Most buyers I meet have run the numbers three times — EBITDA, rent factor, multiple. Almost none can tell me who actually generates the revenue.
That gap is what the veterinarian shortage has quietly widened in 2026. A practice can pass every financial test you throw at it and still sit one resignation away from losing a third of its production — and unlike a bad lease or a tired dental unit, you can’t renegotiate your way out of that after closing.
So here’s a position I’ll defend: the national shortage isn’t your biggest risk. This practice’s retention record is. No workforce projection tells you whether the associate billing half a million a year has been taking calls from a recruiter since March. The staffing file tells you, and most buyers never open it until the letter of intent is signed and the leverage is gone. Here’s how to read it in time.
Where the Shortage Actually Stands in 2026
An inconvenient fact first: the profession’s own economists don’t agree there’s a crisis. The AVMA-commissioned Brakke forecast found no dire nationwide shortage coming, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics projects veterinarians up 10% and credentialed technicians up 9% from 2024 to 2034, against 3% for all occupations.
So why can nobody hire? Hiring is local and slow: AAHA found the average credentialed technician opening sat empty 12.8 months, a full-time DVM seat 15.4.
Production Concentration: The Number Most Buyers Skip
Ask for production by provider, monthly, for 36 months. Then do arithmetic almost nobody does.
Take a $1.5M practice where a non-owner associate produced $525,000 — 35%. She resigns in month four. Keep a generous 60% of her clients and you’ve still lost $210,000 a year. On a practice earning 14%, that one departure erases the year’s profit while the loan payment doesn’t move.
The Staffing Records Sellers Don’t Volunteer
Buying a veterinary practice responsibly means asking for documents that never appear in a listing package. Advisors who handle veterinary practice transitions request:
- Team roster: role, credential, hire date, FTE, wage
- Turnover for 36 months, and why each person left
- Wages benchmarked against AAHA or VHMA survey data
- Open positions, and how long they’ve sat
Read the tenure column first. NAVTA’s survey put respondents at 6.8 years in their current job; a team averaging fourteen months is a warning no P&L gives you. A seller who won’t produce these records has told you something too.
Has Profit Been Propped Up by Underpaid Staff?
Some sellers trim payroll for two years before listing, because every dollar withheld from staff lands in profit and gets multiplied at closing. You buy the multiple; you inherit the resentment.
The math is brutal: six full-time technicians paid three dollars an hour under market is $36,000 a year, often the difference between servicing your debt and not. A 2010 JAVMA study tied each added credentialed technician per veterinarian to a $93,311 rise in that veterinarian’s gross income.
The Associate Question: Will They Stay?
Ask the seller, in writing, whether the associates know the practice is for sale. Often they don’t — so the doctor carrying a third of your revenue hears it as a rumor. Fix that before the letter of intent: ask for a confidential conversation, or make retention agreements a closing condition. An associate three years without a raise has already run the numbers.
The Contracts You Inherit — and the Ones You Don’t
Employment agreements don’t ride along with the practice. In an asset sale the seller terminates the staff and you rehire them, so a non-compete signed with the old entity may bind nobody — and enforceability is now purely a state question, since the FTC’s nationwide rule was vacated. Re-sign at closing or accept you have none.
The Solo Practice You Plan to Grow
Adding an associate to a one-doctor practice is a sound route to veterinary practice ownership — provided the pro forma is honest about the calendar. If DVM seats take a year to fill locally, growth doesn’t start in month three. Price it on today’s production.
Find It Before the Letter of Intent, Not After
Staffing problems found after closing are yours to fund. Found before, they’re leverage — on price, on retention terms, on how long the seller stays. That’s the case for buyer representation: what decides your first year rarely shows up on a tax return.
Frequently Asked Questions:
Q1. How much production concentration is too much?
No fixed line, but past roughly 25–30% for one non-owner doctor, get retention terms or a price adjustment in writing.
Q2. Can I meet the staff before closing?
Usually only with the seller’s permission, under confidentiality. Ask anyway — most agree once a deal is close.
Q3. Should I raise wages right after closing?
Budget for it. Fixing below-market pay costs less than replacing whoever quits in month six.
Q4. How can staffing shortages affect a veterinary practice purchase?
Staffing shortages can increase payroll and recruiting costs while limiting appointments and revenue. Buyers should include realistic hiring and retention costs in their financial projections.
Final Thoughts:
The veterinarian shortage hasn’t made good practices unbuyable. It has made the team the largest variable in what you’re buying — the only asset that can resign between LOI and closing. So answer one question before you sign: if the top producer left in month six, would this deal still work?
