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This is Scott Becker with the Becker Private Equity and Business podcast. Today's title is why do physicians sell their practices to private equity? Three main reasons. So here's the deal. I was asked yesterday, you know, why is it that physicians sell their practice to professional investors, to private equity, to others? And there's one obvious reason, and then there's a couple other reasons. And part of the reason the question is asked is so many physicians are happy upfront when they do it, but end up in the long run not being pleased with the outcome. And again, that differs vastly based on what type of practice, what type of investor, and so forth. But there's three core reasons that people sell. First is you could be a physician at a certain age. If you don't sell to private equity, you actually have no way of exiting your practice and taking money off the table. Thus, this provides an outcome in an asset sale that you otherwise really wouldn't get. Typically, your junior partners, your other colleagues, want to buy you out based on book value or the AR or some variant of that, but they don't want to buy you out at a full price that private equity fund might pay. Some people do it because there's a cash opportunity. That wouldn't otherwise be the second reason. And I'll sort of put two things together here in the second reason. The second reason that people do this is they think they'll get better management, or they think that by joining a more sophisticated group, a fuller group, the Pratts, which will operate better. And this is again, all over the board and where this happens or doesn't happen, sometimes it does happen with a more aggregated group. It's more professionally managed. You're better off. Reminds me of 100 years ago, our small law firm, 20 years ago merged with a much better, larger law firm. I didn't want to give up independence, but in the long run, that's ended up being a great thing. The firm is just much better managed than we were as a small firm. And so sometimes that's the case that you're doing it for better management. And again, all over the board, whether that actually holds true or not. The third reason that people do it is they have economic problems and they need to do it. They ultimately sell because something's gone wrong or horribly wrong in the practice and they need to sell. That's essentially the third reason. So, again, three big reasons. One is you want to cash out and take some money off the table, and this is the only way to do it. And again, all kinds of pros and cons with that beyond this discussion. Second is they think they've improved management for a variety different reasons. And finally, third is they have to do it the practice of financial trouble or something of that sort, and they feel like they have to do it. In any event, thank you for listening to the Becker Business in the Back of Private Equity podcast. Thank you to our great producer today, Grace Flynn Keller. Great to be with Grace today. Thank you very, very much.
