Dental Practice CPA

Accounting Built for the Dental Value Chain
Contemporary dental office interior with high-tech equipment

Running a dental practice is running a business.

Most CPAs have never seen the inside of one. We have worked across the entire dental value chain: private practices, implant specialists, dental laboratories, and device distribution. We already know your fee schedules, supply costs, and what a healthy practice P&L looks like at every stage of growth.

Based in Los Angeles, we work with clients across the United States: remotely, at our Los Angeles office, or on site at your practice.

Stop Waiting for Month-End PDFs. See Your Practice in Real-Time.

Meet Lantern by SW Accounting — our proprietary client dashboard built for practice owners. We transform raw data into clear, actionable insights, accessible anywhere, anytime.

  • Visual P&L & KPI Trends: Track your revenue growth, operating margins, and profit trends at a glance with intuitive charts.
  • Deep-Dive Drilldowns: Don’t just look at the numbers. Click any line item — like Dental Supplies & Materials or Outside Services — to instantly view the exact journal entries and underlying transactions.
  • 24/7 Financial Clarity: Your practice’s financial health is always at your fingertips, empowering you to make confident decisions on the go.
See How Lantern Works
Lantern by SW Accounting — real-time dental practice dashboard showing YTD revenue, net income, margins and monthly performance (demo data)

Demo data shown · every number in Lantern drills down to its journal entries.

What do you reconcile every month, and what do I get?

Every month we match what your practice-management software says you produced and collected to what reached the bank, record insurance payments and write-offs, and close the books into a P&L measured against collections.

  • Production, adjustments and collections. We compare the production, insurance and courtesy adjustment, and collection reports from your practice-management software, so you can see where production did not turn into cash.
  • Deposits by source. Patient payments, insurance carrier payments and patient-financing deposits are matched to bank deposits, so nothing is booked twice or missed.
  • Insurance balances. We review the insurance aging report alongside collections each month and flag balances that keep growing.
  • Payroll, lab fees and supplies. Staff payroll, associate dentist pay, lab fees and dental supplies are recorded in the month they belong to, so overhead percentages are accurate.

What you send us: month-end production, adjustment, collection and aging reports from your practice-management software, bank and card statements, payroll registers, and lab and supply invoices.

What you receive: a monthly P&L with overhead as a percentage of collections, a balance sheet, reconciled deposits, and Lantern access where every number drills down to its entries.

Every engagement is led personally by CEO Sangwon Youn (US CPA, California; KICPA), with a team of associate CPAs handling the monthly work. We work in English and Korean.

What We Do for Dental Practices

Monthly close, staff payroll, and clean financials built around dental industry benchmarks. Our operational package bundles bookkeeping, payroll, and ongoing tax compliance under one predictable fee, acting as your practice’s outsourced accounting department.

Entity structuring (S-Corp, C-Corp, LLC), owner compensation strategy, and proactive year-round planning. We go beyond compliance to maximize your after-tax income at every stage of practice ownership.

Whether acquiring your first clinic or selling a multi-location group, we handle the entire lifecycle: meticulous financial due diligence, business valuation, deal structuring, and advanced tax strategies — including Cost Segregation when real estate is involved — to maximize your after-tax return.

Budgeting, cash flow forecasting, and KPI monitoring without the cost of a full-time executive. We act as your strategic financial partner so you can make data-driven decisions for long-term growth.

Entity registration, EIN application, accounting system setup, and first-year tax planning in one package — designed for dentists opening or acquiring their first practice.

Frequently Asked Questions

A healthy general dental practice typically runs total overhead of 60–65% of collections, leaving a 35–40% owner margin. If your overhead exceeds 70%, staff costs, supplies, or lab fees usually need attention. Our Lantern dashboard benchmarks each expense line against these targets every month, so you see problems before year-end.

For most established practices, yes. An S-Corp lets the owner take a reasonable salary plus profit distributions, which can significantly reduce self-employment tax compared with a sole proprietorship. In California, note that S-Corps pay a 1.5% state franchise tax on net income, so the right answer depends on your profit level — we model both scenarios before recommending a structure.

Yes. Under Section 179 (as expanded by the 2025 OBBBA tax law), practices can expense up to $2.5 million of qualifying equipment in the year it is placed in service, and 100% bonus depreciation now applies permanently to most new and used equipment. Timing large purchases against your income is one of the highest-impact planning moves a practice can make.

At minimum: three years of financials with an earnings-quality review, production by provider, payer mix and PPO write-offs, accounts receivable aging, staff compensation, and the lease or real estate terms. We run this due diligence on the buy side and structure the deal — including price allocation and, when real estate is involved, Cost Segregation to accelerate depreciation.

A Cost Segregation study reclassifies parts of your building — plumbing for operatories, cabinetry, specialized electrical — from 39-year depreciation into 5, 7, or 15-year lives. Combined with 100% bonus depreciation, this can convert a large share of your purchase price into first-year deductions, freeing cash in the years you need it most.

Yes. Our U.S. startup package covers entity selection, registration, accounting system setup, and first-year tax planning — designed for dentists opening or acquiring their first practice.

Most practices choose a flat monthly operational package covering bookkeeping, payroll, and ongoing tax compliance, so there are no surprise hourly bills. Advisory work such as practice acquisition due diligence or valuation is scoped and quoted separately before we begin.

Yes. All services are available in English and Korean, and our partners are licensed CPAs in both the U.S. and Korea — a natural fit for Korean-American dentists and cross-border owners.

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