How to Sell a Dental Practice in Texas (2026)

A single-location general practice in Texas sells for 5 to 7 times profit. Small solo practices sell for 60% to 80% of collections.

• Only a licensed dentist can own your practice. Texas writes that into the legal definition of practicing dentistry.
• Texas names the group model in law. Dental support organizations register with the state every year.
• Texas takes nothing from your gain. The state constitution bans a tax on an individual’s capital gains.

Is Now a Good Time to Sell?

Yes, if your books are clean. Texas has its own dental groups, and they’re partnering with Texas practices.

• Texas groups are buying close to home. Dallas-area MB2 Dental partnered with a practice in Longview.
• Specialists sell too. Southlake’s Allied OMS partnered with an oral surgery practice in Lakeway and Bastrop.
• Preparation is the long part. Eighteen to 24 months of it, if you want the top of your range.

What Dental Practices Sell For in Texas

Small practices are priced off collections. Once there’s real profit after paying a dentist to do your work, buyers switch to multiplying that profit.

No named source publishes practice prices for Texas alone, so these are national figures. Ask anyone quoting a Texas-only number where it came from.

Try your own profit figure and value a dental practice.

What Moves Your Number

• Hygiene past 30% of collections. It’s the clearest sign the practice isn’t just you working faster.
• Your own production under 60%. The more of the work you personally do, the harder buyers discount.
• An associate who stays. A signed agreement that survives the sale is worth real money.

For the tier detail, see dental practice valuation by size and what group buyers actually pay.

Who Is Allowed to Own Your Practice

A licensed dentist. Texas bars everyone else twice, once in its dental law and once in its law on professional companies.

• Owning the office counts as practicing. Under Occupations Code 251.003, someone who owns an office and employs dentists there is practicing dentistry.
• So does steering the dentist. The same section covers anyone who tries to influence a dentist’s independent judgment on diagnosis or treatment.
• Only licensed people may own the company. Business Organizations Code 301.007 limits who can own a professional entity.
• Compare New York. It bars non-dentists too. Texas plumbing, by contrast, sets no ownership share at all.

What That Means for a Group Offer

Group buyers operate all over Texas, so this isn’t a wall. The clinical practice stays owned by a licensed dentist.

• Texas law calls the group a dental support organization. That’s a company providing two or more business services to a dentist under an agreement.
• Texas protects your right to use one. Occupations Code 254.0011 says board rules can’t take away a dentist’s right to sign with a management company.

Get a Texas healthcare lawyer to read the structure before you sign. This is the one part of a dental sale where general business advice isn’t enough.

What a Group Can’t Control

The dental board’s rules list powers a contract can’t hand to a non-dentist. A dentist who signs one is presumed to break the dental law.

• Your patients’ records, including who can see them.
• A set time for performing specific procedures.
• Limits on treatments, referrals or consultations you judge necessary.
• The duties of the clinical staff who assist you.
• Management terms that push overtreatment or undertreatment.

Read any group’s services agreement against that list. The presumption lands on the dentist who signs, which could be you.

Look Up the Group’s State Registration

A dental support organization registers with the Texas Secretary of State by January 31 each year, under Business and Commerce Code chapter 73.

The filing names every Texas dentist it serves, and every owner holding 10% or more, dentist or not. It shows you who actually stands behind an offer.

Your Patient Records on a Sale

Records belong to the dentist who did the work, not to the practice, under Occupations Code 258.051. They can’t be sold except under the board’s rules.

When you leave a practice, the board’s records rule gives you three choices.

1. Keep the records yourself, for at least five years from the last treatment.
2. Sign a written transfer of records to the dentist taking over. That moves ownership.
3. Sign a records maintenance agreement. You keep a copy, and the treating dentist keeps access.

Either agreement means writing to the dental board within 15 days. The clock runs from the agreement, not from closing, so put it on your closing list.

What Transfers, and What Does Not

Your license is yours. It never transfers, in any structure, and neither does your federal registration for controlled substances.

The slow one is the insurers. Your buyer signs up with every payer from scratch, and credentialing runs 60 to 120 days.

• The clock starts when they apply, not when you agree terms. Get them filing the week the offer is signed.
• Unpaid claims pile up meanwhile. Plans won’t pay a provider they haven’t credentialed.
• Staying on as an employee? Tell the dental board within 60 days of changing employer, under Occupations Code 256.105.

The Back-Tax Certificate

Texas has no advance form like New York’s. Instead, Tax Code 111.020 makes the buyer hold back enough of the price to cover tax you owe.

The hold-back ends when you produce a receipt or a certificate saying nothing is due. Here’s how the Comptroller’s certificate works.

1. You and the buyer request it together, on Form 86-114. Both of you sign.
2. Request it before closing. After that it no longer protects the buyer.
3. It’s free. A clean account usually clears in about 10 business days.
4. An audit of your records can stretch that to 90 days.

Only the buyer is protected. You still owe anything that surfaces later, so clear it before you sign rather than after.

Unemployment Tax Travels With the Practice

A buyer who takes over your practice also takes on any unemployment tax you still owe the state, under Labor Code 204.086. No certificate covers it, so settle it first.

What You Will Owe in Taxes

Nothing to the state. Texas bans an income tax on individuals, and since November 2025 its constitution also bans a tax on an individual’s capital gains.

• Compare Pennsylvania’s flat 3.07%. On a $1 million gain, that’s $30,700 you keep in Texas.
• Compare New York City. A seller there pays about $107,260 in state and city tax on the same gain.
• Federal tax still applies. Expect 15% to 20% on the gain.
• Your chairs and scanners are different. Anything you already wrote off is taxed again at your regular federal rate.
• The practice entity can still owe franchise tax. If it closes after an asset sale, a final report is due within 60 days.

For how the structure changes the bill, see asset sale versus stock sale for a dental practice.

Who Buys Texas Dental Practices

• MB2 Dental, based in the Dallas area, partnered with DiStefano Dental Studio in Longview.
• Allied OMS of Southlake partnered with Heart of Texas Oral Surgery in September 2025, with offices in Lakeway and Bastrop.
• Ask every group the same two questions. Which licensed dentist owns the practice after closing, and what the services agreement lets the group control.
• Your associate is a real buyer. They clear the ownership rule automatically, which no group does.

For the comparison, see selling to an associate against selling to a group.

How Long It Takes

For the detail on each stage, see how long it takes to sell a dental practice.

How to Get Your Practice Ready

• Get three years of clean books with your personal spending separated out and documented.
• Push hygiene past 30% of collections and keep recall tight. Buyers read this first.
• Get your own production under 60%. It’s the single biggest lever, and it takes years.
• Sign your associate to an agreement that survives the sale.
• Decide what happens to your patient records, and who writes to the board.
• Clear your state tax and unemployment tax accounts before the certificate request goes in.

Are You Ready to Sell? Score Your Practice

Broker, Advisor, or Direct?

Dental brokers average about 10% of the sale price, which is higher than the general scale.

A buyer who knows you have no alternative has no reason to open with their best number. See what brokers charge and how a direct sale runs.

Dental Broker Fee Calculator

Selling a Dental Practice in Dallas-Fort Worth or Houston

The groups are based here, and they already know the big metros.

• MB2 and Allied OMS are both Dallas-Fort Worth companies. Neither has far to travel to meet you.
• Allied OMS already works in four Texas cities. It names Dallas, Fort Worth, San Antonio and Houston.
• The ownership rule is the same everywhere. It's state law, so no city changes it.

Selling a Dental Practice Elsewhere in Texas

Smaller cities trade too, and the groups travel for a good practice.

• Longview and Bastrop both saw group deals. Neither is a big metro.
• Associate buyers are easier to find where practice costs are lower and a first purchase is affordable.
• The 0% applies statewide. The ban on taxing your gain is in the Texas constitution.

Frequently Asked Questions

Next Steps

1. Ask any group which licensed dentist will own the practice, and read its services agreement against the board's list.
2. Look up the group's registration with the Texas Secretary of State.
3. Clean up three years of books, and request your Certificate of No Tax Due with your buyer before closing.
4. Grow hygiene and reduce your own production. Both take longer than you think.
5. Pick your route. There are six routes that skip the commission, and four are free.
6. Send us your details for a free valuation. We match Texas dental practices with vetted buyers before you commit.

Selling in another state? See our guides on how to sell a dental practice in California, in New York, in New Jersey and in Pennsylvania.