Episode 130: Extended Edition – The Real Deal on Real Estate with special guest Dr. David Phelps

“If you’re investing your hard-earned money into a business where you call the shots, then you have more control.” ~Dr. David Phelps

When the 2008 recession hit, I lost 50% of my portfolio. While I recovered OK, that fear of loss never went away and I started looking at expanding my financial portfolio.

I think everyone has that fear of the stock market tanking and is looking for something more stable for their futures. Many independent dental practice owners like you, turn inward and want to invest in their own businesses. 

One of the most common markets people turn to when they look outside the stock market, is real estate. After all, doing real estate the right way can be a secure way to building cash flow and net worth, so you can secure your future. 

But, you’re not just another investor. Dentists like you have specific financial goals.

Which is why I am so excited to bring you this special extended edition of The Productive Dentist Podcast with my special guest Dr. David Phelps of Freedom Founders. Join us for insights on how you as a dental practice owner can make smart real estate investments including:

• Current thoughts on the economy and where it’s going
• Tips for what to look for when examining options
• Insights on current mortgage and interest rates

Never miss an episode! Subscribe on iTunes & Spotify. Visit us at http://www.productivedentistpodcast.com

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Dr. Bruce Baird
Hi, this is Dr. Bruce Baird with The Productive Dentist Podcast I tell you what I am so excited about today and today’s guest is Dr. David Phelps, David has written numerous books on financial on the financial world, from the silent retirement killer how to outwit the fan from high income to high net worth. How many books have you written, David?

Dr. David Phelps
We’ve done six I believe at this point, Bruce.

Dr. Bruce Baird
That’s amazing. Well, let me tell you a little bit about David. For those of you who don’t know David owned and managed the private dental practice for over 21 years. While still in dental school, he began his investment in real estate by joint venturing with his father on their first rental property. Three years later, they sold the property and David took his 25,000 capital gain share and lever sit into 31 properties that produce $15,000 in month net cash flow, multiple health crises suffered by his daughter Jen and this was back when you and I first met this, she had leukemia and had a liver transplant at 12 that caused you to create the freedom to leave the practice and make time for what mattered most.

Today David is a nationally recognized speaker on creating freedom building real businesses investing in real estate. He authors a monthly newsletter path to freedom and hosts Dentist Freedom Blueprint Practice. He’s also CEO of Freedom Founders, through which he provides hundreds of professional practice owners a blueprint to create freedom in their own lives and I tell you that I have been so excited about what you’ve done in helping dentists because we’ve helped them in the past serve productive dentists get their production up and stuff and make more money, but they just don’t know what to do. Tell us to tell our listeners a little bit about what it is that you do kind of from a 30,000 foot and then I’m going to dig in a little deeper now. Yeah, perfect. Yeah, well,

Dr. David Phelps
well freedom founders really nice shade from when I exited my practice some years ago, and I had a few colleagues, just a few handfuls that just said, Hey, you know, I understand why you left practice because of your daughter, but kind of want to know, you know how to pull it off financially, because most of us, you know, I was in my 40s and most you know, thinking your work till you’re probably your late 50s or 60s or somewhere thereabouts. Right and so I explained that I did you know, dental practice and worked really hard on that, in tandem with building this portfolio of real estate equities on the side started very, very small Bruce and you know, young age and just no big hits, just compounding and over time and that’s what allowed me to get free. So when I had some Docs asking me, Well, how do I do it? I’m thinking, well, I could show you and teach you what I did, but you’re not gonna want to know how I did it back when I was in my 20s. Because today, you know, back then I didn’t have a family. You know, I was a single guy and I could do those things.

I said, You’re not gonna want to do it that way but how about if you want to just piggyback on some of my deals, right? because I was out there buying and this was after the 2008 downturn and there was a lot of properties on sale. So I had a handful that said, yes, it’s fun. I thought, well, I could probably just sort of teaching this in a very, very informal format, you know, those who want to learn and, and we will do some business together and we did and that’s how freedom founders started a little over a decade ago.

Today, it’s grown a lot and the reason why it’s grown Bruce is that number one, I did not want to go out and create a new business called David Phelps, a real estate enterprise. You know, I just I, I build my own portfolio, but that was enough for me but I thought, you know, I know people, you know, we talked about relationship capital, because I’ve been in the real estate space for so many years, I know good people around the country, I thought, Well, I’ll start by bringing a few of those to my small little group here that’s very informal at that point and I’ll just cross-pollinate, I’ll be the translator, I’ll explain how private capital can enter the arena and how it’s good for both people and we started creating this, this little private economy of deal flow in real estate investments, you know, getting back 2020 1020 1120 12. Well, it just started to grow organically, I had no vision for wanting to make this thing big or anything, I just, it was just fun, I just enjoyed the heck out of it gave me something to do because I was out of dental practice but it just started growing over the year.

So today, like anything, Bruce, just like PDA, you know, we’ve just evolved over the years and as we’ve evolved, we’ve become more sophisticated in our underwriting and vetting of real estate investment deals, because I feel like even though it’s not my fiduciary responsibility, I’m not a licensed financial planner, or we don’t, we don’t sell real estate to people but I still feel a strong obligation to do my very best to vet and I think that’s something a lot of people miss is the vetting the underwriting of what you’re going to potentially invest in, just like someone who’s going to buy a dental practice, would want to hire a great team to help them do what do the due diligence that make sure all the numbers are in place, and that what you’re potentially going to buy? Is what’s being shown to you on the front end?

Dr. Bruce Baird
Absolutely. I tell you, I have gotten multiple friends and very, very close buddies who’ve been through the Freedom founders workshops, and have worked and invested with you guys and I’m excited because I’m planning on being there in October, I’ve heard the buzz, in fact, that I’ve had my own little private courses with several of the guys who’ve been to your courses, and they’ve explained it a little bit to me, but I’m really excited to actually get there and, and see what happens in real-time because I again I feel kind of like I don’t really have a fiduciary responsibility to my people who come to your PTA, but I just want them to be successful. I want them to be able to do things that maybe they didn’t even know they could do.

I was just listening to it this morning to Arnold Schwarzenegger. It’s he’s got a deal on YouTube about, you know, setting goals and it’s just a 10-minute little clip but man it was so it’s so important to set that thought process up. Now you and I both started our business as PDA 18 years ago, and you 10 years ago, not with an I mean, we had a vision, but it wasn’t clear at that point but it just constantly keeps getting better and better and that’s everything I’ve heard about what you’re doing. Tell me a little bit, because I know that most of the docs that listen to me are probably watching, watching futures, and you’re on their phone looking to see what the futures are this morning for the stock market and that’s not the way you guys play the game and so, you know, share with me a little bit about your thoughts about what’s going on in the economy right now and Canada, where we should be looking?

Dr. David Phelps
Well, we do watch, you know, Bruce, the big wave trends, so no question about at the end of the cycles do affect everything. They affect our businesses, our practices, they affect the stock market futures, they affect crypto, they affect commodities, they affect real estate, everything is affected to a degree real estate, being an inefficient market is slower to respond to the whip of the market cycles. So yes, we don’t really say I don’t I’m sure there are still some people in our group that like to play the game and I understand it, you know, if you want to have some money, and you want to play ball and do some trading and that kind of thing.

I mean, I get it, that’s, that can be fun and if it’s a fun hobby, and you enjoy doing it with a certain amount of money, I mean, you should do that. I don’t I just personally, learned way back over 40 years ago, when I started buying real estate, which actually was in 1980, which is very similar to what period we’re in right now. People laugh when I say, you know, this is my second round, well, yours to reasonably light. I mean, I know we were kind of young kids back then but in the 70s and 80s. We were going through a period, not very much different in many ways.

Right now with high inflation and the Fed was trying to do what was trying to tamp down real inflation by raising the interest rates. So all those things juxtaposed together, have had an effect on the marketplace, the economy, everything and so everybody’s watching that right now, right there watching to see what the Feds gonna do and if we’re going to have a heavy recession and all these things coming together. So in real estate, we really play as an investor, not a speculator, there’s just like anything you can do. can speculate in real estate and again, people who know how to do that. Great, but you’ve got to be like, really on top of that just like a trader in the markets, you know, it’s a day-to-day job, right and as an investor, we play the long game. So you really go back to fundamentals.

Are we changing and shifting? Where do we focus our capital investment in real estate right now? Yes, absolutely. We’re more careful about the equities we buy into equities being ownership, whether you’re buying houses or you’re in syndication for multifamily or self-storage, or something of that nature. Equities are always great to hedge against inflation. They provide tax benefits in cash flow, but when we’re at the top of the markets, which we really are and so it’s probably starting to go into decline and how far we go.

That’s anybody’s guess but you have to be a little more careful and make sure that you’re investing based on the company if you’re in the market, or in real estate, the fundamentals of the asset, what what are the fundamentals of the company or the real estate, does it really have an intrinsic value, that even in a recessionary period, people are going to want to buy, you know, use real estate, what real estate really holds value throughout recent market corrections and so you buy on fundamentals to make sure you’ve got the cash flow margins, outside of your normal expenses, and the debt service you may be using and debt service costs are going up, or they have been going up, they’re tailing off a little bit now, but we still see what’s gonna go so we can kind of play this long game in real estate, what without having the gyrations of you know, checking in every day to see what’s happening and that’s just, that’s, that’s my personality, right? I mean, there’s just like, I like to play the long game, that’s enough years that I have a pretty good idea of where things are going and how to hedge against yeah, stay steady to hedge.

Dr. Bruce Baird
So you say I’m steady, you know, with, it seems like it would have been the perfect time over the last eight years to be in the real estate arena. I know that prices have just skyrocketed in Texas, with everybody moving in from California, and across the country and I know you’re here in Texas. So I mean, the values of stuff have just gotten ridiculous. I’m sure that is a help but then it also makes you look a little bit deeper and more carefully at properties that could be overpriced or whatever when you’re doing syndication or whatever it is that you’re doing. Is that kind of what you’re seeing now? Yeah.

Dr. David Phelps
I mean, across the nation, of course, every market’s a little bit different and that’s what’s kind of the good part of real estate as you can be very local, very niche specific in where you invest but yes, to your point, you know, we’ve been both in been in Texas for decades and we’ve never seen in Texas, the kind of run-up that we’ve had in the like the last 810 years, we’ve always been very slow and steady and all that while other markets, you know, have this big, big, big appreciation pushes up, you know, Texas in the past, you know, had always been still like, well, where’s our turn? Right?

We got it, we got and I think a big part of that was because investors saw Texas as being you know, a safe haven, because typically when people want to avoid the volatility, they go where to where markets have been steady, Eddie, and so a lot of money came into Texas after the last downturn and as a result, and other factors as well. It’s, it’s pushed our market up. So we’ve seen returns in price appreciation that we hadn’t seen before. So back to your point. Yes, you have to understand, again, if you’re buying into the equity side, in the market today, you’ve got to really know what your numbers are we call it your Buy Box criteria.

What are that criteria? If you hold that criteria, it means you’re probably gonna pass on a lot of deals right now, unfortunately, a lot of people get involved in kind of the exuberance of the marketplace, maybe they haven’t been through a correction before and they’ve been out doing, quote, real estate, or whatever it is they do in the last five or six years and really unless you’re just really totally incompetent, you everybody’s made some money. So if you have this feeling like, Okay, well, I’ll let my margins get a little more compressed. It’s again, it’s good, like being exuberant about buying a dental practice, you know, you have something on the side save, you know, that looks like a pretty good practice but you know, the margins are kind of tight. You know, if you buy that practice, and you lose Delta Premier, and some of the things you’re poor, you know, it’s like, yeah, but you know, I just gotta go do it, and if you believe those, those gut instincts about, maybe I shouldn’t do it, and you buy into kind of speculation mode, like everything you’ve seen in the past is going to continue exactly as it has. That’s where people get into trouble. So having real stringent criteria on how you invest and what that criteria is, is what we find keeps us safe.

Dr. Bruce Baird
Sure. You know, I’m, we’re talking about 1990 and 80 and my first mortgage was 14%. I thought it was great because it got up to 18. Or up at 14, I came to Granberry and I was like, Oh man, I was so excited. I did an SBA loan for my practice here in Granberry and I got an 11% fix for 20 years and I was like, Oh my gosh, this is awesome, and then later on, of course, interest rates went steadily down after that, but I tried to refinance instead and the actual penalty to refinance an SBA was higher than the amount I decided I’ll just keep paying this 11% but I think people think that it’s going to say, and especially a lot of the docs are Listen, never maybe weren’t around in 1980.

I was down and given a lecture at the dental school in San Antonio last a few months ago and I asked the questions that they’re mostly we had probably about 100 students there and I said, How many of you were alive in 1980? And not one of them? I’m officially an old codger. You know, talking to you, but I think people’s history, you know, it does tend to repeat itself over a period of time with interest rates and this is a little bit of a weird time with, you know, job, you know, the unemployment rate being so low. Yet inflation being so high and interest rates, I think right now, or, I mean, they’re definitely going up but do you have a crystal ball? Or what do you think’s going to happen over the next couple of years?

Dr. David Phelps
Well, I think we have to watch and see what the Fed is really kind of mandated to do and you know, up until late last year, the Fed had been pretty what we call dovish, right? They were really accommodating. So every time there was a little blip in the economy, or the stock market maybe took a little hit, or they tried to raise rates in the recent past and as soon as they saw a little bit of a correction coming on, they were quick to open up the floodgates again, in dropped the rates and you know, open back quantitative easing, again. So the problem we have today that we haven’t again, seen in over four decades is the inflation factor. We see we haven’t had inflation, you know, to speak of, you know, in 40 years, Bruce’s after Volcker tamed it, so to speak, by having two successive recessions back in 98. In 81, we’ve had, we’ve had low interest, low inflation rates, and we had steadily we’ve come down from those high inflation rates, you mentioned back in the 80s, we’ve gone down over 40 years to next is zero, I think we really hit the bottom a year ago, in July of 2021, I believe that the long run is we’re going to start to see rates go back up.

Now, I’m not predicting we’re gonna go, I can’t predict they’re gonna go back up to whatever but I think we have, we have seen probably the end of the real cheap money and again, two things inflation factor, which is also a causative effect of the gross amount of national debt that hangs over us now. So back in the 70s, we didn’t have this level, this relative level of debt, so so they could raise interest rates to knock down inflation without causing huge havoc, you know, to the economy, you do that now and the problem is, the government, you know, can’t stand the higher rates too much, because again, that just sucks away the ability of money from the on the private sector. So the Feds really between a rock and a hard place but assuming the Fed, and the government, you know, which is kind of playing the Fed in pushing the Fed, you know, wants to really tamp down the inflation rate, which, you know, it’s only been going up in the last year, they’re going to have to raise rates to the point where it really does that, you know, now, no one knows exactly what that rate is going to be, is it? Can they raise it? And you know, another point and a half?

how has inflation slowed down enough? Or, or will the Fed take the foot off the pedal, if too much recession happens, and then start easing back up? Again, I think if they do that history says that they do that too soon to ease back up again, then we’re going to have more inflation and what really affects the long-term rates. In the long notes at the bottom is the bond market. The bond market is what really drives the mortgage rates that we use to buy practices, real estate, or anything that has a long-term amortization.

It’s not the Fed that doesn’t short-term rates, but the bond market, so the bond market looks at inflation and says, If play inflation is out of control, and we don’t see the Fed doing enough about it, then the bond market says, then we’re gonna have to raise our rates because we can’t sit here and take low returns in a high inflationary marketplace. Right, right now, the bond market is looking at the Fed as okay, you guys are gonna do this and knock it down. So that’s why you see mortgage interest rates come down in the last month from their high, you know, getting close to 6%. Now they’re down to low five, it’s because the bond market is saying, Okay, we’re staying with the Fed looks like you’re gonna do it, but if the Fed takes her foot off the pedal, Katie bar the door, you’ll see rates go back up again and I think that’s where the Fed gets into trouble. So how the Fed tries to land this plane, as they say, is going to really tell us what’s going to happen, I think over the next quarters next several years.

Dr. Bruce Baird
That’s a fantastic explanation. It really is. David, I mean, you this is straight down your wheelhouse. You know, because and the cool part of it is and I’ll tell you back in 2008 This is me and this is I think probably most investors in the market maybe not I’m maybe I’m just stupid or than most but you know, to 2008 hit and lost 50% of my portfolio and I was like, Good grief, you know, I’m 53 years old at the time, I guess and I’m like, crap, you know, this is not good and I dumped everything out of the market, took every penny out on the market and said the heck with it, and I started compassionate finance.

So it turned out, okay, because compassion finance has been a great success and we recently sold to private equity, but I’m still a part of the company but so I recovered, okay, but if I would have stayed, stayed the course I, you know, my money would have been back in there in about three years, or four years, but it’s that fear of loss, whereas I, again, you’ll have to tell me because I’m, I’ve had real estate, I’ve had land, I’ve had shopping centers, I’ve had those things I got out of all of those about four years ago, or five years ago. Now, I’m kind of thinking I wish I had that income coming in, because I just retired a couple of years ago, and I’m thinking, man, you know, it’s a little different as an asset-based lender or owner equity, you know, and with what you guys do, I can see Yes, prices go up but if you have assets, those assets are also going up in value during that time. That’s got to give you that’s got to guess like taken Tums for an investor. I mean, it’s having that has to be good and tell me a little bit about that.

Dr. David Phelps
Yeah, it really is, you know, to have at least some amount of your portfolio that is driven by Yes, what I call asset-based income, you know, we can go to work in our respective businesses, and again, I’m, I’m a huge fan of being in business. So if some guy whether you’re still in your dental practice growing your practice, multiplying it, that is the place where you have the best ability to offset market cycles, inflation, all those things.

That’s just what you did when you said when you got out of the market, but you went back into another business and sideline business where, yes, is it work? It is, but you have more control. It’s what I call degrees of separation from your money. If you’re investing your hard-earned money, and financing, whatever you use into a business, that you get to call the shots, then you live and die by that, but at least you have more control in the stock market, Wall Street, we’re so separated from our money, we’re just hoping that we’re writing the big market and as long as the market goes up, yeah, it feels really good. You see your 401 ks and your brokerage accounts go up but that market is so emotional and so yes, when when you see a big hit, you’re not the only one, Bruce, I think everybody has that fear of like, well, it’s all tanking, and I just gotta get out of this, whatever this is, and do something that I feel is more stable.

So then what do you go back into? Well, if you’re still in business, you can invest in your own business, or businesses or side businesses, or you and my favorite, you know, outside of a business is real estate, doing it the right way and basing the investment on again, the strict criteria that one would want to use so that you do have that asset based income. People say, Well, David, isn’t real estate affected by the marketplace? Well, yes, it is, and we will, we can potentially see in certain markets, the more stable markets we invest in, we won’t see as much of a decline in valuation but we will see a decline in the valuation of this, this market correction recession goes on but here’s the key, Bruce, as long as we’re investing in, in those assets that have intrinsic utility, and again, a dental practice has that people always have teeth, they might all come in at the same time but you’re always going to have a service revival.

The same thing with intrinsic value real estate, people want and will always pay some degree to have a roof over their head. Now, they may ratchet down, they may double up but we’re not going to have people that just abandon ship and go live in tents, it doesn’t happen. I’ve been through enough corrections to see if you have the right utility in the investment you invest in, you’re going to be okay. So let’s just say the valuation of the asset. Let’s say it goes down in actual market value by 20% but Will my rents and my cash flow dividends go down? 20% I’ve never seen that happen. Now we have to stabilize our rents, you know, during times of market corrections where we don’t get to raise them aggressively. Because yeah, people are in recession, they can’t pay more but as long as I’ve got that dividend coming in, I’m really not.

I don’t care if the value goes down, it’s only when I’m a net seller if I have to sell because I’ve leveraged too much or other aspects of my life or business I’ve got none of the margins then I may have to find assets I may have to sell and that’s what happens to people that are over-leveraged in any market crashing they have to get liquidity the banks aren’t lending money.

So what do they have to offer assets to the marketplace and of course, what do you do at that time? You’re gonna offer them, unfortunately, at the sale price, and that’s where real estate or anything gets a quote, a not a bad name, but uh, well, you can’t You shouldn’t do that because it also can tumble, not to the degree in my years of history of investing real estate does it do like it doesn’t stock market we didn’t take up 50% 40% hit in 2008 in our real estate, get, I didn’t have to sell it back then I probably would have taken maybe a maximum 20% hit, and I had to sell it but what why would I sell it? I always say to people, why would you? Why would you sell a great business if you love it right? If it produces income. Now, if you’re just sick and tired of it, you don’t know how to manage it with other people then.

So if you’re managing your own real estate, which is what I started doing when I was growing up, because I had more time than money, great, but at some point, you start saying, Well, my time might be more valuable doing this. So I’ll pay other people to manage it and I’ll take maybe a little bit less return but then the value of my time, or just having free time becomes something I want more than just working hard every day and I think that’s the evolution that we both speak of PDA you do, and helping your Doc’s increase the valuation of their practice, without them having to be in there working, you know, crazy, 12 hours a day, five days a week, that’s not the goal. It is the same thing with real estate, you can start by doing it yourself if you’re the young, perfect, perfect way to start but as you elevate, you want to be able to leverage other people’s time abilities to find the deals to manage the deals and really, that’s what we do through freedom powders.

Dr. Bruce Baird
Well, I’m, I’ve had, you know, again, multiple friends that have gone through with you, I remember back when you came through productive dentist Academy, you were still practicing you you’re a sponge, you know, you pick up information quickly, and you put it to work quickly. I saw that in your practice but in your back pocket, you had this additional way of creating wealth and you know, I always admired that and, and I’m looking forward not only to being in there in October at your program, but I’m really looking forward to seeing some of you. It’s not just us speaking all the time you bring in a lot of experts from different arenas, don’t you? Do your meetings?

Dr. David Phelps
Yeah, well, I think it’s, it’s proven that we do so right. Because I mean, a big part of, I think what we learned over the years is, is it’s not just what we know, I mean, we all have our own experiences, right? We all and that’s great, you have your own experience, you can kind of mine your own experience but but but we find the people we know, are also just a network of resources and, and knowledge base. So I love to bring other people in because I tell people to look, I have a bias. As I look at things just like anybody does and so I don’t want to be the only one I want to play a place where people can come and hear from different people about their respective experiences, what they’re seeing boots on the ground.

This is not theory, this is not, this is not, we’re just talking about what’s what we think might happen. This is people actually are in, you know, in, you know, in the on the battleground on the field and so you want to know what what’s happening in different markets. So I want people to talk about their experiences and then in our group, you can compare and contrast and I think I want people not to follow a pied piper, you know, I don’t want I’m not that person, I have my way of doing things. I know what I’ve done but my situation is not exactly the same as everybody else.

So you need to have a point-counterpoint in ways to look at your situation. This based on, you know, a melding of what you see from people that again, you’ve got to have respect, you have to know that they know what they’re doing that they’re not just selling fluff, but they actually have real experiences and that’s how I think, you and I and other people that we surround ourselves with how we look at how our life in our market cycles in our businesses as our investments is, is I want to learn from the other people because I’ll learn something more than just my own experience.

Dr. Bruce Baird
Oh, absolutely, absolutely. Why I tell you, I’ve really enjoyed it, we’ve gone almost 30 minutes, and I, we’re going to make a couple of episodes of this, if that’s okay with you, Dave, I don’t think you’ll mind and we’ll put up all the freedom founders information for any of our listeners, because I’m coming October if they have any openings, because I’ll be there and we can, we can learn some of this stuff together. Because I’ve had the opportunity to learn from a lot of really, really, really smart people in my career and I consider you a really, really, really smart person but more than that, I know your ethics. I know, you know, I just know you and the statement you said earlier about, you know, I don’t have fiduciary, I just want to make sure everybody gets the best of the best. I’m right there with you and I know that you’ll take great care of any of our productive dentists, you know, dentists that come through, and, as you know, we’ll take great care of any of your guys that need that so well.

Dr. David Phelps
100% both ways and, again, I love what you’re doing because I’ve watched you over the many years, you know, continue to always be upgraded on the forefront of how you’re serving PTA members. I mean, that’s what you are, you never stay stale, you’re stagnant. You’re always on the move and that’s, that’s, that’s the kind of people you want to hang with and I’m excited about what you’re doing with your investment grade PDA because again, it fits so closely with what we do in real estate, investment, grade PDA.

Obviously what you’re doing is helping Docs who want to really increase the value addition of their practice, which is what a business should be able to do, it produces cash flow, just like real estate does but you’re also showing them how to increase the value, which is, again, what we do with real estate, we do value add. So, you know, the concepts are similar and I learned so much in my years of investing in real estate that apply back to business, right? So they really, there’s like, there’s a complimentary correlation between the two and I’m excited about jumping back in and seeing what you’re doing with the investment grade, PDA group, because, again, it just it fits so well. So I think, yeah, I see some fun coming up here that we can really help specific people with both sides of this of the coin, so to speak, both sides of the formula,

Dr. Bruce Baird
we brought in David Pourraient, we just hired David David, I think you probably have met David before in the over the years, David and Sandy port but David was the CEO of the finance company, for the first five years, when he left that he spent six years getting his doctorate and your thesis was on job satisfaction of a dentist and a DSL and I tell you what, there’s more information in that thing and what we realize is, you know, everybody’s getting these unsolicited offers for their business and what I’m seeing, which is kind of interesting is I’m seeing a 34-year-old guy, 37-year-old dentists saying oh, I’m gonna get a million and a half dollars, Excel.

Was that what that is all they’ve ever seen in their career is an upcycle? You know, if I could just get a million and a half, put it in the market, and have it continue to grow, I will never have to work again and I think they’re getting a real Rude Awakening right now. That is pretty scary for everybody. So that’s kind of what the investment grade practice is, let’s make sure we, let’s make sure we look at OPERS that you’re getting to make sure you know who’s figuring the EBIT of the business. Now it’s the DSO. That’s right.

That’s not, you know when the buyers figuring out you’re gonna, you’re gonna get hosed and I remember I remember years ago, Greg Stanley, I don’t know if you remember. Whitehall management, but Greg, I went to one of his first courses, and it was really weird because I’m sitting in this room. Everybody in here was 55 and I’m, I’m like, 32. You know, I’ve listened to Greg and I mean, and I’m pretty excited about all this and one of the guys said, you know, they said, you know, you can get good deals on equipment or good deals on this. He said, Now, if we all got together, could we get a better deal? He said, No, you’ll just get hosed together and so at that point, I realized, yes, we have a special gene that comes down to us. So anyway, Dave, thanks so much for spending time with us this morning and I look forward to seeing you in October and September, hopefully coming to the PDA workshop, so all the information to reach freedom founders will be on the beyond here on your screen. So thanks a lot, David.

Dr. David Phelps
Bruce, I’ll see you soon. Thank you.

Dr. Bruce Baird
Thank you for joining me for this episode of the Productive Dentists Podcast. If you found this episode helpful, make sure you subscribe and pass it along to a friend. Give us a like on iTunes and Spotify. Or drop me an email at podcast@productivedentist.com Don’t forget to check out other podcasts from the Productive Dentist Academy on productivedentist/podcast.com Join me again next week for another episode of the Productive Dentists Podcast