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Issue No. 1 · · 5-minute read

Vet prices: slowest rise since 2021. Visits still down.

Plus a 40-hospital deal, a two-speed market for practice sales, and the benefit new vets want most.

By Matthew C. and our editorial team

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Key takeaways

  • US veterinarian services prices rose 4.6% in the 12 months to September 2026, the slowest rise since November 2021, down from 7.8% a year earlier (BLS CPI-U).
  • All-items inflation was 3.7%, so the gap between vet prices and overall prices narrowed from 4.8 points to 0.8.
  • Practice visits were down 3.2% year over year in the week of Oct 4 to 10, 2026, with revenue flat; over 12 months visits are down 2.0% and revenue is up 3.4% (Vetsource/AVMA tracker, 6,383 practices).
  • GoodVets acquired WellHaven Pet Health (40+ hospitals), growing from 75 to 116 locations.
  • Ackerman Group reports H1 2026 GP practice multiples of 14.7x EBITDA for large practices versus 11.8x for all other GP practices.
  • 2026 veterinary graduates who borrowed owe a record $227,588 on average; loan repayment is the benefit vets most want and only 19.9% of new grads got it (AVMA).

THE LEAD

This week's big story

Vet price growth just hit its slowest pace since 2021

Prices for veterinarian services rose 4.6% in the 12 months to September. That is the smallest 12-month rise since November 2021. A year ago the rate was 7.8% (BLS CPI-U, veterinarian services; calc).

Prices overall moved the other way. All-items inflation rose to 3.7% from 3.0% a year earlier (BLS CPI-U, all items; calc). The gap between vet prices and everything else shrank from 4.8 points to 0.8 (calc, on unrounded index values; the rounded rates above differ by 0.9).

The cooling hasn't brought patients back. The Vetsource/AVMA Veterinary Industry Tracker (6,383 practices) shows visits down 3.2% in the week of Oct 4–10 against a year earlier, with revenue flat (0.0%). Over the last 12 months, revenue is up 3.4% and visits are down 2.0% (Vetsource Veterinary Analytics, Oct 13).

The long view explains why clients still flinch. Since December 2019, vet services prices are up 53.4%, against 31.1% for all items (BLS; calc). Vet prices have stopped racing ahead, but they have not given anything back.

So what: if your 2027 budget assumes another big fee increase and a visit rebound, test both assumptions. The CATalyst Council's June forecast puts US clinical visit growth at −2% to 0% a year through 2030 (CATalyst Council). A new Vetsource white paper, covered by TVB on Oct 15, says the expected "senior pet boom" is unlikely, and it points practices toward retaining the patients they already have (Today's Veterinary Business, Oct 15). Model 2027 with flat visits. Then decide how much of your growth has to come from price and how much from bringing lapsed patients back.

VITALS

5 numbers that moved

Number What it is Source
1 +4.6% Vet services prices, 12 months to Sep 2026 (slowest since Nov 2021) BLS (calc)
2 +3.7% All-items inflation, same period BLS (calc)
3 −3.2% Practice visits, week of Oct 4–10 vs a year earlier (revenue 0.0%) Vetsource/AVMA tracker
4 14.7x vs 11.8x Average EBITDA multiple, large GP practices (5+ DVMs, >$750K EBITDA) vs all other GP practices, H1 2026 Ackerman Group Q2 2026
5 $227,588 Average vet-school debt, 2026 graduates who borrowed (a record) AVMA News, Oct 8
Vet services vs all-items inflation, September of each year, 2019 to 2026. Source: BLS CPI-U; Vet Rounds calc.
Vet services vs all-items inflation, September of each year. Source: BLS CPI-U; Vet Rounds calc.

BUYOUT BOARD

Deals & ownership tracker

  • GoodVets acquires WellHaven Pet Health. WellHaven runs 40+ hospitals in 7 states. The deal takes GoodVets from 75 to 116 locations and adds the Pacific Northwest and Midwest. Terms weren't disclosed, and the WellHaven hospitals will move to the GoodVets brand over time (Today's Veterinary Business, Sep 24; McDermott Will & Schulte, Oct 7). GoodVets has mostly built its hospitals from scratch, so this is a shift to buying an existing network.
  • VetEvolve adds Oak Hammock Animal Hospital (Sebring, FL), a 3-doctor primary-care practice. VetEvolve says it now has more than 50 practices across the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast (VetEvolve; Healthcare DealHub, Oct 12).
  • The market is moving at two speeds. Broker Ackerman Group puts the H1 2026 weighted-average GP multiple at 13.4x EBITDA, up from 12.4x in H2 2025. It says that average is "misleading": large practices averaged 14.7x, while all other GP practices averaged 11.8x and have been flat for two-plus years. Cash at close averaged 8.7x EBITDA, or 65% of total consideration. Ackerman also reports that GP valuations have overtaken specialty/ER as the ER buyer pool has shrunk. Deal volume has fallen from about 1,100 consolidator acquisitions in 2021 to roughly 350 in each of 2024 and 2025 (Ackerman Group Q2 2026). Note: these figures come from Ackerman's own transaction data (20 hospitals in H1 2026), not the whole market.

So what: if you run a practice with fewer than 5 DVMs, don't plan around the headline 13.4x. Ask any adviser which bucket your practice falls in, and what the cash-at-close share would be.

On the calendar: Ackerman's Q3 market webinar is listed for Oct 22 (events). Listed for information only. Vet Rounds has no relationship with any broker.

PEOPLE

Hiring, pay and benefits

AVMA's Oct 7–8 economic forum previewed new workforce data (AVMA News):

  • 2026 graduates going into full-time jobs averaged $131,784 in starting pay, or $133,056 in private practice.
  • Graduates who borrowed owe an average of $227,588. The average debt-to-income ratio is 1.5:1.
  • 58.7% of new grads taking full-time jobs got a signing bonus. Only 19.9% got student-loan repayment.
  • When AVMA asked all veterinarians which benefit they most want and don't have, the top answer was educational loan repayment.
  • The real-income gap between new grads and all vets widened to 28%, up from 19% in 2025.

So what: if you're recruiting an associate, loan repayment is the benefit candidates say they're missing, and most offers don't include it. Under IRS Section 127, an employer's written educational-assistance plan can pay up to $5,250 a year of an employee's student-loan principal or interest tax-free. That limit is set to be indexed to inflation after 2026 (IRS FS-2026-10). Ask your CPA before you put it in an offer.

TRIAGE

3 things to handle this week

  1. Run your own Vitals. Pull 12 months of visits and revenue from your PIMS and set them beside the tracker's −2.0% visits / +3.4% revenue. If your revenue is growing on price alone, note it in your 2027 budget.
  2. Build a lapsed-patient list. Vetsource's white paper recommends a proactive recall system and a focus on 1–7-year-old pets. Have the front desk pull every active client with no visit in the last 12–18 months. (Business operations only. Clinical recall intervals are your medical team's call.)
  3. Ask your CPA about a Section 127 plan before your next associate offer goes out (see People).

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Sources

All sources accessed October 16, 2026 (PT). Figures marked calc are Vet Rounds arithmetic on the linked data.

Disclosure: Researched with AI tools. Written, edited and fact-checked by Matthew C. and our editorial team. Nothing here is clinical, legal or tax advice. Spot an error? Email hello@veterinaryrounds.com and we’ll correct it here and in the next issue.