school loans. You can't be unemployed. So you visit a few private OD offices and tell them of your NEED for $110,000/yr plus full benefits. The private OD, probably barely making that himself, laughs inside and offers you a few days fill-in. So you fill in a few places and pick up a part-time Lenscrafters gig too. So you're making decent $$ but are not really fullfiled doing things the way other people want them done. Because after all, you have three years experience and there is nothing more a doc likes than someone coming in and telling him that the place he's built with blood, sweat and tears, 'really needs to add vision therapy' (Trust me.....there are NO new ideas in optometry....it's all been tried 100 times.....anything you can think of has been tried)
You are filling in here and there, all the while, life happens. Maybe a baby comes, a marriage (maybe even the marriage first), a parent gets old/sick..........bottom line.........you will ALWAYS have bills to pay. You contemplate going to a bank and borrowing $100,000 to start a practice but with home debt, school debt, car debt..etc.......they are reluctant to give you one and you are not even really sure you want to take on more debt so you just never really pull the trigger 100%.
So then you are stuck. Out of the clouds the sun breaks through like an angel and you see a flyer that a new Pearle Vision is coming to your town and needs an optometrist. Finally your 'own place'. They will just set the hours, make you work Saturdays and Sundays, determine the price of your exams, determine which lenses you will sell.......blah, blah, blah..... And so it goes....
If you do the first scenerio, life can be good for you.
If you do the second one, not so much.
you know? Socal makes me laugh. He/she just never quits...
