A dentistry professional corporation carries every rule that makes corporate planning hard, the passive income grind, the salary versus dividends decision, a 50 percent tax rate on investment income, plus one most professionals never face: a practice that will one day be sold.
I'm Hootan Sal, a licensed insurance and investment advisor working exclusively with incorporated medical and health professionals. I plan across both sides, corporation and personal, alongside your accountant, and every recommendation comes as a comparison in dollars.
Each one exists because the practice side and the personal side are usually managed in isolation. Closing them is the work.
A profitable practice builds retained earnings fast, and once the corporation earns over $50,000 of passive investment income, every extra dollar cuts the small business deduction. In Ontario the cost tops out at $30,000 a year, set by last year’s numbers.
Salary or dividends is a yearly decision with six-figure lifetime consequences, but for most dentists it was set once by the accountant’s default and never revisited against RRSP room, CPP, associate income patterns, and the corporation’s own tax position.
Many dentists pay personally, with heavily taxed dollars, for coverage the corporation could own. Corporately owned life insurance can also shelter investment growth from the passive income rules and create tax-free capital at death through the capital dividend account.
Unlike most physicians, dentists have a real exit: practices sell, and the structure you carry for years before the sale decides how much of the price you keep, including whether the lifetime capital gains exemption is available when the day comes.
Most corporate planning advice assumes the corporation just winds down. A dental practice is an asset with a buyer.
The decisions that look small today, how much cash accumulates in the corporation, where the investments sit, how the insurance is owned, all change what a sale looks like years from now. Planning with the exit in view is not about rushing to sell; it is about never being the seller who has to restructure in a hurry.
If you want the technical foundation first, it is all published here: the guide to corporate investing and the passive income rules, the passive income calculator that models the grind on your numbers, and the IPP versus RRSP comparison for the retirement side.
This year's small business limit is set by last year's passive income. Planning done this year pays off next year, which means the best time to look at this is before your fiscal year end, not after.
Bring rough numbers from both sides, practice and personal. We identify what is already optimised and what deserves a closer look. No cost, and no obligation.
I run your actual numbers: compensation mix, passive income projection, insurance structure, and retirement accounts. Every recommendation arrives as a comparison in dollars.
I share the analysis with your accountant and we agree before anything moves. You end up with one coordinated plan instead of two professionals working in isolation.
No. Your accountant files and advises on tax; I plan across the corporate and personal sides and bring them into the conversation. The analysis is shared with them and we agree before anything is implemented. Most of the gaps I find exist precisely because nobody was looking at both sides at once.
The first conversation and the initial analysis are free. If we implement together, I am compensated through the insurance and investment products involved, which I disclose openly. If the analysis shows you do not need what I offer, I say so and you keep the analysis.
Earlier than feels necessary. Some of the conditions that decide how a sale is taxed, including eligibility for the lifetime capital gains exemption, depend on how the corporation looked in the years before the sale, not just the year of it. Positioning done early is cheap; repairs done in the months before a sale are expensive and sometimes impossible.
Yes. I serve the Greater Toronto Area and the Hamilton to Niagara corridor in person, and work with incorporated dentists across Ontario virtually. Licensing is provincial, so anywhere in Ontario works.
Bring numbers from both sides, practice and personal. You'll leave with concrete next steps either way, and if I can't help, I'll tell you on that call.