If you don’t have all your patients logged digitally in an Electronic Health Records system, now is the time to convert to one. If you’ve had a practice for decades, paper charts have probably worked for you just fine, but your new owners want to access things easily. It could hurt your asking price if a buyer anticipates needing to convert to an EHR.
If you’re thinking about selling, you’re probably looking to wind things down, but now is the time to ramp up. You want to show potential buyers you are selling a growing, profitable business — not one that is shrinking. After you sell, you can have as few patients as you want. Follow the steps below to get more patients:
- Improve your office space: Be sure to make a good first impression. Your office should be clean, attractive, and modern to welcome new and returning patients. Some inexpensive steps you can take to enhance your space are adding new paint, furnishings, or carpet.
- Enhance your online presence: Buyers are likely to find your practice via an internet search. A smart approach is to focus on incorporating some simple search engine optimization (SEO) features on your practice’s business website. If you don’t already have a business website for your practice, now is the time to set one up.
Once you complete the sale, notify your patients that your practice is being sold. The sale could affect how your patients’ medical records are transferred after the sale. To comply with licensing requirements, the terms of the Asset Purchase Agreement, and professional and ethical standards, you should notify and advise your patients of the transfer.
You need to value your medical practice before you sell. How your business is valued depends on a few factors, including what type of medical practice it is. At Synergy Business Brokers, our database of potential buyers is interested in:
- Walk-in clinics
- General practitioners
- General diagnosticians
- Adult internal medicine
- Virtual medical services
- Primary care physicians
- Family medical practices
- Nurse practitioner offices
- Pediatric internal medicine doctors
- Cardiologist specialists
- Genomic research and more
One of the key elements to consider in your valuation is your owner’s net income. Typically, a practice is valued off a multiple of your net income (including your salary and benefits), and practices that have a large number of doctors can usually use higher multiples to calculate value.
Valuators and medical practice business brokers can be effective partners when you need to value your practice. Professional medical practice brokers can go a long way toward getting you a fast sale and a great price on your medical business. When you work with a broker, you’ll be able to give a reliable estimate to buyers on how much your company is worth and have access to great advice and motivated buyers.
At Synergy Business Brokers, we have a database of more than 40,000 potential buyers that may be interested in purchasing your medical practice. Buyers that may be interested in your practice include:
- Hospitals
- Affluent doctors
- Private equity firms
- Large medical practices
- Public healthcare companies
There are pros and cons to each type of buyer. Hospitals, for example, are top acquirers of medical practices, but they often end up offering lower payments. Private equity groups may pay top dollar for some specialties, but they are especially selective. Individual doctors can be good, but you need to make sure they have the financing in place.
This is why so many practitioners looking to sell their practices turn to a broker for assistance to help them to navigate their options. Partner with a broker from Synergy Business Brokers to sell your medical practice for the best price.
You may need to stick around for a while to entice buyers. There’s a good chance that you are the heart of this business and that many of the patients came to your practice because of you.
Buyers don’t want to have to worry that as soon as they buy your business and you retire, your patients will no longer be loyal to the practice. If you agree to stay on for six months or a year to ease the transition, it could help seal the deal.
