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How to Create Financial Freedom, Time Freedom and Options in Life Far Sooner Than the Majority
Are You Building a Business You Can Sell—or One You're Desperate to Escape?
Most founders spend 20+ years building equity they can't access, income they can't replace, and a business that owns them instead of serving them.
What if there was a third path—one where selling becomes optional, not inevitable?
What others are saying about the Exit-Optional Playbook:
“What you build should expand your future, not limit it. I believe deeply in investing in yourself, thinking intentionally, and designing a life—not drifting into one. The Exit Optional Playbook gives business owners a clear framework to do exactly that. Dr David Phelps shows how a business can become a powerful platform for freedom, opportunity, and a future you choose—if you’re willing to think bigger and act with purpose.”
Scott J. Manning MBA
“Economic transitions reward those who understand cycles and prepare accordingly. David Phelps brings that long-range thinking to business ownership. The Exit Optional Playbook helps dentists position their practice as a strategic asset—one built for resilience and optionality in the economy ahead.”
David McAlvany
McAlvany Financial Group
“Dentists are often so focused on clinical excellence that they neglect the long-term implications of ownership. David Phelps brings a needed perspective. The Exit Optional Playbook helps doctors think more clearly about their practice as a business and an asset, offering practical insight into how ownership decisions today can expand - not limit - future options.”
Dr. Jeremy Krell
Revere Partners
Some of what you'll find inside...
Transformed Lives and Revitalized Futures!
Drs. Brent and Ally Rickheim
We had an accountant CPA who said, “You guys are making it: you're on cruise control on the open highway. All you have to do is keep doing this for twenty more years!”
We looked at each other after we got off the phone, and we were like: “Cruise control?? This is not cruise control. We wake up and fight every single day to keep this car on the road!”
We had no exit strategy other than just working away for twenty more years and hoping that we had enough at the end of that to do what we want in retirement.
Freedom for us means knowing that we have the option to pivot to do something different if we want to, because we aren't dependent on solely practicing dentistry to make a living.
Drs. Becky Steinbach & Schuyler Van Gorden
Schuyler was burned out, exhausted by years of solo practice and nonstop staff turnover. His wife Becky was stuck in a large partnership she didn’t want to inherit. Instead of white-knuckling through another decade, Schuyler asked a radical question: “What do you think about selling our businesses and going to South America for a year?”
Becky answered in 30 seconds: “I’m in.”
Two months later, Schuyler had sold his business. Months after that, Becky sold hers. They bought one-way tickets and spent a year traveling through Central and South America with everything they owned on their backs.
That year stripped away the illusion that happiness required bigger houses, higher production, or more stuff. They discovered how little they truly needed—and how much freedom came from not being financially or emotionally dependent on a practice.
When they returned, they didn’t retire. They rebuilt. This time, they designed a business that served their life instead of consuming it. Their story is Exit Optional in its purest form: selling not as an escape, but as a reset—so you can choose what comes next.
Listen to Becky & Schuyler’s full journey on the Freedom Founders Podcast.
Dr. Cindy Rider and Scott Densmore
Scott and I would have these discussions: What are we gonna do when we stop working?
I saw a Facebook feed from Freedom Founders and it was a survey about retirement. “Do you have enough to retire on?” I had a couple of calls, and David offered for us to come to a Freedom Founders meeting and see what it was about.
It literally took one day of hearing different people, seeing different people, listening to different people to decide.
The future for us is being able to enjoy our life journey together, but we also want to enjoy our adult children as they start their own families and discover who they are as people. What's important for us to pass on to our children is the value of money. For your family, for yourself, for your lifestyle, for your children.
Dr. Jerry Gray
For decades, Jerry Gray believed what most professionals do: Your profession is who you are. As a highly successful endodontist, he was “root canal guy”—productive, respected, and quietly miserable.
When his teenage daughter finally confronted him about his anger and isolation, it became a wake-up call he couldn’t ignore. Jerry realized he wasn’t just burning out—he was losing himself. Through coaching and community, he began the hard work of rebuilding not just his practice, but his identity.
Today, Jerry no longer measures success by procedures or production. He sees his practice as a platform for leadership, mentorship, and family legacy—including preparing his son to one day join him.
“Who we are as people is way more important than what we do,” Jerry says. That shift—from technician to steward—gave him something far more valuable than an exit: a life and business built around purpose instead of pressure.
Listen to Jerry’s full story on the Freedom Founders Podcast!
Dr. Michael and Jennifer Kelly
Michael and Jennifer didn’t hate their profession. What they hated was how it was running their lives. By the time they found Freedom Founders, they had spent years on what Michael called “the hamster wheel”—working hard, earning well, but slowly losing time, peace, and clarity about why they were doing any of it.
The breakthrough didn’t come from a spreadsheet or a new strategy. It came during a simple walk at a Blueprint Weekend, when they finally admitted: “We don’t dislike what we’re doing. We just dislike the way we’re doing it.”
Instead of rushing toward a sale, they rebuilt their life from the inside out—realigning around faith, family, and purpose. And the irony? Once the pressure lifted, they didn’t want to walk away from their business at all.
They wanted to practice business—on their terms, with time, health, and relationships intact. Their story is a powerful reminder that freedom doesn’t start with an exit—it starts with alignment.
Hear Michael & Jennifer’s full story on the Freedom Founders Podcast.
Meet Dr. David Phelps
Dr. David Phelps, DDS, owned and managed a thriving business—a private dental practice—for over twenty-one years before his daughter’s health crisis served as a dramatic wake-up call in his life. David’s “Plan B” portfolio of cash flow producing real estate assets gave him the freedom to sell his practice mid-career and focus 100% on what matters most– TIME.
He is the author of From High Income to High Net Worth, What’s Your Next?, The Apprentice Model, Own Your Freedom, and Inflation: The Silent Retirement Killer.
David is a nationally recognized speaker and founder of the Freedom Founders Community, providing a proven process to true freedom for professional practice and small business owners.
