Brian Hanks has spent this whole season nudging associates to stop waiting. His own data says the average associate buys five to seven years later than they wish they had.

In this solo finale he admits he’s the biggest hypocrite on the show: he knew he wanted to be his own boss at 18, sweating through a summer of construction labor, but he didn’t do anything about it for twenty years.

What finally moved him wasn’t a plan.

It was 5:12 p.m. on a Monday in March 2017, walking out of a meeting he’d set up to ask for a raise, fired twelve minutes in, locked out of his email before he reached the parking lot.

Four kids at home, a hotel room, and an extra muffin from the free breakfast bar because he suddenly had no income.

The book, the business, and this podcast all came out of the 4:30 a.m. mornings that followed. This is the episode for anyone whose reasons for waiting sound perfectly logical. Brian’s did too.

In this episode:

The 18-year-old on a construction crew who swore he’d never work for someone else, and the twenty years of very reasonable excuses that followed

The raise meeting that ended in twelve minutes, and the detail Brian still can’t shake

Why being “responsible for six people” is the most convincing reason not to start, and what it was actually covering

Everything is figure-outable: the first crown, the first implant, the first time a client paid him over Venmo

Steve Van De Graaff’s test from episode 3: problem solvers look for reasons to do it, problem finders look for reasons not to

Readiness isn’t a mood you wait for. It’s what shows up on the other side of taking the step.

The action step: write down what you’re actually afraid of, every item, and why the list isn’t permission to keep waiting

What’s coming in Season 10

This week’s homework: Write down what you’re actually afraid of. Be specific. One thing or twenty-five. Then send it to Brian: brian@dentalbuyeradvocates.com.

No pitch, no follow-up unless you ask for one. He’ll read it and tell you which items someone in your dental school class has already figured out.

Thinking about owning someday? Get Brian’s free Ready Kit for the steps leading up to buying a practice:

https://www.dentalbuyeradvocates.com/ready

More resources:

Read How to Buy a Dental Practice: https://www.dentalbuyeradvocates.com/how-to-buy-a-dental-practice-book/

Book an introductory call with the Dental Buyer Advocates team: https://www.dentalbuyeradvocates.com/schedule-a-call/

Thank you to this season’s guests: Len Tau, Steve Van De Graaff, Mike Pakula, Josh Matthews, Matt Mulcock, Jonathan VanHorn, and Brady Smith.

Season 10 is dentists who bought: a year later, what did they learn, and did they wait too long?

Practice Purchased is hosted by Brian Hanks, MBA, CFP, founder of Dental Buyer Advocates and author of How to Buy a Dental Practice and Taxes for Dentists. It’s ad-free and under 22 minutes, the average American commute. If it helped, forward it to one dentist.

Dr. Brady Smith, comedian and dentist, bought into a practice straight out of dental school, made more in his first months than most of his classmates would in years, and spent twelve years as an owner before he learned the one thing nobody told him: the practice he "owned" couldn't be used as collateral for anything. He found out when he tried to buy a house.

Brady is a multi-practice owner, the host of Laughing My Gas Off, and the most-followed comedian in dentistry. He's also the rare owner who'll tell you, on the record, that he's had months in the last two years where he didn't pay himself.

In this episode of Practice Purchased, Brian Hanks and Brady get into the question this season is built on: how do you know you're ready? Brady's answer comes from the comedy stage as much as the operatory. Nobody feels ready the first time. You go on, it goes okay, you find out what you didn't know, and you get reps. Ownership works the same way, except the reps are months.

One thing worth noticing: Brian describes the two associates he talks to every day, the one who's terrified and the one who's furious at their DSO. Brady's read on which one is closer to ready is not the one you'd guess.

In this episode:

• The worst reason to buy a practice, and why it sounds perfectly reasonable when you're an associate
• What Brady wishes Comfort Dental had told him before he bought in, and who the franchise model is right for
• The Caesars Palace moment: opening for Sebastian Maniscalco in front of 1,800 dentists, and why he still needed reps afterward
• Why "there's no practice run for ownership" is wrong: month one, month two, month twelve
• Months with zero owner income, months with six figures, and why associates never see either
• The angry associate versus the scared one: the questions Brady would ask each before saying "go"
• Rapid fire: toothpaste, favorite comedians, the adult treasure box, and the best dentist to follow on social media

Thinking about owning someday? Get Brian's free Ready Kit for the steps leading up to buying a practice: https://www.dentalbuyeradvocates.com/ready

More resources

• Read How to Buy a Dental Practice
• Book an introductory call with the Dental Buyer Advocates team

About the guest Dr. Brady Smith is a general dentist, multi-practice owner, and comedian based in Portland, Oregon. He hosts Laughing My Gas Off and performs at dental conferences across the country, including opening for Sebastian Maniscalco at Thrive Live in Las Vegas. Find him on social media and at https://www.drbradysmith.com/.

Practice Purchased is hosted by Brian Hanks, MBA, CFP, founder of Dental Buyer Advocates and author of How to Buy a Dental Practice.

He was fired after his first tax season, in the middle of the 2008 crisis. Fifteen years later he runs Tooth and Coin, one of the best-known dental CPA firms in the country. So what did Jonathan VanHorn actually know about running a business before he started one?

Less than you'd think, and more than he gave himself credit for. He'd never run payroll for his own firm. He had run it for a hundred clients. That gap, between what you've never done and what you've already done a version of, is where most associates get stuck.

In this episode of Practice Purchased, Brian Hanks and Jonathan get specific about the financial side of feeling ready: where new owners actually fail, what a dental CPA should cost, and why the spreadsheet is almost never the problem.

One thing worth noticing: Jonathan says failure comes down to two numbers, patients seen and revenue per patient, and in most practices it's obvious which one is off. If you can figure out which one, you can fix it.

In this episode:

• How Jonathan went from fired first-year CPA to founding Tooth and Coin
• The associate's "I've never done that" list, and what's actually on it
• The two numbers that explain almost every practice that struggles
• Why startups should obsess over new patients, and what a healthy count looks like
• The acquisition mistake nobody sees coming: buying a practice whose treatment philosophy doesn't match yours
• What a dental CPA should cost in year one (and what you get for it)
• Brian's one tip on how to be a client your CPA wants to keep

Thinking about owning someday? Get Brian's free Ready Kit for the steps leading up to buying a practice: https://www.dentalbuyeradvocates.com/ready

More resources

• Read How to Buy a Dental Practice
• Book an introductory call with the Dental Buyer Advocates team

About the guest Jonathan VanHorn, CPA, is the founder of Tooth and Coin, a dental-focused CPA firm serving practice owners across the country, and host of the Tooth and Coin podcast. Before founding the firm he worked in public accounting and as an assistant CFO for a manufacturing company. https://www.toothandcoin.com/

Practice Purchased is hosted by Brian Hanks, MBA, CFP, founder of Dental Buyer Advocates and author of How to Buy a Dental Practice.