007 | This Man is Helping Californians Survive the Insurance Crisis | Local Business Breakthrough Podcast - Local Business Breakthrough

Episode Transcript
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Brian Davis (00:05):
I'm so excited bill, to have you. Bill
Saunders, from w j Saundersinsurance has gone from football
coach to now insurance all star,making a huge impact in Simi
Valley, being integral to ourcommunity. I'm excited to sit
down with you and just hear moreabout your story and kind of

(00:26):
where you came from, some of thechallenges that you've overcome,
and what's next for W daySaunders insurance. So kind of
take us back. Take us backbefore you got onto this
entrepreneurial journey. Who wasBill Saunders back then, what,
what was it that you were doing,and what was it that they got
you to think, like, hey, youknow what? Like, I want to get
into insurance.

Bill Saunders (00:47):
So, so very I've worked every single job you can
possibly imagine. But, you know,back in the day, I was, you
know, when I graduated fromcollege, I was part of the
University of football,University of Colorado football
team, back in 96 2000 where Iwent to school, was working as a
student assistant with thefootball team over there. Really

(01:11):
liked football. Didn't reallylike school as much as I should
have. Did you

grow up in a family of football fans or so something
that you just kind of

yes and no? My so my uncle was actually he was the
number one draft picked in the78 college entry draft to the
Canadian Football League.
Interesting lineman. Wow, Ididn't even know that they had a
Football League. Yeah, it'sdifferent rules. It's fun to
follow, but it's a lot crazierthan what we have here in the
United States. You only getthree downs instead of four. Oh,
my goodness, anybody in motionbefore the snap thing be headed

(01:41):
towards the line of scrimmage?
Wow. You can even score a pointby kicking a kick out the back
of the end zone. So, you know,there's different ways to score
and all that stuff. But yeah, hedid that. You know, it was
drafted in 78 and ended upplaying through the 86 season.
So at the time, I'm eight yearsold, I never got a chance to see
him actually play football, he'dbe mad at me if I didn't tell

(02:04):
you. He did score one touchdownin an all star game. Fell on a
fumble in the end zone, and wegot so excited. He threw the
ball in the stands. So we don'tknow whatever happened to the
football, but he scored thattouchdown. It counts. It counts.
It counts. But he ended upcoming down out of Canada, came
to Stanford to get his MBA. Andwhile he was there, he had
reached out to the footballoffice and said, hey, you know,

(02:26):
if you need any help, you know,with coaching or anything like
that, graduate assistant coachesweren't really a thing back
then, but he said, If I can helpout, I'd love to yeah and Jack
Elway, who was the coach at thetime, John Elway's dad said,
Yeah, I'll hire you. And so hecame in as basically a graduate
assistant, and he approached me,I think was the spring or summer

(02:49):
of 1988 and said, How old wereyou? I would have been, I would
have been nine. Nine years old.
Okay. And he said, Hey, I'mworking at Stanford the football
team. Would you like to be awater boy? And I said, Oh, cool.
What do I do? And he goes, Well,you're gonna come to every,
every home game, and you'llhelp, you know, give the guys
water, pick up the cups on thesideline, all that stuff. And I
said, Hey, this sounds awesome.

(03:09):
So I got to start watchingfootball from the sideline of
college football games, startingat nine years old. He left a
couple years later. Theequipment manager absolutely
loved me. Wanted me to stay on,so they promoted me to what was
called a ball boy, which iswhere now I'm getting the balls
into the into the game and allthat stuff. And you know, as an
1112, year old kid, hanging outwith the one football players is

(03:33):
pretty cool, and I got to knowsome of them. That's exciting
fairly well. One of them is aguy by the name of Andy
Sinclair, who I'll I'll circleback to in a minute, because
it's just crazy how full circleworks. But did that all the way
through high school, and thenwhen it came time to go to
college.

So while, while you were doing that all the way
through high school, was thereother water boys and ball boys
kind of coming up? Or was itjust like, was it, it was me

there, they had other ball boys there and stuff
like that. At one point,actually, a couple points in
time, I had a couple of mybuddies helped me out doing it.
They thought, doing it. Theythought was pretty cool. Okay,
okay, awesome. But yeah, when itwhen time came for me to pick a
college, I went in and wastalking to the equipment
manager, So where have youapplied? I'm like, oh, Michigan,
Oregon, Colorado, Sacramento,state's my safe school. And he

(04:18):
goes, Well, have you applied toStanford? And I said, No, I
don't. I don't, I don't have thegrades for Stanford. And he
goes, Well, you better get anapplication in, because coach
Willingham just wrote you aletter recommendation. And I
went, Wow, oh, okay, so got theapplication put together, sent
in, and of course, didn't get inthere. Otherwise this, this
story would have a muchdifferent ending, but didn't get
in there because apparently myadmission didn't go to the right

(04:41):
admissions counselor orwhatever. So the equipment
manager said, Well, where elseare you looking I said,
Colorado. And he said, Great,we're gonna get you out to
Colorado. I know the equipmentguy out there. You're gonna meet
with them. We'll have you meetwith the coaches out there and
all that. And so here I am a guythat you know broke my arm early
on in life, never really gotinto you. Got into being able to

(05:01):
play really good competitivefootball. How'd

you break your arm?
I fell off of

an iron railing when I was nine that first year,
and literally, and I don't knowfor video, but you can see my
arms kind of elbowed out. So hada couple years of surgeries and
re breaks of the arm to try toget it right and all that stuff
so but when I went out toColorado the first year I was
there, and I was, you know, wemade it all the way to the

(05:30):
holiday ball. And so I'm, we'redown, we're practicing. I'll
never forget this conversation.
I was talking to our offensiveline coach. I was working with
the offensive line, doing someequipment type stuff, and I
said, You know what Coach I'dlike to walk on next year, you
know, and see if I can make theteam to play. And he goes, Oh, I
think that'd be a great idea,you know. I think that you you
definitely know the game, youknow what's going on, and we'll
see what happens. And I said,Okay, so

how much, how much experience had you had actually
playing only a couple of

years? Yeah, I didn't really play in high
school because I was, I wasinjured the whole time, so, but
you're, you're around it. I'maround all the time, all the
time, all the time mentally,mentally figuring it out,
knowing what's going on. So inthe spring of two, sorry, of
1997 so my, you know, right,still, during my freshman year,
right after the season it ended,the airline coach ended up

(06:19):
leaving and going on to anotherschool, and I'm like, okay,
who's coming in, who's comingin, and ended up being a guy by
the name of Tom cable. And hewas, he was coming from Cal. He
was a young coach. He was 33years old. Had already done six
years at Cal, came in, and so Iwent through the 97 season with
him, you know, being his kind ofguy and all that stuff. And at

(06:41):
the end of the season, I went upto him and approached him the
same way I had done with theprevious guy, and I said, I'd
really like to look at walkingon. And he goes, why? And I
said, because I want to get intothis as a profession and coach.
And he goes, You didn't ask myquestion. Why do you want to
play? And I said, Well, I thinkif I play, it gives me that
experience, and that'll lookbetter on on resumes and stuff

(07:04):
like that in the future. And helooks at me, he goes, Billy, how
many games are you traveling to?
And I said, I'm going to all thegames right now. He goes, you
realize that if you walk on,even if you were to make the
team, you're only going to thewhole games, and that's it. So
you've got, you know, five,maybe six games a year, whereas
now you've got 1112, games. Sohe goes, I'll tell you what
we're going to do. I'm going toreach out to the equipment

(07:25):
office right now, and we'regoing to make you a student
assistant. And you're going to,you're going to be with me.
You'll come to my meetings.
You're going to stay here in thesummer, don't go home, or in the
summer, you're going to stayhere with me. We're going to,
we're going to learn the game offootball together. And he took
me under his wing. That'samazing. And it was awesome. It
was awesome because here I amnow, my jobs on game day are

(07:46):
sitting up in the booth,scouting the defenses, knowing
what's coming, seeing what'sgoing to be, you know, seeing
plays unfold before they evenhappen. It was just, you know,
totally turned my mindsetaround, from watching the game
of football as a fan to watchingthe game of football as a coach.
So when I graduated, he hadmoved on. He was now the the
head football coach at theUniversity of Idaho. So the

(08:08):
season ended. My senior year, Ididn't know what I was going to
do. I came back to Colorado tocoach a summer camp, and ended
up picking up a job coaching ata high school in Durango, at
Durango, Colorado, SouthernColorado, and did some high
school football there. Two yearslater, I got a job coaching as a
graduate assistant. Now it's athing, so I'm a graduate student

(08:30):
coaching football at Minot StateUniversity. And if you don't
know where Minot is, it is inNorth Dakota. The question that
always gets asked is, why notMinot? And the reason is,
freezing. Is the reason? Becauseit was 68 below in the in the
winter time there it was nasty,52 miles south of Canadian
border. That sounds fun, but itwas great experience. Here I am
now coaching. I'm coaching at anNAIA school, coaching some

(08:51):
football. They had moved me torunning backs, and I was doing
really well there. And then Igot an opportunity, through some
of the coaches that I knew atColorado to move back to
southern Colorado to Adam state,and did two years coaching there
with the offensive line, doingsome special teams and stuff
like that. Things ended there,as I do for most coaches, you
get fired at least once in yourlife. And I got fired from there

(09:14):
because the team didn't performas well as we thought that they
should have. And so I ended uptaking a job coaching at Santa
Monica City College. So now I'mback coaching, you know, junior
college football, having funwith it. Did that for a couple
years, and then a buddy of mine.

How did you get that opportunity? Well, somebody
knew was just they had

posted it online, and I said, Look, here's my
experience, here my references,all that stuff. So they
interviewed me, and they likedwhat I could do. And so they
brought me out, what

do you feel like?
Really differentiated, you like,with that opportunity from any
of the other candidates thatmight have been going for it. So

one was my willingness to move, move from
looking forward to getting backto California. I grew up in
California. I wanted to do thatto, you know, I was willing to
work for peanuts again, youknow, you know, three or 4000
Dollars a year, and I would haveto find a job to supplement
that, which is the way that mostof these coaching you know,
everyone thinks, oh, coachesmake a million dollars. Well,
yeah, if you're in the NFL, orif you're a top, you know,

(10:08):
division one coach, yeah.
Otherwise, you're not makingmuch at all. You know, you're
making barely enough to survive,and a lot of times you have to
supplement with other income,yeah.

So it's really the passion, it's the passion, it's
the passion. So is it thepassion for the the job? Is it
the passion for this, theplayers? Is it the excitement of
just being out there on thefield? Is it like, what? What is
it that driving thing? It's,

it's all of it, to be honest with you, I love
the game. I love the chessaspect to it. You know, what are
they going to do? I do this.
They're going to respond withthis. How do I beat that
response? And you know, you'rethinking two or three moves
ahead, which makes it reallywhich is funny, because I'm a
terrible chess player too, but,but you know, in terms of
football, I can, I can seewhat's going to happen, and know

(10:51):
how to set things up to makesomething happen. So did that
for a couple years, and thenwhen I was at Granada Hills, was
there for a couple years. And atthe time, when I moved to
Granada Hills, I started, youknow, doing some health
insurance. And this is 2009 2010and if anyone remembers 2009
2010 that's when Obamacare wasmaking it big.

So how did that, how did that opportunity come up
on your radar? Oh, the healthinsurance. Yeah.

So another funny story. So when I took the job,
you know, when I moved back hereto Santa Monica, I was living in
the valley and coaching in SantaMonica, and the guy that hired
me the office corner said, Oh, Iknow this guy that's working in
juvenile probation. I told you Ihad a million jobs. You know
this guy in juvenile probation,he'll be able to have you work
nights and do that, which isfantastic. Then it doesn't

(11:42):
affect football at all, and gofrom there, something great. So
I did the juvenile probationthing. Ended up moving to
another juvenile probationplace, and ended up getting laid
off from there in 2009 and so Istarted, I'm like, so I'm out of
a job knowing I need money, and2009 The other thing people know

(12:03):
is that we had a big recessiongoing on there, and so I was
applying everywhere for jobs,trying to find something because
I'm just someone who cannotwork. You cannot not work. I
should say I got a you know,response for an ad like, Hey,
come here for an interview atnoon on a Monday and see what's
going on. Well, of course, I getto the interview late, so I'm
already though this is bad, likeshowing up to interview late,
not a good thing. And as I walkinto the room, I see like, 30

(12:26):
people walking out. I'm like,Oh, they must have just had a
sales meeting. So I go in, andI'm sitting down, and I'm, you
know, listening to the guy, youknow, ramble on about selling
health insurance and thiscommission only job. And if you
sell two policies a week, you'regonna end up making 50 grand a
year. So four policies a week,you're making 100 grand a week
and a year, and it's going to bea great deal. And so I sat

(12:47):
there. What I didn't know at thetime, but found out later, was I
missed the part where it was allcommissioned, and that if this
wasn't job for you, you walkout. And those were the 30
people leaving. So so I'm in aroom with like, three or four
other people ended up signing upthat day to do it. So I'm like,
hell, might as well give it ashot, see if I can make it work.
Make

it work. If you had been there and heard that, would
you have been one of the 30 thatleft? You know, it's

funny. I've had that conversation on my head and
with other people about 100times. I think in the end, I
would have stayed, because I'mjust that much of a, you know, a
stubborn individual that says,hey, no, I can do this. So I
did. I stayed and was sellinghealth insurance. Obamacare was
coming in, and the Obamacarething affected our commissions
tremendously.

So how did, how did this deal work? What was your
relationship with the guy thatwas pitching this deal? He

ended up being my boss. But it was just a random
at the time. It was a randomguy, you know, that was pitching
this thing, and I'm like, Youknow what? I need to make money.
You know, I'm on unemployment,so I can kind of do that thing
where I can start on acommission and still get some
unemployment until this rampsup. And sure enough, it took
off, and I was able to get offof unemployment a lot sooner

(13:54):
than I thought I

would. Wow. So how would the, how would you
contribute the that taking off?
Like, what was it that you did?

It was, it was all determination. At the time,
I was dating, well, now my wife,but I was dating her, and so I
kind of had, you know, this, Ihave to prove to her that I can
be, you know, a useful,productive member of society. I
have to prove to her that I canbe a breadwinner. I have to
prove to myself that I can dothis, and we'll see where it
goes.

So, like, what?
What did that? What did thatlook like? You know, you learn
about the opportunity, you signup for it, right? And then how
does that translate intoproductive work like? So what
did, what did your dailyactivities look?

Okay, so daily activities, what? First it was,
hey, you know what? I'm gonnasit on my couch. I'm gonna have
ESPN news on mute, and I'll makephone calls and see what
happens. And I'll see whathappens when nothing, there was
nothing happening. Yeah, who areyou? Who are you calling? Random
people like we

had, we open the phone book, sign up, basically.
So that were they? Were theyalso, when you signed

up, they were giving them, providing us some
leads. But you know, a lot ofthe leads were for. Fake names.
There's a lot of sifting throughof them, and it was one of those
things that I wasn't good atcalling people, mostly because I
hated the now, I hated all that.
I decided about a month into it,I said, You know what? I'm done
with it. I'm done with thesitting at home and treating
this as a side job. I need totreat this as a real job. So I

(15:16):
suited up every day in a suitand tie and went into the office
and had a little booth that Irented for, I think, 100 bucks a
month, and would make calls andwould and would do the
activities necessary to getthings done. I also learned of a
group called BNI at the time,which I became, still a big
member of today, which is anetworking organization. And I

(15:37):
learned from BNI that I am verygood face to face, very good
person to person. Not good goingout and doing sort of the mass
shotgun approach, but very goodat getting to know you know who
you are working with, youbuilding that relationship so
that now you feel comfortablereferring me out. And so word of
mouth marketing became my jam.

(16:02):
That was where I was going tolive. So like I said, I did
that. 2009 2010 comes around. Myboss takes notice of my work and
says, Hey, we want you to, youknow, become a sales leader and
manage a team, and you'll getoverrides on the team.
Fantastic. One problem. You gotto quit football, because I need
you here during those hours thatyou'd be coaching. So I made the

(16:25):
phone call that I didn't want tomake, which was to coach cable.
You know, a lot of you haven'tfigured out yet, it's pretty,
pretty famous football coach,and I reached out to him, and I
said, Coach, I have a dilemma.
He goes, What's the dilemma? SoI just got promoted at my job.
He goes, that's fantastic. Well,if I get promoted, then I can't
coach football. And he said,Okay, Billy, let's sit this down
and let's write this down onpaper. What are you making as a

(16:47):
coach? I said, right now, I'mmaking 3000 a year. He goes,
What's this job going to payyou? I said, it's going to pay
me 100,000 a year minimum. Hegoes, Billy, you didn't call me
for $97,000 and I said, Coach.
Coaching is my passion. It'swhat I've always wanted to do.
It's where I've lived. And hegoes, Billy, it'll be there for

(17:09):
you, trust me, it'll be therefor you when you're ready for
it, it'll come back. But fornow, you now have a fiance. You
need to take care of her andyour future family, he goes,
I'll still be here, stay incontact with me and all that.
And sure enough, to this day,I've been in contact with him.
You know, we taught, you know,probably two or three times a

(17:30):
year. So I left football andstarted doing this thing. And in
2014 things were going great,but the company that was with
the boss, who had been my bossforever, and two other sales
managers had decided they weregoing to go off and start their
own company, I was at a positionwhere I had some stock options,
if I waited around for a coupleof years that I couldn't or till

(17:53):
the end of that year, I shouldsay that I couldn't really move
at that time. And they said,well, it's fine, you know, most
likely they're going to end upgiving you this agency. And I'm
like, Oh, that's fantastic. I'llbe a much better position. Well,
the day, we had the conversationof what was going to happen with
the territory VP. The territoryVP said, No, you're lucky. We're
even keeping you on as a salesmanager at this time. We're

(18:13):
going in a completely differentdirection. And I said, Well,
wait a minute. I've been loyalto you guys. I'm not going with
them. What are you talkingabout? As well, your numbers are
down. So when my numbers aredown for a million different
reasons, one, my team gotsmaller, you know. Two, that a
lot of them are going over thereand all that stuff. And so I
left that meeting feeling very,very irritated and wondering
what my next step was going to

be. Was it was this leadership that had been a part
of the company, or was this,it's leadership

that had been a part of the company, but I never
had direct dealings with them,okay, you know, they had always
dealt directly with with ourboss, and kind of filtered
information that way, yeah. Butit was, you know, one of those
things where I got that word,and that word to me was, start
looking for another job, becausethis is not going to be your
place. So I left that meetingreally pissed off at an office

(19:00):
down the hall, and I walk backinto my office and sitting there
on my desk, I kid you not, as anadvertisement to open up a
nationwide insurance agencyoffering a $15,000 signing bonus
and all that stuff. And I'mlike, how the hell this has to
be like whatever. So So Iimmediately there was no there
was just an email to respond to.
So I shoot an email, and me,being the stubborn, persistent

(19:21):
person that I am, says email isnot good enough. You know, who
is this? And so I ended up justGoogling the email address.
Yeah, from googling the emailaddress, I found out who sent
it. Went to LinkedIn, whenLinkedIn was still the thing,
went to LinkedIn, found out whothis person was then got into a
company directory, found herphone number, and called her,

(19:43):
and she goes, You are the firstperson that I've ever sent one
of these things to that has everactually taken the time to call
me and I said I knew you weren'tgoing to respond to an email,
because you get a million ofthem. So how do I so she's
hooked it up, got into ameeting. Uh, with my future
sales manager in Calabasas. Sowent out, met with her, and that

(20:03):
started a six month recruitmentprocess, basically, I think it
was April or May of 2014 and byNovember of 2014 I'm signed up,
ready to go, and I'm opening myoffice. What does that
recruitment process look like?
Well, one, they wanted to makesure that was financially viable
to do that. And like I said, Ihad stock from that company. I
was able to utilize and cash inthat stock to basically invest

(20:26):
into this. They wanted to makesure that I had that was setting
up my office in a in aprofitable place for them. When
we were looking at location, I'mlike, Look, I got my BNI group
in Burbank. I'm really good inBurbank. She said, Don't go
there. We're not profitable. Isaid, Okay, well, I'm living in
Simi Valley. She goes, go there.
We're profitable. And I said,Great. So that was kind of the
process and, you know, settingup pro formas and doing all that
stuff and showing what it wasgoing to take to get up and

(20:49):
running. They offered me a verysweet package where they
basically salaried me for twoyears with sort of a ramp down
in money every month. So startoff great money and kind of ramp
down until I could build myagency to where they wanted to
be the whole time they'rehanging over your head. This is
your contract. This is theamount that you have to hit. If
you don't hit it, we willterminate you. So it was a risk,

(21:11):
you know, not saying it wasn't arisk, but it was a risk. And
again, me being the stupidperson that I am, said, Well, if
you print these numbers down onpaper, then people can do these.
And if, then, if people can dothem, then I can do them. I went
in with that mindset. To say Istruggled at the beginning would
be an understatement, because Ididn't have any property in
casual insurance. I only donehealth insurance. So I had to
start from ground zero and buildmy book of business with home

(21:35):
and auto insurance in ways thatI didn't. I thought I could
parlay my my health insurancebusiness in there, but problem
was, they were all Burbankclients, and like we said, we
weren't profitable out there. Sothat didn't really work. So so
really had to start from groundzero. Got involved with the
Chamber almost immediately. Youknow, I think it was January of
2015, I was a member of thechamber, and knew that, you

(21:57):
know, living in Simi Valley,owning a home in Simi Valley,
this was going to be my jam.
This is what I was going to do,was I'm going to build and I'm
going to make this community mycommunity. And one of the things
that I think goes really sort ofunder the radar with a lot of
people. I don't have anycompetitors in this space. I

(22:19):
have, I have other people who Iwork with, and, you know, there
are, look, there's a millioninsurance companies here in Simi
Valley, you know, and that, Iwill tell you that some of my
best friends and some of thepeople who I work closely with
the most are people of competinginsurance companies. And it's

(22:39):
because we can bounce ideas offof each other. It's because,
even though I might have aclient go over to somebody else,
or they might have a client comeover to me, we have a
relationship where, like, Hey,by the way, this person is going
to call you, they're leaving mebecause they're not happy with
something I did. Or, you know, Ican't offer this anymore. If you
can offer this, please takethem, because I want them with

(23:00):
somebody who I know and willtrust. And it's all goes back to
that relationship building thatI have with my clients. Did it?
Did it

start off that way, like when you originally got
into got into Simi Valley. Imean, you entered into this
space, there was probablyalready a number of existing,
successful insurance agencies.
Did it start off that way, whereit was kind of like a community
collaboration type of thing, orit started,

it started out by me saying, I got to be know
everybody. I have to know whoI'm dealing with in this town,
who's there, what's there. And,you know, it's interesting,
because I knew I knew, and stillknow today, see me to be a very
small town. As a matter of fact,we were talking this before we
started. Simi is an interestingplace in that what I have found

(23:49):
in the 10 years that I've runbusiness here is the people that
stay in Simi Valley are mostlythe business owners. You know, a
lot of people who are workingnine to fives are sleeping here.
It's a bedroom community, andthen are going elsewhere for
work. So because of that, Iwanted to know who the mover and
shakers were, who were the ones,not necessarily that had the
loudest voices in town, but whowere the ones that actually got

(24:12):
things done. That led me rightaway to the chamber. I knew that
we had a really good chamberhere, one that advocates for
people here, it was probably ayear later that I joined the
leadership program. What year2016 awesome. 2016 and that's
where everything took off, forme, to be honest with you,
because in with that leadership,you get to meet all the movers

(24:35):
and shakers in town. And one ofthe things that happened
randomly was there were a couplepeople from a rotary club in our
in our group, and they wanted tostart a Beer Fest. And I said,
Well, I like beer, and I'd loveto be a part of getting
something like that off theground. How do we do that? So I
joined the rotary and, you know,two years later, we have a Beer
Fest, and it's one that I take alot of pride in, in managing.

(24:57):
You know, pretty much every yearI've been a chair or a co chair,
every. A year, except for one,the one year I wasn't was when I
was president of the RotaryClub. So it's one of those
things that I take great pridein that. But by doing that and
being that involved with Rotaryyou get to meet more and more
people. I keep going back tomeeting and relationships. One
thing that I really hang my haton in my business is when that

(25:19):
phone rings, if it's a client ofmine, nine times out of 10, I
already know who they are andwhen I like, I hired a new
associate about two years ago,and the first thing she said to
me is, she goes bill every timesomeone calls, you know exactly
who they are. And I said,because I've met them, because
you know, either over the phoneor in person, but I've dealt

(25:39):
with them. I know their story.
I've I've learned their story,and that's what I want to be. I
want to be doesn't matter howmany clients I have. I need to
know who they are my name, sothat way, when they call, they
know that they're not justanother number on the wall. They
know that I'm actually thinkingabout them and what's going on.
So back to the whole question ofinsurance and getting into that,

(26:00):
if you remember from way back mystory with Stanford, there was a
guy that I mentioned by the nameof Andy Sinclair. Andy Sinclair
was a center at Stanford andended up as a free agent,
undrafted free agent, with theSan Francisco 40 Niners, and he
still has his last check framedin his office. Andy opened a
farmer's agency back in 1989 sowhen I started looking into the

(26:20):
nationwide program, first call Imade was to Andy, because Andy
was my parents insurance agent.
Andy was someone who we hadstayed in contact with through
the years. Andy is a really,really close personal friend of
ours and family friend. And youknow, every year, this is the
first year we did them, andevery year my dad and I go back
up to Stanford for one game, andAndy sits in our section. We see

(26:44):
him. I go to his tailgate andall that stuff, and get to watch
his kids grow up. By the way,his son might be getting drafted
in the NFL this year as alinebacker out of Stanford. So
go Tristan. But you know, we,we've bounced through everything
as far as the current market,and we can definitely talk about
the current market of insurance.
We can talk about, you know,what, you know, what we did, how

(27:07):
we, you know, how to structuremy business, you know. Andy was
one at the very beginning. Hesaid, If you're going to do it,
it's a great deal. He looked atthe contract. He said, This is a
really good contract for you tobe in. But let's, let's talk
strategy and having a standStanford educated person talking
strategy with you in thebusiness that you're going into
was absolutely, I mean, one itwas mind numbing, because it's

(27:29):
like he knows so much, and it's,you know, I'm trying to drink as
much of it in, but it'sinvaluable, because here's
somebody who cares about me.
Again, he's with farmers. I waswith nationwide rival companies.
But again, he's given me all theadvice that I need, having been
in the business at that time, 30years. And here I am starting
out, and he's going back to whenhe started out, saying, here's

(27:51):
how we do this. So it was reallycool to have that kind of, you
know, thing. And you know, westill talk, by the way, about
four or five times a year, youknow, and especially in this
climate, we're talking all thetime like, Hey, do you have a
market for this? Do you have amarket for that? How can I help
you here? Really, really goodstuff. So that's kind of that.
And then just to wrap everythingup, full circle, two years ago,

(28:15):
my son started playing footballfor the Simi Valley Bulldogs, so
I got called in to coach histeam, and it ignited a little
bit of a flame that I didn'tknow was there about this time
last year, I was over atMoorpark high and was talking,
not even knowing I was talkingto their head football coach. I
was in there to do somefinancial class for his for his

(28:36):
econ students in the class. Italked to him about the coaching
and stuff like that, and hegoes, would you want to coach
here? And I said, Don't temptme. He goes, Oh, I'm tempting
you. And so this year, Iactually jumped on board with
more part, you know, assistingwith the offensive line. You
know, the offensive line coachthere is a phenomenal guy, you

(28:57):
know, John Kidder, who played atUCLA and won a couple of Rose
bowls. Really, really, reallysmart coach. And it was kind of
nice for me to be able to take aback seat and watch him do what
he does and just sort of helphim with with that. But it was
funny because my wife said, youknow, what are you thinking? You
know, he said, this coachingthing might only be a one year
thing. And I said, hon, I gottabe honest with you, this is some

(29:19):
of the most fun I've ever had,like, I can't believe how much I
missed this. Like, it just, Imean, the fire is just raging
inside of me to to go back anddo it. And I said, look, the
business is doing well. I'm nottaking any time away from that,
you know. And now I get anopportunity to coach football
again. And sure enough, caveswas right, 15 years later when

(29:39):
he said, you know, football willbe there when you're ready for
it and when it's ready for you.
And sure enough, it is so reallykind of cool to kind of wrap it
all together and take advicefrom the past and be able to put
it into into the future. So I

think that's one of the themes that you know, like
as you've been sharing yourstory, which is a really
incredible story. One of thethings that I that I see, is the
just. The value of mentorship,you know. Like, it seems like
you've had people in pivotalpoints of your life and your
journey that have been able tospeak into you, yes, you know,
and then you've been able to acton that, yes, yeah, and be in a

(30:13):
much better position than if youhad not, right? So, like, have
you taken that, and are you nowkind of putting that into
practice.

One of the things, and I've got to be way
better at it, you know, I liketo talk, you know, but it's kind
of the Be quiet and listen,because you learn so much more.
And it was really great to putthat in practice this year on
the football field, because, youknow, there was somebody there
who I respect him to the fullestbecause of what he knows and
because of what he's done, butto be able to listen and see

(30:43):
what he does, I learned so muchfrom that, and really put me in
a into a place where I'm like,oh, yeah, that's that makes so
much sense. And, you know, beable to slowly and gradually get
in there and then be able totalk to him on the side and say,
Hey, why did you do this? Or,you know, what are you seeing
here? You know, it got to thepoint where we just started
feeding off of each other as theseason went along. You know,

(31:05):
really good, really good. Butthere's, yeah, they're just
never, you know, one, never looka gift horse in the mouth. But
two, and more importantly, don'tever forget that the person that
you're sitting across from couldgive you the best piece of
advice that you've ever had andyou weren't expecting it. There
are people that, of course, yourespect and that you know and

(31:26):
you'll listen to everything thatthey say, but there are a lot of
other people, and maybe theydon't think the same way as you,
or maybe they're doing somethingcompletely different from you,
but if you take time to reallylisten to what they're telling
you, there might be a nugget inthere that you can put in your
back pocket for 15 years andthen pull it out and go, Oh, I
remember this. And, yes, this isreally important. A great story

(31:48):
with that was when I was incollege, I told you I wasn't
great student. School was notfor me. Yeah, it's not for
everybody. And after my firstyear, first semester, no, first
year, after my first year, Icame home for the summer, I was
placed on accurate informationbecause my great GPA had dropped
below a 2.0

was it because, like, a lack of interest? Was
it?

It was, yes, it was school. Didn't interest me.
You know, you put me, you put medown in front of, in front of,
you know, 12 or two footballplayers, and tell me to do
whatever. I'll figure it out andI'll analyze it. But you sit me
down and ask me, in what yeardid the Battle of 1812 happen?
I'm not gonna, you know. I mean,obviously 1812 but you know,

that's what they have. They have

us believe. But it was one of those things that,
you know, I'm on academicprobation now, and the school
gave me two options. I said.
Option one, you go back for thefall and you have one semester
get great up above a 2.0 wherewe kick you out. Option two is
take a year off, and then youhave a year to make it up. And I
looked my parents both in theeye, and I said, If I don't go
back this fall, I will never goback. I know myself. I won't

(32:50):
ever do it. I said, trust me,please. You know I'm going to go
back and I'm going to do it. Sowhen I left the home to head
back to school, my mom had givenme this box, and it was, like, a
little, I don't know, jewelrybox. You open it up and there's
the green felt inside of it, orsomething like that. Okay, yeah,
and on the outside of the box,she had written the secret to

(33:12):
success. When I opened it up, itwas one word. It just said,
work. And I got really mad whenI saw it the first time. Like,
really? Like, duh. Like, and Iand I just kind of threw it off
to the side. What was funny was,and I told my mom this years
later, I said that box went onevery single road trip that we
ever had. That box stayed withme, and I'm so mad that I lost

(33:34):
it in one of my moves. She'slike, I make another one. I'm
like, you. I'm sure you could,but it's not the same, like
that. Debug that box. I mean,really. And it just, it just
stuck with me, and it was a waythat, you know, here's mom
trying to do something helpful,that at the time, I was like,
Oh, it's just mom being mom,like, you know, whatever. But
here it was, you know, hell,we're going to play the

(33:57):
University of Nebraska, and I'mcarrying this box with me. We go
to Hawaii to play, you know,play against Oregon in the Aloha
bowl. Here comes this box withme, you know, like this box
traveled everywhere with me. Andevery game, every Friday night
before the game, I would look atthat box, I would open that box,
and I would ask myself, did I dothe work that I needed to this

(34:17):
week to ensure we have a goodday on Saturday. And that's how
I've lived my life. You know,when I when I come into Fridays
during the week. Now, did I doenough? Did I work hard enough
this week to enjoy my weekend?
Yeah? And you know, that'sreally where that came from. So,
yeah,

thank Thank you, mom. Yeah, thanks mom.

She knew what she was doing, you know, and it's
great. Like, my wife says she'sone of my favorite people. So,
yeah,

no, that's awesome, man, I can see the I can see the
passion as you're sharing thatstory. Yeah, that's incredible.
So like, you had people, you hadyour mom, you had these coaches,
you had people that werespeaking into your life, you
know, that were, um. Um, thatwere, they were serving you in a
way that was making sure thatthat you had your best outcome,

(35:07):
even though it was kind ofcosting them, right? You know,
it was, it wasn't for their owngain, right? Has that kind of
informed the way that you nowapproach your relationships with
your customers, right? Yeah,right, yeah. And it kind of
sounds like it does Yes, like,Yeah. Kind of unpacked out a
little bit.

There's more than one way to skin account, and I
realize I use a lot of a lot of,you know, what do they call
like, you know, similes to kindof, or sayings to get to where
I'm going. And I think that'sthe football in me. But no two
customers are the same. And ifyou don't understand their
story. You can't understandtheir solution. And you know, so

(35:45):
when somebody calls me eventoday, you know, when you know,
I'm sure we'll get into, youknow, the difficulties writing
insurance. But you know, itdoesn't matter if I can write
everything, or there's not manymarkets open, or whatever it is,
the first question when someonesays, you know, hey, I need new
insurance. Why are you looking?
What is the why? I need to knowyour why, because then I know
how to approach because, ifyou're looking, because you you

(36:06):
need to save money. And I'mtalking about the bells and
whistles and the features andall that stuff we've missed
completely. Even if this ends upbeing a better product for you,
it's it's worse because I didn'tmatch what you needed. So the
very first question I always askis, why are you looking, you
know, and a lot of times say,Well, I want to save some money.

(36:27):
And I'll follow that up with,you know is that the only reason
that you're looking because mostpeople don't wake up on a
Tuesday morning and say, Hey,I'm going to call around and
spend three hours callinginsurance companies trying to
find a better rate. Whathappened, you know? Oh, I had a
claim that wasn't covered. Oh,you know, my insurance guy, I've
been trying to reach him. Hehasn't called me back. Oh, I was

(36:49):
talking to my neighbor. Theywent over to you. They were so
happy with their service, Iwanted to see what you could
offer me. And so that's reallywhat it was. And you know, when
I said at the beginning of thecall, of the of the podcast, I
hate getting told no on thephone. I'm calling people. I'm
okay being told no face to face,I'm okay if this doesn't work.
And a lot of times I'll reachthat, that conclusion before you

(37:11):
even do and I'll be able toshift you to where you need to
go. But I want to be seen assomeone who's honest, as someone
who you know is more going toshow you how the coverage works
and why we're doing I want toshow you the why behind just
doing it and that that I thinkcomes from my coaching
background, you know, I can tellyou, you know, just go out there
and block that guy, okay, butyou need to know, why are we

(37:34):
blocking the guy? Why are weblocking the guy that way? What
happens if I miss that guy? Andhow do I block that guy? So I
want to take that into intoinsurance, right? Why do we want
this coverage? How do we get tothat coverage? What happens we
don't have that coverage? Andwhat, what kind of strategies
can we utilize to get to thatcoverage without breaking the

(37:56):
bank? So that that's kind ofwhat I do with my clients,

yes, really making sure that they understand. Yes,
you know the purpose behindeverything, right? Like, instead
of just like, what it is that wehave to do, but it also seems
like you care, like, a greatdeal, and as as I have heard
people talk about you, I've readreviews that people have left,
two of the common words that Isee are character and integrity.

(38:21):
Yes, why is that an importantpart of your service to your
customers?

So I'll pull the curtain back a little bit.
Insurance Agents, we make ourmoney off of what's called
residual income. We getcommission every time that you
pay your premium. We get acommission off of it. Okay, it
is much easier to keep a clientthan it is to go out and get a
new client. It caught. The costsare way lower for me to retain
than it is to go out and get newokay, if I care, and it's not

(38:52):
just showing that you care. Youhave to really care. You have to
really care that you're puttingthem in the right spot. And by
doing that, you know, I'm goingto maintain a long term client
so that when things happen, thatwe need to move you from one
insurance company to anotherinsurance company. You know that
I still have your best interestsin mind. You know that I'm

(39:13):
really worrying about thisbecause the worst call that I
can make, it's much easier forme to tell you, No, you're not
going to be covered on that now.
Yeah, if that fire comesthrough, and we didn't have fire
protection on your home, that isa much worse conversation to
have, sorry, your million dollarhome that you've worked your
entire life to have went up inflames. You don't have coverage
for that. I don't want to makethat call at all. So maybe it's

(39:36):
a little bit selfish to see forme to say, I don't want to make
that call, but in order for meto protect my selfishness, I
need to care for you now, and Ineed to make sure that you
understand what you've got, howyou got it, why you got it, and
why you know why it's importantto you. And it's only important
to you if you care about it. Soif you don't care about. It,

(39:59):
then, why are we even talkingabout this coverage, you know,
and why are we talking aboutcertain things? But I want to
know what it is that makes youturn what? Why is it that you
want that coverage? And italmost becomes a you sell me on
why you need this, as opposed tome selling you because nobody
wants to use car salesman. Yeah,no. And, and, you know, I've

(40:19):
made mistakes in my career,where I've hired people who are
very aggressive, aggressivesales people. And mind you, they
they bring in business. But Inoticed that business turned
over quite a bit. And I don'twant that. I want people
because, again, I've built thisbusiness on word of mouth. I've
built this business onrecommendations, if I don't care

(40:40):
for you, then why would you evencare to tell the next person
what I can do to help you out.
So it really is, you know, comesfrom a place of compassion and
caring and understanding. Andyou know, in this insurance
market sucks right now, and I,my heart goes out to everybody,
including myself, who's in thisposition of having, of having to

(41:03):
write policies where I'm like,looking at it and it's almost
like I have to hold my nose andwrite it, because it's all
that's there. And, you know, Itry to empathize with people,
and you know, I tell them, Look,if you can go find something
that's better, by all means, doit. I had a client just last
week who, you know, went outand, you know, had an
opportunity to go somewhereelse. And I said, No. I said,

(41:26):
You know what, I've known youfor a long time, and I would be
remiss if I didn't tell you thatthat place is better, and you
know, it's better, you know, fora bunch of different reasons,
but most importantly, you feelit's better and and that to me,
if you're comfortable going overthere and you feel better being
over there, by all means, do it.
You know, when the tables turnand the tides turn and there's

(41:47):
more stuff on the table that Ican write, I know that I can
pick up the phone and call youand say, Hey, this has happened.
Would you like to come back? Youknow, it's not a forever
goodbye, it's it's for now. AndI'm more than willing to let
people go. And I'll even say,hey, look, if that agent needs
something, some information fromme, have them reach out to me,
please, and I'll give it tothem. I'm not going to hold them

(42:07):
up, and I'm not going to holdyou up because, you know, look,
there are many games thatinsurance agents can play to to
either delay or to or to make itreally hard to move. And I just
am not that person, you know, Iwant to. I want to, especially
if you and I have already hadthat conversation where, where
it's it's time to make thatmove. Well, then let me help you
make that move as easy aspossible. Because at the end of

(42:29):
the day, are you going to referyourself to who you're with? Now
are you going to go, you know,what? You should go, reach back
out to Bill. He always took careof me, you know? And that's,
that's what I want. I wanteveryone who leaves me to leave
with that. Hey, it's notforever. You know, you didn't do
anything wrong. I didn't doanything wrong. It's just the
time, and then you'll be thereto come back so that, that's why

(42:49):
caring means so much to me.
That's That's

incredible. Tell us a little bit about you know, I
have a couple of friends andacquaintances that you know, are
in the insurance industry, andyou know, as I've been talking
to them about what's been goingon the past handful of years and
how crazy things have beengetting, I'd love to know just
your perspective on what's goingon and how it is that you are

(43:16):
helping your clients kind ofnavigate that and deal with
that. So, so I'll answer

the second part of the question first, and then
I'll kind of get into what'sgoing on and all that stuff. I
want to be a resource for myclients, and I want to be a
resource for people who aren'tmy clients. So right now, I'm
telling everybody exactly whatI'm seeing in the marketplace.
I'm telling people what I'veseen, what I've heard, what I've
known. You know, I've had anopportunity to meet with the

(43:41):
insurance commissioner's office.
I thought I was going to meetwith the insurance commissioner.
That's a story for another day,but I've met with the with his
office at least a couple oftimes. I've gotten some good
information, some good insightsinto into what's going on. And
so I'm telling people call menot to get a quote, because
right now, if you're looking toshift for price, it's the wrong
market, and you're just gonnaspin your wheels. Okay, if

(44:02):
you're forced to get newinsurance, then let's look. But
otherwise, stay where you're atright now, because it is an
awful, awful desert out there.
And this started really back forme. It started back right around
2020, and the reason it startedback then was because nationwide
made the decision back in 20192018 somewhere in there that

(44:25):
they were going to kick everysingle agent that they had from
exclusive to independent, whichmeant that now we could
represent other carriers. And itwas a great it was a great idea.
Well, that move came on July 12020. So those of you that
remember exactly where we wereon July 120, 20, most of us were
still in our homes. So now hereI am again starting out new to

(44:46):
try and build relationships withnew carriers. Okay, well,
something else was happeningduring COVID That that went
under the radar that peopleweren't recognizing as much, and
that was there was a big battlebrewing between the insurance
commissioner. Or and theinsurance companies, and the
Insurance Commission was reallytrying to force the insurance
company's hands on givingrebates to the clients, to their

(45:10):
customers, because, hey, they'renot on the road as much. You
know, there's less accidents onthe road. Insurance companies,
you're making way too much moneyin in light of the lockdowns and
all this stuff, in light of thelockdowns all that, and also
because, hey, look, people arelocked down. They need savings.
Insurance companies handled thatvery differently from company to
company. Some people gave awhopping 50 bucks back. Some

(45:30):
companies gave more back. Somecompanies gave less back. But at
the end of the day, there wasn'ta lot of movement that was done
during that time, okay? And thereasoning given by the insurance
companies. I gotta be carefulhow I say things, because I want
to make sure that when I'mtruthful, and two, I want to try
to keep this as a political aspossible, because I don't want
anyone knowing my politics.
That's one of the big thingsthat I have mostly because, you

(45:51):
know, I just it doesn't need tobe said. But insurance companies
said that, look, while therewere less accidents on the road.
Okay? Parts became fewer andfarther between to come by, so
the cost to repair went up. Carswere sitting in a shop for 3045,
days. The insurance company waspaying storage fees for the
cars. During that time, homeswere still, you know, having

(46:14):
their issues, the water leaksand all that stuff. Okay? So
that the rate and the cost ofgoods and services on, you know,
on plywood and stuff like that,was going through the roof. So
insurance companies marginsstarted to shrink, okay? Well,
the insurance commissioner said,we're not allowing any rate
increases in 2020 we're notallowing any rate increases in

(46:36):
2021 in 2022 the insurancecompany said, hey, look, we
don't have rate increases inthree years now. We need a rate
increase. And the insurancecommissioner said, Look, you
didn't do enough for yourclients during the lockdown. I'm
not going to approve a rateincrease now. So that was 2023
okay. And so everyone's aware, Iguess I should back up a little

(46:56):
bit. Insurance companies canalways go for less than a 7%
rate increase without goingthrough the commissioner's
office. The commissioner stillhas to approve it, but they can
go for less than seven. If theygo for seven or more, it creates
a whole new scenario where theyhave to go in from a consumer
watchdog group, which theinsurance companies have to pay

(47:16):
for. They have to go throughthere's a bunch of different
regulations and processes ofthat fall that cost the
insurance companies more. So foryears, the insurance companies
always took their 6.9% 6.9 6.96.9 but now we're into 2023, and
the insurance commissioner isstill saying, No, we're not
going to allow any rateincreases. And the insurance

(47:36):
companies are like, well, now wehave to take our 20 25% rates.
So we're going to go throughthese consumer watchdog groups,
and we're going to go to battleand we're going to see it. But
by the way, Mr. InsuranceCommissioner, we're now going to
take our ball and go home andlet you figure it out. What do
you mean by that? We are nowgoing to stop writing insurance
coverage. So in 2023 we sawinsurance companies start

(48:02):
playing some really crazy gamesnationwide. Was the first one
that I saw do it. And what theydid was they said, Okay, look,
you want a home or an autopolicy? Fantastic. You're going
to submit a quote. Okay, we'regoing to take two weeks. You're
going to go get all thisinformation that we need. We
need the age of the house. Weneed a photo of your dog to make
sure it's not a pit ball. Or,you know, we need to, you know,

(48:23):
see your employment address. Weneed to see. There was a litany
of things that you need, thatthey needed to see. Okay, once
you got that all in, you had towait two weeks for them to come
back and give you a quote ortell you no, or when they did in
about 50% of the time, oh,you're missing a piece of
information. We still need this.

(48:44):
And by the way, that starts youryour 14 day window over. So they
did that. And so basically theystopped writing coverage. And at
that time I said, like, it's noteven worth going through
nationwide, you know? So we, westopped promoting nationwide. At
that moment, then otherinsurance companies started
doing things, Hey, Bill, we knowthat you're appointed with us.
We're going to put you on what'scalled temporary binding

(49:05):
restriction. You're not allowedto bind a policy. So, so we, as
a carrier, we're not going tostop selling it, but, but you as
an agent cannot promote it andcannot sell it and cannot get
commission on it. So just, youknow, go, go elsewhere. So this
started happening. This startedhappening. This started
happening. And then in thesummer of 2023 nationwide sent
me a Dear John letter. Now, mindyou, I've been with nationwide

(49:26):
Since 2014 so this is nine yearsat this point, and they sent me
a letter and said, Hey, by theway, due to, you know, not, not
for any fault of your own, butwe are going to cancel your
agency. Wow. And and with thatmeans that all your you need to
start moving your clients fromnationwide, because we want off
of all these policies. And theydid this to me and about 400

(49:50):
other agents in California oragencies. And I went, Well,
look, guys, I'm exclusive. Mybiggest book of business is with
you guys like, what are you whatare you thinking? What are you
doing? Nope. Sorry. And justknow that in the letter, it's
just going to say not for cause.
So, so yeah, so then this isagain where I've got to get a
little bit careful as to what Isay and word it in the right
way. But for me, at least, theydon't want business in

(50:13):
California through me. So, sonow we're in a situation where I
don't have companies writing,and now I've got companies
starting to terminate me. Sothey've been one that has
terminated me. Another one hasand then binding restrictions
with other carriers. So really,the standard homeowners
insurance marketplace, I don'thave any carriers that are
really writing right now. I haveone that is writing in Simi

(50:35):
Valley. They are only writinghomes that are less than 30
years old, so 1995 or newer,without any claims, perfect,
clean, squeaky business, and notnear their guidelines of
wildfire, yeah, okay, which is awhole nother undertaking auto. I
again, have one carrier that iswriting, and they're writing
pretty liberally right now. Sothat's pretty good, and that's

(50:57):
been that's been nice, but mostinsurance companies are not
writing. State Farm was one ofthe last pull out of the game.
They're the biggest carrier inthe game to pull out in
California. And that's whenpeople's eyes started waking up,
going, oh, wait a minute, thisisn't just nationwide and
farmers pulling out. This isState Farm now telling us, no,
they're not writing inCalifornia. And so now the

(51:19):
insurance commissioner isstarting to get heat from his
own party. The insurancecommissioner is an elected
position, by the way, and hisown party is now telling you,
hey, look, man, this has gone onlong enough you got to figure
this out and figure out what'sgoing on. So this year, they had
a whole slew of public hearings.

(51:39):
They've started working with theinsurance companies. They're at
the negotiating table as wespeak, trying to figure out the
best way to move forward withthis. So what does that look
like? Well, one, it's thegovernment, so it's going to
take a while, as always, asalways. So don't expect anything
anytime soon. I thought at thebeginning of the year of 2024

(51:59):
that we'd be in a position bynow where we'd start seeing a
lot more light than we do. Thereis light, but it's very small.
So now I'm saying, by the end ofnext year, hopefully, you know,
the optimist in me says, By themiddle of next year, we're going
to start seeing some carrierscome back into the game, because
some have had rate increasesapproved, and they're holding
off waiting for other insurancecompanies to come on board,

(52:20):
because they don't want to bethe ones caught holding the
purse, so to speak. So I thinkby the end of next year, the
insurance companies, for themost part, will be back and it
will be back to business asusual, unfortunately for us as
the consumer, that means thatrates aren't going to go up the
day of the of the $100you know, auto insurance a month

(52:41):
plan is probably gone. Okay?
They're not going to be aroundmuch. You know, homeowners is
ugly. My own personal home, Ihad to move it away from
nationwide. This year I saw minewent up 300% you know, and, and,
you know, unfortunately, that'snot an anomaly. There are, there
are a lot, then that's why I'mtelling people, don't shop for

(53:03):
price. It's not gonna, it's notgonna make much sense to shop
for price. But I do have acarrier now. It is a non
standard carrier, meaning thatthey are not bound by the
regulations of California, butit is backed by Lloyds of
London. So, you know, they havegood financial strength that is
writing in California, andthey're writing a lot, and
they've been a really good kindof bridge for me, because it's

(53:24):
one of those we're doing thingsso as on a year to year basis,
with, with, especially withhomeowners insurance, the
homeowners insurance companythat you're with this year, you
know, if it's one of these nonstandard, I don't want you on it
next year. You know? Why not?
Because it's non standard, thecoverage is not as good as
matter of fact, Californiarequires that we get 3d clients
before we can even promote them.

(53:46):
So me and three carriers have tosay no, which right now is very
easy because nobody is writing.
But also, when it's nonstandard, they can do things a
little bit differently, sort of,in terms of the sub limits of
coverage and how they offercoverage and and all that. And
they're and they're expensivepolicies, to be honest with you.
Like, for instance, like I said,mine tripled. Well, if I can get
back onto a standard policy, myrates gonna go down. And I'm

(54:09):
gonna feel like, Oh, my ratewent down. Well, it's not gonna
go down to where it was. Youknow, look, I was at $1,300 a
year for my home. That wasfantastic. I'm never gonna see
1300 again. But I'll tell youwhat, if it goes to 2400 I want
to feel like I'm saving a bunchof money. So so, you know,
that's the way we have to lookat it's kind of like gas prices.
They're going to rock it up, andthen they're going to feather

(54:29):
down. But it's, it's going tobe, it's going to be a haul. If
your insurance company has notnon renewed you, if they're
continuing to renew you do it,if they're asking you to jump
through some hoops, I know youwant to call and definitely call
me, because I can give you someadvice on that, but nine times
out of 10 the recommendation isis going to be to jump through

(54:51):
those hoops, because it's goingto save you the money in the
long run. Now, if they're askingyou to replace a whole roof, and
they're giving you two weeks todo it, then definitely call me.
We can see what we can do tomove you on that one. Because,
you know, that's going to be alot of money that you probably
don't have built up. But if it'slittle things like, like, brush
clearance, do it. Just do it.
So, you know, like I said, thereare companies that have gotten

(55:14):
their rate increases. There arecompanies that are still
waiting. There are othercompanies that are starting to
dabble in coming back on, youknow, again, we're in wait and
see mode. I kind of feel likewe're in the eye of the storm
right now. The worst has comethrough, but there's still the
back end to come, you know, andwhat's that going to look like,
you know, I've told everybody. Ikind of feel a little bit like

(55:35):
Forrest Gump, you know, when,when all this, when all this,
hit the fan? I literally wentinto the foxhole and let the
bullets fly overhead. To me,that was like the hurricane and
forest guilt. Okay, couldn'tcatch shrimp, so I'm just going
to kind of lay low and see whathappens. Now, the hurricane is
coming through, and a lot ofinsurance agencies have either
moved or sold or, you know,agents have gotten out of the

(55:56):
market. Because it's been somiserable, I've been able to,
it's going to pivot my businessto more commercial stuff, which
has kept me afloat. And betterthan a float I'm doing, I'm
doing great. But when this stormactually fully passes, and the
insurance companies come back,it's going to be like Forrest
Gump and the shrimp is going tobe easy, and it's going to be

(56:17):
really easy to go out there andfind places for people. And, you
know, it'll be, it'll be whatwe're so sick of hearing, but it
will be the new normal, youknow, as to what it is. So, like
I said, my job now is to educatepeople on what is going on. My
job after the storm will be thento Okay, now we can move you

(56:37):
into the right place. We moveyou into the piece. So if we
have to move you, we're kind ofmoving you off to the side for
right now, into a place that'sjust kind of a placeholder, and
then we'll move you into thereal deal when we get there.
Yeah, so, so right now it's justkind of transitional. Right now,
it's very transitional. Staywhere you're at, if you if you
can stay where you're at and anddon't look back and don't wait

(56:59):
six hours on the phone, calling100 people, because everybody's
going to tell you the samething. Where I try to, again,
differentiate myself, is I hopeI'm calling number one or two,
because then I can give you allthe information and tell you you
can stop your search now andstay where you're at, and I
don't get any commission if youstay where you're at, yeah, I
get commission off what I sellyou. So if I'm telling you to
stay where you're at, there's,there's a good reason for it.

(57:20):
And again, it's that for me,telling you to stay where you're
at is to build that trust.

So what did you end up doing with your book of
business? So you had to move it

so nationwide.
Gave me an opportunity with thehomes to appeal for a for a one
year and the first half of theyear, they were very easy on the
appeal process, but then theyrealized they were being too
easy on the appeal process.

So was it like, every time a renewal would come
up, you would have to appeal tokeep it with them. I would have
to

appeal. Six months super easy. Six months
super easy. Then all of a form,and then all of a sudden, and
literally, it was from one daythe next. This worked yesterday.
It didn't work today. And I'mlike, What are you talking
about? This isn't working. Ijust did this for another
client. Listen, don't we changethe rules? And you know, then it
came down that, oh no, we don't.
Just because they're not writingin the area doesn't count

(58:07):
anymore. You have to actuallyget a physical decline. That
shows that it was for wildfire.
Like, okay, here we go. So, um,so most my clients stay with
nationwide last year, whichmeans now I'm having the real
conversations with them. Of,hey, we can't appeal again. We
got to get going. But like Isaid, and that happened with me,

(58:27):
I technically could haveappealed my own home, and I'm in
the middle of see me like I'mI'm as far away from what I
would consider fire danger asanybody what insurance companies
will tell you, because I've hadthis conversation with
underwriters a million times,they're not worried about the
middle of seeming going up inflames. They're really not. And
actually, and I've talked to thefire captains out here, the fire

(58:48):
science out here shows thatfires will go around us. You
know, they'll go over theridges. They might lick up
against wood ranch or lick upagainst Big Sky, but really it's
going to stay off. So theinsurance companies are not
worried about the fire comingthrough, you know, la Avenue.
What they are worried about isthe smoke damage. And, you know,

(59:09):
there's the smoke damage claimsreally hurt the insurance
companies, because those are,you know, they can be, you know,
like I've seen, $100,000 smokeclaims. Most of them are 15,
$20,000 but they keep coming in,they keep coming in, they keep
coming in. And that's what theinsurance company is not set up
to handle. You know, they're,they're set up for the total
loss of the big fire. So,

yeah, so what smoke damage? So what? What is smoke
damage

if there's a fire, right? And I saw a few of
these, not a fire in the house,so brush fire and brush fire
around. You know, I saw a coupleof these with my Oak Park
clients back in the Woolseyfire, where the smoke is so
heavy it gets into the vents, itsits the walls. It ruins your
clothing, it doesn't you can'tget rid of it very easily.
You've got to bring in aremediation company to get it

(59:56):
out of there. Those are, thoseare the big, those are the, what
I would call the legitimate.
Claims, yeah.

Brian Davis (01:00:00):
So it's not structural damage, it's it's
something that needs to getcleaned up,

Bill Saunders (01:00:05):
right? Exactly?
There are a lot of people outthere, a lot of attorneys out
there, that will say, hey, look,there is a smoke, you know,
smoke claim. You can file asmoke claim, and you can get
this money, and it's not goingto affect your rates, because
it's a catastrophic loss.

So are they going through house to house to house,
or they'll fly a plane

overhead. We see them in the valley all the time,
smoke claims.com. I justpromoted them.

Don't go there, but they'll promote it and all

that stuff. And that's where the insurance
companies get and so one of thebig sticks with the insurance
company is in, say, Florida,okay, you have a deductible on
your home, okay? And it might bea $5,000 deductible. Mean, you
got to pay that out of pocketbefore the insurance pay.
Insurance pays. But they will dosomething for wind and hail.
Will say it's a 2% deductible.
Okay? So that means if it costs,you know, $500,000 to, you know,

(01:00:49):
to rebuild your home, you'regoing to pay $10,000 before we
kick in for wind and hail. Sothe insurance companies have
said, Hey, can we do that herein California? Can we have their
deductible, and then can we havea fire, smoke deductible of 1%
2% something like that, that waythat would alleviate those,

(01:01:10):
those those minor losses, 2% ofthe the value of the home, of
the replacement cost of thehome, the replacement cost, very
good differentiation, becauseyou got to remember, when you
look at your home's value, theland that it's sitting on is of
value. Okay, the even if thehome is a total loss, that land
is still there, unless you're ona cliff in Malibu, but that

(01:01:31):
property is still going to bethere. So they're looking at the
cost to rebuild your home, notthe value of your home. So
that's why a lot of times,you'll notice your home's worth
1.3 million. The replacementcost comes in at 600,000 it all
has to do with that, and so youwant to make sure that your
replacement cost is up. You alsowant to make sure that there's

(01:01:52):
coverage in there for extendedreplacement cost, which is
usually at 50 to 100% on top ofit, to make sure that you've got
enough to rebuild your home, butit either one to 2% of the
replacement cost so that, youknow, again, that's going to get
rid of those 15,001 less claimswhich really shouldn't be filed
anyway. But, you know, theclient feels, hey, I got all
this money. This is great. I cango, you know, rent all my

(01:02:12):
kitchen now, or whatever theywant to do. It'll eliminate
that, and then that'll alleviatesome of the stress off the
insurance company. So that's oneof the areas that the insurance
companies have been going to theDepartment of Insurance saying,
Hey, can we get this added? TheDOI also wants them to write
more and what they considerwildfire areas? Well, what is a
wildfire area? I've asked theask the department insurance,
the Commission's office, what doyou guys consider a fire Well,

(01:02:35):
an area where there could befire, okay, but that's pretty
much all of California, yeah,but, yeah, but I'm like, Okay,
but what? Well, but areas thatare more prone to fire. I'm
like, Okay, well, then I willgive my address and I'll say,
Look, I'm here. Is this a firearea? Well, we haven't
determined the map completelyyet, but that's yeah. So they're
working on it. They're trying tofigure out where they're coming

(01:02:56):
from. What's going on? I did askthe commissioner's office. I
point blank. I said, Look, wehave California FAIR Plan. Yeah,
we have these non standardcarriers. Is there any problem
with writing with a non standardcarrier? And their response was
none at all. None at all. Pleasefeel free to write those
policies. The truth of thematter is that California FAIR

(01:03:16):
Plan is got way too much in it,then it can pay out. There are
too many policies. If there is abig fire that comes through here
that that is going to put, youknow, put a lot of strain on the
FAIR Plan. They might not haveenough money to pay it out. And
so that's another reason why I'mkeeping people away from the
FAIR Plan as best I can. So whatis the California FAIR Plan?

(01:03:37):
That's a really good question.
The California FAIR Plan wasestablished as a insurance of
last resort. It was meant to bethere when somebody couldn't get
insurance on the open market.
Okay, it was, it's beenestablished for many, many
years, and what it wasn'tutilized very often. I mean, if
you lived in the woods up inFraser park, you probably had a

(01:04:00):
California FAIR Plan, but if youlived within city limits of a
major city, you never thoughtabout the fare plan, because,
again, it's the insurance oflast resort, and the way that
they fund it is by taking theinsurance company, having the
insurance companies pay apercentage of their overall
premium into this fund, and thenthey would charge a premium to

(01:04:22):
the consumer, and then thatpremium, plus the insurance
money, would all go into a bigpot of money for the state of
California, so that if there wasa fire, say, in Northern
California, doesn't matter wherethat money was collected from,
that money can all be directedup to that fire to take care.
And they were looking at maybecovering one or two homes.
What's happened in the last twoyears with insurance companies

(01:04:45):
leaving the game now, CaliforniaFAIR Plan has become a topic of
of our daily conversation in theinsurance world, and now we're
seeing people go on theCalifornia FAIR Plan that have
Simi Valley, California, 903063, and. 65 zip codes. It's
very, very not what it wasintended for. And because of
this, we have more peopleparticipating in the FAIR Plan

(01:05:07):
than it was ever establishedfor. And so what the fear is is
that if there's a major firesimilar to the Camarillo one we
had a couple of weeks ago, orthe Woolsey fire, or something
like that, that there's going tobe too many homes and too many
people that are on thesepolicies than what the FAIR Plan
has money for. And if thathappens, then the big question

(01:05:30):
is, what do they pay out? Andhow do they pay it out, and how
long until you get that money?
Because in the insurance world,getting your money after a loss
is the difference in everything.
You know, if there's, if there'sa major wildfire that comes
through, and my insurancecompany pays me out today, I can
call a contractor today and say,hey, you know you want to come

(01:05:55):
out and rebuild my home. Andhe'll say, Yeah, I got nothing
else going on. Absolutely. Let'swork out what we can what we can
rebuild the home for. Okay, if Idon't get paid out in a week, I
call that contract goes, Yeah, Igot two or three homes that I'm
building. So I'll get to youafter that. If I'm waiting a
month or two months, hey, youknow what? We're so busy right
now, if you want me to come out,I'm going to charge you a

(01:06:17):
premium for it. And if it's ayear or more, yeah, man, I'm so
booked up still. Like, what doyou know? What do you want me?
So this, this is the problem is,you know, contractors, yeah,
it's getting that money rightaway really does make a
difference in the rebuildprocess of your home. So that's
another reason why FAIR Plan wewant to stay away from. But
also, the state and theinsurance companies have drilled

(01:06:41):
in us for years. This is theinsurance of last resort. Well
now it's turning into theinsurance of only resort. And
that's why I was so happy to seea carrier come in that, you
know, while they're nonstandard, still say, hey, we
want to alleviate that. Comeover here, because at least
we're backed by Lloyd's ofLondon, and we'll be able to get
your money quickly, becausethat's, that's where I'm like,

(01:07:01):
Alright, here we go. Let's

roll with it. So that's that's making a big
difference for your yourclients. Yeah, that's awesome,
man. So if, if anybody wants toget more information from Bill,
if somebody has some insurancequestions out there and what,
what's the best way for them tobe able to get in contact with
so the best

way you can always go to my website, www.wj,
Saunders insurance.com,insurance is spelled out. You
can call me 805-426-4855, well,people there to answer the
phone, those are the two bestways to get a hold of me. So
again, 805-426-4855, or www.wj,Saunders insurance.com, awesome.

Awesome. And what would you say to, you know,
maybe some young entrepreneursout there that are thinking
about, you know, getting into, Imean, you were talking earlier
there, right now, it's kind of adesert, but, you know, in the
next couple of years, like itcould turn into quite the
bountiful harvest, yeah, What?
What? What type of guidance,what type of mentorship, what

(01:08:04):
type of life,

I would say, start now. Start, start getting,
you know, there's licensingprocesses and stuff like that.
Go up and get your license ifyou really want to do this. You
know, there, there's, you know,a lot of times there are
companies that are hiring,especially looking for people
that are really wanting to getinto it and get hungry with it.
You know, don't get discouraged.
If an insurance company says,No, we don't want you right now,

(01:08:27):
or an agency says, No, we don'thave any openings right now. If
you're ready and you're alreadylicensed and you're good to go,
the moment that this marketflips, people are going to be
looking to hire right away,because they're going to want to
take advantage of what, ofwhat's going to come do it. Do
your steps, do your training, doyour mentoring, you know, talk
to talk to those around you.

(01:08:49):
Make sure it's something thatyou want to do. If you can start
it out as a side job right now,because you still got a full
income job, fantastic. You know,if you have to dive in head
first, you got to do what yougot to do, but don't look back,
you know. Just, just make thatjump and go, you know. And you
know, don't hesitate. You know,the more you hesitate, the

(01:09:09):
harder it gets to do things. Youknow, it's kind of like going
into a cold pool. You know,you're going to be in that cold
pool anyway. Just jump in andget it over with. So just tear
the band aid right off. Amen,yep, get it going. But if you,
if you have time, you have afull job right now, but it's
something that you want to lookinto doing. You know, definitely
go get licensed and all that.
And I would say forentrepreneurship in general, if
that's a move that you want tomake, is to entrepreneurship and

(01:09:32):
you have an idea, and it's,you're passionate about it,
definitely dive in and do it.
You know, don't give upeverything for it. But, you
know, be if you're passionate,you know, follow that passion,
because that passion is notgoing to go away. And my big
thing was always, I don't wantto look up 10 years ago what,
you know, what it could have,should I? I'm glad that I've

(01:09:53):
lived my life in such a way thatthe what a could have shoulda
doesn't exist. And, you know,like the. Ice. It was given to
me 15 years ago. You know, ifyou have to step away from a
passion for a little bit, it'llbe there waiting for you, but
always, always stay true toyourself and doing it. And if
it's what you really want to doand you're starting to get some
traction with it, by all means,stoke that fire, because it's
really a really awesome thingonce it gets up and

running. Awesome, awesome. Well, thanks so much,
Bill. Thanks for coming. Thanksfor having this conversation
with

us. Yeah, not a problem. And, yeah, awesome,
man, thanks for having me.
Thanks,

brother. Thank you.
You.

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007 | This Man is Helping Californians Survive the Insurance Crisis | Local Business Breakthrough Podcast

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