Legal considerations when selling a veterinary practice

When you are the seller of a veterinary practice seeking to lease your real estate to a new buyer, veterinarian and lawyer Charlotte Lacroix, DVM, JD, recommends negotiating a few terms including the lease term and rent price. In a recent dvm360^® interview, Lacroix offered up a few nuggets to help practice owners successfully streamline the selling process.

"Typically, you might have [the lease term] for 10 years with two 5 year renewals," Lacroix informed dvm360^® staff. "The rent of course is clearly, very important and you want it to be fair market value so that if you end up wanting to sell your real estate later, whoever is buying your real estate has a good source of rent on that."

She then advised owners to be mindful of the escalation clause, and if the commercial lease is triple net, to determine who is responsible for expenses involving maintenance, repair, and replacement.

“And then finally, I think 1 of the last points that can be quite important is that you should have a guarantee or guarantor sign the lease in the sense as a guarantor," suggested Lacroix. "So, that if the primary tenant defaults, you [have] somebody to go to collect your rent."

Watch the full video below for more of Lacroix's insight on legal considerations surrounding selling a veterinary clinic.