The dental office’s request goes to a partner for assessment and any resulting offer.
Chairs, scanners and sterilizers fit equipment financing. Buying a practice or a share of one fits a term loan. Lab bills fit a line of credit. The building and work on it are outside this site, as is patient financing.
At a glance
- Offices of dentists with paid employees, Alamance County, NC (CBP 2023)
57
- Of those, with fewer than 5 employees
10
- Offices of dentists with no paid employees, Alamance County, NC (NES 2024)
26
Dental Practice Loans for Equipping an Existing Operatory: Notes for Burlington, NC Dental Offices
Equipping an operatory that already exists means a chair with its delivery unit, an operatory light, doctor and assistant stools, and often a new X-ray sensor for the room. Those are movable items from a dental supplier and fit equipment financing. Moving walls, adding cabinetry fixed to the walls, or running new water, air and vacuum lines to a second room is building work, and it stays outside this site.
Illustration only, invented figures: for the $46,000 operatory package, 72 installments at 8.75% a year are $823.48 each. Its full repayment schedule is $59,290.56.
Dental Equipment Loans for a Burlington, NC Dental Office: Sterilizers and Lab Bills
An autoclave or a full sterilization center is a one-time equipment purchase. Lab bills for crowns, bridges and aligners are the opposite: they arrive every month and are paid before the insurer pays for the case. A line of credit drawn for lab invoices and paid down as claims settle keeps those bills off a long fixed term.
County Business Patterns counted 57 offices of dentists with paid employees in Alamance County, NC in 2023 (NAICS 6212). Our arithmetic from the same table: 47 of the 57 had five or more employees. ZIP 27217 had 4 offices of dentists with paid employees that year. Nonemployer Statistics listed 26 offices of dentists in the county with no paid employees in 2024.
Dental Business Loans When a Burlington, NC Dental Office Needs Intraoral Scanners
An intraoral scanner replaces trays and impression material with a digital file sent to the lab. The scanner and its cart are equipment. Any software subscription that comes with it is an ongoing cost, paid monthly like any other bill, and does not belong in the financed amount.
Illustration only, invented figures: the scanner has two possible schedules at 9.25% a year: 36 payments of $909.61 or 60 of $595.08. The second option costs $314.53 less each month, but its total is $35,704.80 rather than $32,745.96, a difference of $2,958.84. Which matters more depends on the office's monthly cash.
Dental Clinic Acquisition and Imaging Upgrades: Notes for Burlington, NC Dental Offices
A dentist buying an existing clinic often plans changes from the first year, such as replacing a panoramic unit with a CBCT scanner. Those are two separate purchases. The practice itself, meaning its equipment, patient records, name and working cash, can be a term loan case. The CBCT scanner bought afterward is a separate equipment purchase with its own quote and term.
Kept apart, each can be reviewed on its own terms: the purchase on the practice's history, the scanner on its own value. Buying the building the clinic sits in is a real estate purchase and outside this site.
Dental Office Acquisition and a Practice Transition: Notes for Burlington, NC Dental Offices
Not every transition is an outright sale. An associate may buy a share of the practice now and the rest later, while the selling dentist keeps working for an agreed period. The share bought today is a business purchase, and it can be paid over years with a term loan.
Illustration only, invented figures: in this made-up $600,000 practice sale, a two-fifths ownership stake is priced at $240,000. Over 120 months at an annual rate of 9%, that share carries a payment of $3,040.22, and the payments total $364,826.40. The value itself would come from the buyer's own appraisal, not from this example.
Dental Practice Acquisition Checklist When a Burlington, NC Dental Office Needs Dental Chairs
A practice-acquisition file can contain the following records. Having them available makes the purchase discussion more concrete:
- The seller's business tax returns for recent years and the practice's production and collection reports.
- The letter of intent or the draft purchase agreement.
- An equipment list with the age of each chair, the imaging units and the sterilization equipment.
- The current office lease and the terms for transferring it to the buyer.
- Staff and payroll figures, and which team members are expected to stay.
- A separate quote for any dental chairs that will need replacing soon after the sale.
Chairs that are near the end of their life can be priced as their own equipment purchase rather than folded into the price of the practice.
By Sageway Lending · Updated