Are the wealthiest dentists those who do high end cosmetic work on high profile clientele (e.g., celebrities in the Beverly Hils area) or those that own a very large practice with multiple offices?
10% of the uber rich in this country's income comes in the form of salary, the other 90% comes from their financial investments returns or capital gains. Hence why they pay less tax than everyone else.
The idea of being wealthy for dentists requires to think outside the box, and use dentistry as a tool which creates other opportunities that leads to better financial success than dentistry itself.
Example 1: There are dentists that manage multiple practices they helped create, but shared the burden with other doctors who have stake in the business at the branch/office level.
Name: Clint Herzog, DDS
Graduate from: Texas A & M University, 1996
University of Texas San Antonio Dental School, 2000
Practice Name: FLOSS Dental
Practice Locations: 11 locations across Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston and Austin, Texas
Practice opened: First location opened in 2007 in Dallas
Income Range: $3-5 million a year.
Web site:
www.flossdental.com
Example 2: There are doctors who invest in commercial or real estate properties over the course of their career.
Name: Dr. Joe Smith
Graduate from: Case Western
Practice Name: Big Smiles Dental
Practice Locations: 2 locations (with 3 associates, and 1 orthodontist)
Practice opened: 1994
Number of Properties Owned: 50-60 (residential rental properties, some commercial with national tenants - ie. Wendy's, Starbucks, etc.)
Income Range: $2-3 million a year.
Example 3: There are oral surgeons who work for big chains like Aspen.
Name: Dr. Paul Ryan
Graduate from: Tufts
Practice Name: Aspen Dental
Practice Locations: 15 locations (oral surgeons rotates between 20 Aspen offices)
Years At Aspen: 5 years
Income Range: $1-2 million a year.
I know at least 1 dentist who falls into each of the above examples.
There are 100's of other avenues to be financially successful, but they all have one thing in common. They are all outside the norms of your conventional $150-250k a year salary for a dentist, with no financial plan to go beyond his/her profession.