The Dental Boardroom

Wes Read, host, Practice CFO

Duration: 44 minutes

A solo walkthrough of the year-end tax planning work that must be finished by December 31st, built around the idea that a strong year of planning only counts if the final execution lands. Wes covers what locks in at year end, the internal checklist Practice CFO runs on every client, and why single tax strategies have to be judged inside the full financial picture rather than on their own. The central point: tax friction is the main brake on financial independence, and most of the levers close on December 31st.

Key topics

• Retirement plan design and funding deadlines
• Section 179 and bonus depreciation on equipment
• Pass-through entity tax elections
• Tax brackets, phase-outs, and lost deductions

Key takeaways

• Retirement plan design cannot be changed once the year closes, and elective deferrals must clear payroll by December 31st.
• Financing equipment for a Section 179 deduction can start a debt spiral: deduction now, payments later with nothing to deduct.
• Missing the pass-through entity tax election is the most common and most expensive oversight on a dental return.
• Getting income under a phase-out threshold pays twice: lower tax now, plus deductions you would otherwise forfeit.

Actions to consider

• Schedule a year-end projection meeting with your CPA or CFO advisor in October or November, while options are still open.
• Confirm your W-2, spouse and children payroll, and 401(k) contributions will land on target before the final December payroll run.
• Have an advisor vet any supplier equipment deal for whether you can actually use the deduction before you sign.

Participants:

• Wes Read, host, PracticeCFO
• Megan Shelton, a practice management consultant specializing in dentistry who previously owned and sold her own dental practice
• Michael Anderson, a dental marketing consultant with 13 years in the industry

Duration: 60 minutes

Reimbursement is flat while overhead climbs, and most owners have at least daydreamed about dropping Delta. This session breaks the decision into three levers, price, friction, and yield, and argues that the fee schedule is rarely the real problem. Friction, the cost of collecting the money, is what owners actually control.

Key topics

• UCR fee schedules and percentile benchmarking
• Claim denials, eligibility, and breakdowns
• Per-plan profitability math
• Marketing readiness before going out of network

Key takeaways

• The squeeze is often the cost to collect, not the fee schedule.
• An 80 percent PPO practice can still be highly profitable.
• Not every plan delivers the same patient; case acceptance varies by carrier.
• A practice with no marketing history will struggle to go fee for service.

Actions to consider

• Run a UCR percentile analysis and raise fees toward the 80th to 85th percentile, then resubmit.
• Pull payer distribution and case acceptance by plan to find your worst performer.
• Verify eligibility within two days of every visit and get a full breakdown, not a coverage table.

Participants:

• Wes Read, host, Practice CFO and Practice Orbit
• Jared Bergquist, a licensed business and commercial real estate broker in Nevada who runs his own brokerage selling dental practices and handling dental real estate across Nevada, Utah, and Arizona

Duration: 57 minutes

A broker and a CPA walk through what the practice acquisition market looks like right now: where DSO activity stands, what private buyers are competing for, and why the "perfect" practice is the wrong target. They cover building ownership, rent as a percentage of collections, and how staff stability drives both value and a successful transition.

Key topics

• DSO activity and divestitures
• Private practice acquisition
• Buying versus leasing your building
• Staff retention through a transition

Key takeaways

• Waiting for a flawless practice is why many qualified buyers never buy one.
• DSO divestitures over the next five to ten years will create locations, equipment, and patient bases worth pursuing.
• Owning your building controls the one expense you cannot renegotiate later.
• A de novo that fails to launch is very hard to sell, because leasehold improvements and used equipment carry little value.

Actions to consider

• Check rent as a percentage of collections against the seven to ten percent target and know what a long lease escalates to.
• Widen your acquisition criteria to four and five operatory practices and offices with fixable problems.
• If you are buying, negotiate for the seller to stay on twelve to eighteen months to hand off staff and patients.

Participants:

• Wes Read, host, PracticeCFO
• Paul Lipcius, CFO advisor at PracticeCFO, a CPA and Series 65 investment advisor focused on higher net worth clients and capital markets
• Howard Farran, host of Dentaltown, who interviews Wes and Paul in this crossover episode

Duration: 71 minutes

With SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic all heading toward historic public offerings, dentists want to know whether to chase the hype. Wes and Paul explain why euphoric IPO pricing rarely rewards latecomers, how to capture AI's real growth through the less obvious companies underneath it, and why a doctor's own practice, not a moonshot stock, is still their highest returning asset.

Key topics

• AI mega IPOs: SpaceX, OpenAI, Anthropic
• CapEx trickle-down and downstream suppliers
• Concentration risk in the S&P 500
• The practice as the core wealth engine

Key takeaways

• Euphoric IPO valuations already price in years of unproven growth.
• The winner is often the second or third mover, not the first to market.
• Own AI through the picks and shovels suppliers, not just the headline names.
• A well designed portfolio's job is to be boring, disciplined, and consistent.

Actions to consider

• Cap any speculative bet, a single IPO or crypto, at a small insurance sized allocation.
• Pick three or four practice metrics to improve this quarter instead of chasing every new one.
• Pressure test your advisor's fees: ask whether anyone other than you pays them.

A Dental Boardroom data deep-dive, PracticeCFO

A breakdown of the Q2 2026 State of the U.S. Dental Economy Report from the ADA Health Policy Institute, translating national data into what it means for an independent practice. The core tension: dentists feel confident and are busier than ever, yet revenue is flat and margins are squeezed from every side. This episode decodes why, and what owners can do about it.

Key topics

• The confidence versus consumer disconnect
• The fiscal squeeze on practice margins
• Insurance reimbursement as rent control
• AI adoption for the back office

Key takeaways

• Dentists feel recession-proof, but consumer dental spending rose just 1 percent in a year.
• Overhead and wages are climbing far faster than reimbursements, so owners eat the difference.
• Packed schedules and two-week waits mask flat revenue, not real growth.
• AI is being adopted fast for admin and imaging, yet 82 percent refuse it for treatment decisions.

Actions to consider

• Audit your payer mix and renegotiate or drop the worst-reimbursing plans.
• Pilot AI scribing or insurance-verification tools to reclaim staff hours.
• Weigh a DSO's back-office scale against your true overhead before ruling it out.

The PracticeCFO investment committee sits down for its quarterly market update, digging into how AI is reshaping valuations and where the Federal Reserve stands today. The core message for practice owners: AI is genuinely transformative, but most of the hype is already priced in — so valuation discipline and diversification still decide long-term returns.

Hosts & guests: Wes Read (host, PracticeCFO), Brandon Hobson (Chief Investment Officer, PracticeCFO), and Paul Lipcius (PracticeCFO investment committee).

What we cover:

• AI's effect on market valuations
• Government involvement and regulation of AI
• Federal Reserve policy and interest rates
• Portfolio positioning and risk assessment

Key takeaways:

• AI is groundbreaking, but the hype is largely priced in already.
• Every prior CapEx cycle eventually reversed and normalized — this one will too.
• The Fed is holding steady, with a hike now more likely than a near-term cut.
• New Fed leadership is prioritizing inflation, easing fears about Fed independence.
• Strong balance sheets and diversification protect wealth better than chasing momentum.

Actions to consider:

• Reassess your true risk tolerance now, while markets are strong — not after a drop.
• Trim over-concentration in high-flying AI and tech names.
• Rebalance toward a diversified mix: bonds, some cash, healthcare and consumables, and precious metals.

In this episode of The Dental Boardroom Podcast, Wes takes a break from his discussion of The Five Types of Wealth to tackle an important topic for dental practice owners: buying and selling dental practices.

Drawing from years of experience as a dental CPA and financial advisor involved in hundreds of practice transitions, Wes explores why dental practice sales remain an inefficient marketplace, the critical role brokers play in successful transitions, and the challenges buyers and sellers face throughout the process.

He also shares the vision behind Practice Orbit, a technology platform designed to modernize and streamline dental practice transactions while supporting brokers, buyers, sellers, lenders, attorneys, and advisors.

• Dental practice transitions are complex, emotional, and financially significant events.
• A skilled broker can provide tremendous value by finding buyers, coordinating the process, and helping avoid costly mistakes.
• Dentists should carefully evaluate broker experience, incentives, and transparency.
• DSO offers should be analyzed beyond the headline purchase price.
• Technology can improve efficiency, transparency, and communication throughout the transition process.
• The future of dental practice sales may involve a combination of experienced brokers and modern marketplace technology.

Wes Read continues his series on The Five Types of Wealth by Sahil Bloom, diving deep into Chapter 4: The Life Razor. Building on the five categories of wealth Time, Social, Mental, Physical, and Financial Wes explores how a single, carefully crafted sentence can become the most powerful decision-making tool in your life and practice. From the cockpit of Apollo 13 to Netflix’s boardrooms, to a late afternoon assembling a hydraulic bed with his son, this episode delivers a framework that is equal parts philosophical and practical.

What You’ll Learn

• Why your net worth number alone doesn’t define true wealth and what fills the gap
• The philosophical concept of a “razor” and how it applies to your personal life
• The 3 non-negotiable traits of a powerful life razor: controllable, ripple-creating, and identity-defining
• How Marc Randolph (co-founder & first CEO of Netflix) used a five-word rule to protect his marriage through startup chaos
• A step-by-step process to discover and draft your own life razor
• Wes’s personal life razor and the touching story behind it

159: Executive Sessions: AI & The Dental Practice

What does AI actually mean for your dental practice right now? In this executive session, host Wes sits down with Michael Anderson from Wonderist Agency, one of the nation's largest dental marketing firms, and Dr. Megan Shelton of Shelton Solutions to cut through the hype and talk about what's really changing.

They cover the dramatic shift in patient search behavior (ChatGPT now accounts for 20% of all searches and is growing), why the fundamentals of digital marketing still drive AI search results, how AI-informed patients are showing up differently at the front desk, and why the human connection at the center of your practice is more valuable than ever.

Wes also shares a powerful framework from Lawrence Ford's book The Difference Between Knowledge, Intelligence, and Wisdom and explains exactly how Practice CFO is approaching AI adoption, client investment strategy, and the future of financial advisory.

• Why 20% of patients are now searching for a dentist via ChatGPT — and what that means for your marketing
• The "unsatisfying but true" answer to ranking in AI search: go back to the basics
• Why AI-generated content is not penalized — but lazy AI content is a dead end
• How the AI-prepped patient is changing chair-side conversations and silently eroding trust
• The knowledge → intelligence → wisdom framework and why wisdom is AI-proof
• Why documenting your SOPs is the mandatory first step before any AI automation
• What Practice CFO is doing with client investment strategy in an AI-dominated market

In this episode, Wes Read continues his deep-dive review of The Five Types of Wealth by Sahil Bloom, a book that profoundly influenced his thinking as a financial planner who has spent his career helping dentists build meaningful lives through their practices.

Wes covers the book’s preface and Chapter 2, unpacking the research on money and happiness, the philosophy behind redefining wealth, and Sahil Bloom’s powerful framework: the five types of wealth that truly define a fulfilled life.

• Why money matters but only up to a point. Wes walks through three core findings from the research on money and happiness, including the concept of declining marginal utility.
• The Pyrrhic Victory. The story of King Pyrrhus in 280 BC and what it means to win the battle but lose the war, and how this applies directly to the pursuit of financial success at the expense of everything else.
• Wealth inequality by the numbers. A candid look at Federal Reserve data on how wealth is distributed in America and what it means for dentists trying to cross from labor income to capital ownership.
• The comparison trap. Why “there’s always a bigger boat” and how excessive comparison is one of the greatest enemies of happiness.
• The 90% rule. A striking stat: 90% of all the time you will ever spend with your children happens before they leave home.

The Five Types of Wealth are defined:

• Time Wealth: The freedom to choose how, where, with whom, and when you spend your time.
• Social Wealth: The depth and breadth of your meaningful relationships; the #1 predictor of happiness.
• Mental Wealth: Connection to higher-order purpose, lifelong growth, and a healthy relationship with your mind.
• Physical Wealth: Your health, fitness, and vitality; the most entropic form of wealth requiring consistent daily habits.
• Financial Wealth: Assets minus liabilities, but with a twist: your expectations are also a liability.

The seasons of life. How your priorities across these five categories will naturally shift over time, and why balance, not perfection, is the goal.