Becoming a Dentist?

Question

Hello Everyone,

I am currently a 20 year old junior pre-med student in college. I've always considered this as a "backup" in case I couldn't get a business set up by the time I graduate. Well, I'm beginning to realize that starting a business while your $20,000 in debt is tricky!

I love helping people, working with my hands, working as a team, and studying advanced science classes. I believe that I would truly enjoy being a dentist instead of a doctor. This would allow me to have significantly more free time to spend with my future family and start a real estate business.

That is my question for you guys - does becoming a dentist to provide the stability, capital, and lifestyle to start a real estate investment company sound like a good idea?  I could be a dentist by 24. I feel like if I work a normal college graduate job (ie teacher, analyst, lab technician) it would be almost impossible to get into real estate. However, I know dentists who work 3 days a week (6 hours a day) and still make six figures.

If you were in my position (20 years old and 20k in debt with the grades to get into dental school), what would you do?

Thank!

Ryan Busk · Answer

Hi Brian,

As a dentist myself, I thought I could chime in.  I had a bit of a chuckle when I read this, "Dentistry seems like a relatively quick route to a six figure salary"  It is quick, in that you can get out of school and instantly make over $100k.  The problem is that dental school costs north of $300k now.  Given that you already have $20k in student loans, I am making the assumption that you don't have a large trust fund to pay for dental school with.  I didn't either, and neither did my wife.  We left school owing over $600k in student loans before we had ever worked a day.  Now, 7 years later, we still owe about 40% of that, albeit mostly at very low interest rates.

All that said, I just signed up for BP because I am looking at a possible real estate deal and need some advice, but it has taken me 7 years to get here, and the only reason I am looking at real estate at this point is because we would like to own the building that our practice is in, and it has become available for purchase if we would like.

Dentistry is a difficult profession.  Those doctors working 3 days a week are spending at least another day a week managing their practice.  They also spend lots more time keeping up with the ever changing technology and services by taking many hours of continuing education.

Please, don't let me talk you out of the dental field, it is an incredible profession!  But there are tons of great jobs with excellent salaries that you can get with a 4 year degree that don't come with the $2k/month debt service that dental school does.

Best of luck, if you are serious about attending dental school and have questions, by all means, let me know!

Ryan

Account Closed · Answer

Be a dentist if you want to be a dentist. Dont be a dentist to start a REI business! Dental school is probably a lot of time and money commitment. So if you dont want to do that for the rest of your life, find another way to build capital. If you do however love Dentistry, then by all means go for it.

Travis Cripps · Answer

I see this is an old forum, but I am currently a military dentist. If you have questions, feel free to contact me.

Cindy Hunter · Answer

Thanks for the tips..

Carlos Enriquez · Answer

Brian,

I decide to become a dentist rather than a physician while I was in college.  I didn't do the military scholarship route, but I did join the Army after graduating from dental school.

After leaving the service, I married a dentist, and her father is a dentist too.  Her brother is a physician and her mom is an RN.  My in-laws have noted that the Golden Age of dentistry is over, as my father in law had started practice in the 60's.  Being in a group practice or working for the State or Federal government is a good way to go.  Private practice, with just one doctor (dentists are doctors) can be very expensive when you are the only one paying for everything that pertains to the practice.  I suppose being incorporated can help with that though.  It is still a single payer liability.  Also, all the regulations that are required now is very time consuming to put into practice.  I advised my two sons that if they go into dentistry, that they should specialize rather than be a general practitioner.

That being said, dentistry has been very good to me.  It has allowed me to pursue many options during my career, and as it's winding down, I'm parking my resources in investment property.  I'm using equity from my free and clear dental building and primary residence to purchase RE and will refi in the future to purchase more in the way many members do here.

Sometimes people have to start slow and build from there, and have patience.  That's what I did.  The creative financing that I read about here is not something that I feel I would want to do unless there was no other way.  For now, I've been blessed with choices.

Good luck.  PM me if you want to discuss dentistry or the military.

JR T. · Answer

It sounds like you have a passion and desire for dentistry so I'd encourage you to pursue that path. It is very hard to come from nothing and make it in real estate. The average dentist makes around $165k a year. Real estate agents make around $40k a year - sometimes. Get the money from being a hopefully above-average dentist and plow it into real estate investments where you can earn a respectable semi-safe return.

If I were in your shoes I would focus on the dentistry with everything you have. While the debt levels can seem intimidating you must put them in context of "guaranteed six figures year one." Keep up on this RE stuff on the side, keep current on new listings in your target market, but don't put too much time into it.

Your focus needs to surround developing a successful dental practice. At first you'll probably work for someone else but after a year or two you should be able to obtain a loan to start your own practice or join an already successful partnership. Put everything you have into it, get involved, go to conferences, be around local dentists so you know when practices are going up for sale or looking to bring in a new partner. You will/ find some of the skills from this RE stuff relateable to getting any type of business going.

Ryan Busk · Answer

The military dental scholarships are a GREAT deal!  If you don't mind the sacrifices you have to make to get them.  My wife and I considered taking that route after school, but we wanted to start a family, and didn't want to do that in a different state or overseas.  We opted to both work in public health and get some of our loans paid back that way.  It worked well, we got lots of experience, built our hand skills, and retired about $200k of our student loan debt over 4-5 years.

Brian W. · Answer

Thank you so much for your post!

What are you thoughts on the military dental scholarships?  They pay 100% dental school costs with a 4 year payback.  Is this better than your situation, 60% paid off after 7 years?  What could you recommend?

Thanks again!

Daniel Chang · Answer

If you head over the "creative financing" portion of BP forums, you can find many strategies that you don't need a job/income to get started investing in RE.

I myself, don't care for all the "creative financing".  Sure if it drops in my path, I'll utilize it.  But for the most part, I work my job, save money, and invest.  Having a profession does 2 important things:

1) It creates diversity in income stream (recession in the RE market)

2) it makes it MUCH easier to qualify for conventional financing

I also don't believe in do or die real estate. Real estate is only one part of my overall portfolio and financial plan.

What you are planning to do I believe is overall smart, but it's a longer less efficient road if you want to get into real estate.  There have been many on BP that have millions in real estate assets in just a few years.

I can't really suggest what profession to choose.  I wouldn't choose a profession based on how much it makes.  Choose one that you want to do, or at least you will tolerate it.  Dentistry overall is not a bad choice if you enjoy it.  It's decent income, decent length of time in school, and flexible.

Brian W. · Answer

Hi Daniel,

Thank you for your reply.

I am hoping to start a renting company that works with Section 8.  I would purchase $100,000-125,000 houses, fix them up, and rent through Section 8.  Then I would increase the number of properties exponentially by re-investing my profits.

Obviously I need some type of job before I start investing in real estate.  What would you suggest?  Dentistry seems like a relatively quick route to a six figure salary.  Most other jobs (advertising, engineering, teaching, etc.) would take many years of promotions to reach that level.

How did you get your portfolio started?

Thank you,

Brian

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