Many times the purchase or sale of a dental practice is the biggest business decision of that dentist’s life. It is not recommenced to draft up a one page document that has some basic terms on it and have both parties sign it and call it a day.
For the selling dentist, they want to make sure that they are not legally obligated to continue to provide things like transition terms, or in certain cases prevent them from practicing dentistry in a certain area or for a certain period of time.
The purchasing dentist wants to make sure that the selling dentist doesn’t simply lease an office three blocks away and open up a competing dental practice after receiving all the money from the purchaser. Having an attorney explain the moving parts of the transaction will help a dentist concentrate on preparing to actually practice dentistry and not get caught up in legal terms and provisions that they will only most likely use once or twice in their lifetime.
Having an attorney who is familiar with dental practice transaction helps both parties to make sure that as many terms and provisions are addressed. An attorney can help guide dentist through the unusual vocabulary and provisions in the practice transaction documents and they can help flush out things that a dentist has not thought about during the preparation for the purchase and sale of the dental practice.