229. The Fascinating Impact of a Hard Market on Insurance Carriers w/ Curtis Goldsborough

This is a mini meditation guided by Bombas.

Repeat after me.

I'm comfy.

I'm cozy.

I have zero blisters on my toes.

And that's because I wear Bombas.

The softest socks, underwear, and t-shirts that give back.

One purchased equals one donated.

Now go to bombas.com slash listen and use code listen for 20% off your first purchase.

That's B-O-M-B-A-S dot com slash listen and use code listen for 20% off your first purchase. That's B-O-M-B-A-S dot com slash listen and use code listen at checkout.
The best cars for the money are Hondas. Save big with 0% financing.
The 25 Accord Civic Passport and Odyssey have been named the best cars for the money by U.S. News and World Report.
Save thousands with 0%, like the 24 Prologue with zero APR. To drive the best, ask anyone who owns a Honda and search your local Honda dealer.
See dealer for financing details. Financing on credit approval.
Offer ends 4-30-25. View U.S.
News Best Cars at cars.usnews.com. Did you know that parents rank financial literacy as the number one most difficult life skill to teach? Meet Greenlight, the debit card and money app for families.
With Greenlight, you can set up chores, automate allowance, and keep an eye on your kids' spending with real-time notifications. Kids learn to earn, save, and spend wisely.
And parents can rest easy knowing their kids are learning about money with guardrails in place. Sign up for Greenlight today at greenlight.com slash podcast.
You just got to put stuff out there and see what happens. And that's a big part of, I think, where people, whether they're using it to bring awareness to a personal brand or to a business or they're selling something, whatever the reason, is they'll

put stuff out and then they won't go back and like look and see what actually happened.

Did people actually comment?

Did they like it?

How much reach did it get?

Like, and then, and then think for themselves, okay, why did that happen?

In a crude laboratory in the basement of his home. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the show.
Today we have a tremendous conversation for you with Curtis Goldsboro, innovative loss control expert insurtech infusionado creator the guy that does the insurtech wraps at itc he's also the president of national insurance inspection services and an all-time meme creator on linkedin about the insurance industry and guys if you're not following following Curtis on LinkedIn, I highly recommend you do. His takes and his kind of sarcastic memes that he creates about the insurance industry, I find to be thoughtful and hilarious and just all around good guy.
And I really wanted to have Curtis on just for his perspective. We have so many people on this show who in some way, shape or form are directly creating or working in the retail side of the independent insurance agency space.
And I just wanted to get an outside perspective from someone who is interesting and thoughtful. Obviously, Curtis fits the bill that doesn't directly sell to and or sell retail insurance.

And while Curtis has had retail sales experience in the insurance industry before as a as a agency owner for Farm Bureau, for the last 10 plus years, he's worked for National Insurance Inspection Services and has a unique perspective on the way various dynamics, particularly the hard market that we're currently operating in, have impacted the insurance industry and insurance carriers. And we talk a little bit about what that means, what he's seeing across the board, particularly as it relates to homeowners insurance and property loss, et cetera, and why the hard market and various cat losses that we've had in the last, you know, say half dozen years or so have created a fragility in our industry that most are not aware of.
So it's an awesome conversation. And as I said, I highly recommend you connect with Curtis on LinkedIn, follow along with what he's doing.
We'll have his LinkedIn profile in the show notes, whether you're watching on YouTube or listening on the podcast. And you can also just go to LinkedIn and search for Curtis Goldsboro and you'll find him.
Before we get there, guys, just wanna go quick shout out to you for listening to this show. If you love what we're doing here, if you're not subscribed, subscribe.
If you are subscribed and you love what we're doing, we'd love for you to share the show. Just share it out in your socials, text it to a friend, email it to a friend.
That's how more people find what we're doing, find these conversations, find this content. And hopefully through the various episodes, through the guests that we have, through the conversations, thoughts, ideas, something resonates that helps you grow, helps you become a better leader, helps you become a better sales professional, or whatever it is that you're doing helps you better understand this industry and how you can be successful within it.
And if you want to go down that rabbit hole even further, I recommend you visit masterclass.insure. That's masterclass.insure.
This is the insurance growth masterclass website where you can join a community of people that are growing their business like no others. This is dynamic.
It is interesting. It is pushing the boundaries of what it means to grow your agency, to build scalability, predictability, and sustainability through inbound marketing.
Guys, this is the culmination of 18 years of my work in this space. And it is just such a pleasure to be providing this to you guys.
So go to masterclass.insure today. And with that, guys, let's get on to Curtis Goldsboro.
Well, dude, I'm excited to have you on the show. You are like the insurance LinkedIn meme master.
and maybe even just like you may have ascended even past just insurance in terms of your meme skills but um dude it's like funny i love your takes it's so engaging and uh uh i probably have interacted with too many of them because now like it seems like everything you post just like comes to the top of my LinkedIn feed. A mission accomplished.
Yes. Dude, I give you so much props.
It's great. I mean, it's this is not the easiest space to like find ways to make it humorous.
And that didn't you know, that doesn't then just like completely offend somebody. So I found found it to be, I found it to be awesome.
I mean, like, why, why do you use like that type of content? Like, where did that come from? You know what I mean? Like you have a very distinct style, obviously. So, where does all that come from? Yeah, I mean, you know, I wish that I had a profound answer for that, but, you know, it's one of those things where I've always been a creative person and always, you know, felt like I had an interesting take on things, but didn't really know what the right outlet was, you know, for that or how to convey that, you know.
And so, I mean, a couple of years ago, I guess, well, gosh, four years ago for InsurTech Connect in Vegas, I had, you know, written this InsurTech wrap and kind of collaborated with the insurance nerds group on that. And yeah, those always kind of got a little, you know, got a little bit of traction and made some waves, but then I had no, you know, no intentional plan to like capitalize on that, you know, attention or build upon it.
But I did one every year for the last four years. And then this year really put a lot of energy and time and effort into it to you know try to make it really up the production value and all of that and it made a pretty big splash and this year i was like you know what i need to because like literally for the past four years like i would post this insure tech rap video at itc time and then do nothing on linkedin after it you know yeah and so this year I was like, you know what, I'm going to grease the wheels a little bit leading up to it and get the algorithm at least recognizing who I am.
Um, you know, and then that really helped engagement on, on that InsureTech wrap video this year, which was, you know, called hard market. And that just really resonated with a ton of people and, and I I had a ton of fun with it and yeah.
And so then beyond that, just, I've kind of followed up with, quite frankly, I don't even know where the first kind of meme idea came from, but like, you know, I, I made one and it resonated and got tons of engagement and really hit. And I was like, Holy cow, this, this really seems to work.
You know, it resonates with people and you know, and obviously I had, you know, had heard Gary V at ITC this year saying attention is everything, you know, attention is your most valuable asset. And I was like, Hey, I'm going to, I'm going to try this.
You know, I've attracted some attention, but let me see if I can keep the ball rolling. And yeah.
And it's just been kind of off to the races from there. And I'm still learning as I go, but I'm having a lot of fun with it.
So. Yeah.
And I, and I think that's the really most important part of that too, is that you're, you're doing it and some of them are going to work. Some of them aren't, you know what I mean? It's, it's just, you never know.
I mean, that's the biggest thing when people come to me about like the, you know, inbound insurance stuff that I've done and whatever. I'm like, you know, I can give you a whole bunch of like things that you can do.
And there are some best practices and obstacles you can side set, et cetera. But like, really, you just got to put stuff out there and see what happens.
Like, and actually, and that's a big part of, I think, where people, whether they're, whether they're using it to bring awareness to a personal brand or to a business or they're selling something, whatever the reason, is they'll put stuff out and then they won't go back and like look and see what actually happened. Did people actually comment? Did they like it? How much reach did it get? And then think for themselves, okay, why did that happen? Did it, was it, you know, you know, I've seen, and this is going to sound crazy, but I was testing emojis in the first line of my LinkedIn posts.
And I found that if you use like the green box with the check or if you use more positive related emojis, you tend to get more reach. Where if you use like a red X or you use I was using like the alert siren thing.
Yeah. Get less.
And I was like because I posted this one and I was like, I just thought I thought I had hit on all the things i thought it was a good kind of contrarian title but what i did was i framed it between two red x emojis yeah like it didn't go anywhere and i was like what stuff i was so pissed you know i mean i was like you know so then i started testing and i found that like oh oh, OK, that's not for whatever reason.

You know, it's like those are the kind of things that end up making a difference in the long run that I feel like people just don't want to think that deeply on the nuance. But it is important.
No, it absolutely is. And I mean, I'm sure that you're aware of this.
Right. But like if you watch any of the stuff, you know, from from Mr.
Beast, right. Like interviews that he's done with with Rogan or whoever.
Right. And like, I mean this, the, literally the most successful and prolific YouTuber in history.
Right. And if you ask him, like, he doesn't think that he's a creator, right.
He's like, I'm a data nerd. And he says that, you know, literally from the beginning, he has just obsessed over analytics and like what you were talking about.
Right. And like, you know, ABCD, EFG testing.
Right. And like, you know, just absolutely obsessing over that.
And yeah, I mean, it matters. You absolutely, you know, can get results.
But it's work, right? It's a lot of work. And I think this goes into really everything, everything that we do, you know, and probably outside of insurance too, but it's, it is this ability to test, test, test, test, test, and not chair and not, you know, I actually just, I had a couple of days ago and I've talked a little bit about this on the podcast, but I had this kind of back and forth a couple of people because I have this perspective that when you are working with inbound leads in a business, particularly an insurance business, but that's what I know best.
So we'll just stick to that. Is that you solve the people's problem, you round out the account later.
That is my particular take. That is not my take because I ideologically believe that that's what it is.
It's my take because I think I personally have dealt with more and more diverse segments of inbound leads in this industry than maybe anybody that operates in it currently, right? Like multiple different businesses, multiple different formats,

listening to hundreds of agents,

my own businesses,

businesses I'm consulting for, et cetera.

And if you focus,

and I know there are people listening to this who are not going to want to hear this,

but if you have a hard focus on rounding out accounts

in the initial call or the initial sale,

you're going to lose business. And this is the part that everyone pushes back on me on.
Just because you solve someone's problem and that's one policy today, that does not mean that's a bad account. Everyone immediately jumps to, well, if it's not a rounded out account, then the business isn't going to stick.
And I'm like, I buy clothes from like four or five different brands and I go back when I need them. Like, like also just because you only have one account today doesn't mean that you can't call them back in a couple of weeks and get the rest.
But there's like this sense.

And I think it goes for all of us.

Like, you know, and I ultimately want to get into like where your technical expertise in the industry is, too. Like, but I feel like when someone calls you for a problem, don't don't you just or if you call someone for a problem, don't you just want them to solve your problem?

Or do you want them to try to figure out all the problems that you have? And in that call, then try to solve all the problems that you have. Like, you're like, no, no, no, no, no, no.
I just have this one problem I need to solve today so I can get this off my brain. And, you know, I just, you know, it's just funny how people get so ideologically bent on things.
You know what I mean? And it's like, this is the way it is. No, you have to round out accounts or it's a bad account.
It won't be profitable. I'm like, says who? Yeah, no.
And I saw your post yesterday about that and saw some of the pushback and enjoyed the thought process, you know, and I can see, you know, see both sides of it. I feel like there is an interesting parallel, maybe to some extent, you know, because I'm personally not on the agency side, but more on the insurtech side and in a, in a B2B space.
Right. And, you know, so, so my clients are insurance carriers and MGAs, but.
I can totally see parallels even with, you know, for instance, just, just this in the past six months, you know, we had a, had a tier one carrier that came, you know, came to me and said, hey, like, you know, we are looking for a new field inspection vendor, right? Well, yeah, we do field inspections, but that's like we're shifting really quickly towards self-inspection, right? And we built our proprietary technology on that. And, you know, we're kind of making a somewhat strategic shift in that direction, although it's happening organically as well.
So, like, with that carrier, like, quite frankly, I'm not terribly interested in doing field inspections for them. But I absolutely want to be a self-inspection provider for them.
But I'm like, yeah, absolutely. Like, you know, if I get that opportunity with them, so we're doing field inspections with them and not making any money, quite frankly, but I want that door open.
Right. I want to have my foot in the door.

Yeah. I just feel like there's some bit of parallel there.
Right.

Like 100% where it's like, hey, let's you know, I want that opportunity. Let's open the door.
Let's start to establish a relationship. And, you know, even though the quote unquote solution that I'm providing for them right now is not exactly what I want to be doing for them, but I'm going to establish myself as, you know, as a resource, as a solution provider and continue to foster that relationship.
And quite frankly, I mean, that was three months ago that we started. And next month, I already have a demo set up with them for self-inspection, right? So there's definitely that fostering process and bringing people along.
And yeah, I can totally see that.

And I think that's a tremendous parallel because I completely agree. And this is one of my arguments is like, why is it that most of those people who are pushing back on me in almost every other aspect of their life, they would probably agree solve the original problem.

But for some reason in our space, it becomes, no, we have to solve all the problems. Yeah, you know what I mean? So I think it's a wonderful parallel because it is exactly how people want to buy, right? None of us wake up in the morning and go, I need to find someone to solve every problem that I possibly have in X.
You know, you're like, you know, my my whatever thing about a problem with your home or your, you know, whatever's going on in your life. Like, I need this thing solved.
I don't need all the problems solved. I need this one thing solved.
And if you can solve it for me now, you you go into the column of value creator. And now I'm willing to come back to you over and over again, because I know you're a value creator.
I just think that's a, it's kind of an old school methodology. I think you can be successful guys.
Don't please don't start blasting me again or blowing up my DMS. This is the beauty of America.
You get to do it however you want. I just don't, I just don't believe that.
I just don't believe that it's the future. I don't believe the future is continuing to force people down the path that makes the most sense to you, the provider.
I think we have to be like the Bruce Lee's philosophy of, you know, fit the solution to what they need. And if writing their entire account or pitching them every service you have, you know, if you're an insured tech or whatever is what makes sense in that moment.
Great. But there, you should be, have the nimbleness or mental dexterity to know when this person just needs me to solve this one problem.
And it's, as you said, a shoe in the door to do the rest. So we can, we can move on from that topic.
I actually, you know, I, one of know, one of the memes, I think it might even be the one.

Yeah, you posted it today. You have this meme out there, which is awesome.
I'll have it linked up in the show notes, guys. But it's it's the one where the guys it says insurance and the guys run on the treadmill.
But he's attached to all these weights and it says innovation is where he's running and technical debt is the weights. and I wanted to ask you about this

because I actually was talking to

Margot Giles whose episode

will come out maybe a couple before this.

I'm not sure where it will all fall.

But before this episode, you can go back and listen to her episode, guys, if you haven't. But this topic came up in our conversation with her because she was kind of talking through some of her feelings and thoughts on why, you know, her competitors, her legacy competitors in her vertical haven't made the change.
And, you know, she brought up a couple ideas which were 100 percent legitimate. And then but she didn't address the technical depth side.
And I said, how much do you think their unwillingness to move at pace or at least the pace that, say, innovators and early adopters in our space would like them to move at? Because I think everybody, even the big guys in the AMS space would agree that they do not move at the pace that innovators and early adopters would like them to. I think they tend to move at like a early majority or late majority pace, depending on which one it is.
OK, So I said, how much do you think technical debt plays a role? And I don't want to necessarily mince, you know, I don't want to misrepresent her feelings, but in general, it was, she thought it was more a philosophical slash profit decision than it was a, you know, turning the Titanic in the New York Harbor kind of thing. Where do you fall in general? And it doesn't have to be about the AMS systems, but just in general, legacy tech and the technical debt associated with it and how that's created opportunities.
Because I think that's a topic that maybe like you and I kind of understand, but maybe most of our listeners don't get maybe what technical debt is. Maybe we can start there and then talk about how you see it impacting the industry as a whole.

Yeah, definitely. I mean, it's it's a super interesting topic and I'm looking forward to listening to Margo's episode.
She's awesome. But yeah, I mean, it's interesting as, you know, for for my company, National Insurance Inspection Services.
and, you know, we're, you know, decades old, you know, started this family-owned business.

And, you know, we're, you know, decades old, you know, started this family-owned business and, you know, built on, I mean, we started doing these property field inspections for underwriting, right, back on, you know, notepads and Polaroid cameras, right? Like that was the genesis of our company back in the day, right? And so and so we have had this transition, you know, slowly over time. And like, you know, when we moved to, you know, inspectors having digital cameras like that was mind blowing.
Right. Like to move from Polaroid photos in the mail, getting sent to carriers to have a digital workflow like that, you know, was just cutting edge.
Right. And then fast forward and it's like, okay, now instead of using digital cameras, now our inspectors have a mobile app that they can use.
Right. And now they're all taking photos with their phones.
Right. And so like there's all of that, but then for our company, no company's immune to this, right.
Like as technology evolves, like if you're not evolving as a business, like you're going to develop technical debt, right? And I think literally every company has some. And just for the audience, I'm trying to run, just for the audience who may not understand exactly what is technical debt so that they can kind of have an understanding of what that means.
Yeah. I mean, I'll take my best shot at it and you might have a better answer than I would.
Right. But essentially, you know, as, as technology advances and as you need and want your business to evolve along with that and take advantage of new technology so that you, uh, you know, ultimately at the end of the day, hopefully can be more profitable, right.
Drive efficiency and all of those types of things. Um, but you know, as that technology advances, if you're technology advances, if you're not moving along, moving your business along that pipeline of technology advancements and you're just relying on, you know, infrastructure systems, and it doesn't matter whether that's hardware or software or whatever the case may be.
In some sense, it's even just business processes, right? That are enabled by technology. That literally becomes debt, you know, and that is going to hold your company back.
It's going to hold you back from reaching the milestones of profitability that you, you know, would have been able to reach had you not gone ahead and say, look, we haven't upgraded our systems in a decade, and this is absolutely holding us back. And ultimately, I that's that technical debt kills businesses every day you know what i mean it is just you know and it can be perpetuated just by a kind of an old school mentality right and and and i think the you know it's the old cliche right if it ain't broke don't fix it.
And sometimes that can be a big hurdle for people because that cliche basically drives more technical debt, right? Yep. Because the reality is nothing is going to work forever.
And especially today as the speed of technology and advancement is just, the momentum is growing every single day, right? And things are changing so quickly that if it ain't broke, don't fix it mentality, you're going to die. You're just not going to survive, right? Because there are absolutely going to be competitors in your space that come in and do not have any of that technical debt holding them back.
And they're going to get catapulted, you know, ahead of you. So, yeah, it's funny.
That's a long drawn out. But no, I think it's a perfect it's perfect way to describe it.
It's with each year removed from when you built your system. There's almost like it's not a linear scale on how much it's going to cost to upgrade that system.
And actually, it's like a logarithmic scale almost. Like maybe the first couple of years, if you were to update it, no big deal.
But you get too far removed from the newest technology. And now that upgrade costs exponentially more.
And I actually heard this described one time, not the technical debt part, but the decision to upgrade an antiquated system. I can't remember, it was some entrepreneur forum I was watching on YouTube or whatever.
And I can't remember who the guy was. So I'm going to try.
But he basically referred to this as when to kill the golden goose is kind of paraphrasing what he said is like, he's like, as a CEO of a mature company, one of the hardest decisions to make is how or when do you kill your golden goose? And what are you referring to this kind of thing? Like if you have this system that's 20 years old, that is almost impossible to upgrade, but man, there's still people using it and you're making money, but you also know, like at some point those people are going to leave and you're not going to be able to provide them with a product that is up to today's standards. Like, how do you make that decision? What do you do there? And he didn't necessarily have an answer.
It was mostly just like, this is a question every CEO of a mature company has to ask or answer. Sorry.
And, you know, he was like, how will you answer it? Could it determine success, failure?

You know, you turn the page and become a whole new company and it's amazing or you crash that plane right on the side of the mountain. So it's a really it is something that I think a lot of people and I just want to spend some time here just because I feel like we do give, you know, specifically applied invertifore get yelled at a lot.
Right. And I'm sure as guilty of that as anybody else.
At the same time, I am appreciative of the the true struggle that they have with their own internal technical debt and the fact that they have golden geese that that pay their bills that still that companies still operate on. And it is a very tough decision on what to do.
And I think it doesn't always make a lack of innovation. It doesn't excuse a lack of innovation, but it is a real legitimate business problem that they're dealing with every day, I think is something that at least needs to be said to be fair to them.
Yeah, no, absolutely. I couldn't agree more.
And I do think that progress is always being made, right? There are always innovators. There are always people that are trying to push that along.
And I think especially on the carrier side, I mean, we've worked with some amazing innovation teams over the last three, four years that are doing incredible work. But at the same time, I mean, you cannot get away from the reality that.
What's up guys. Sorry to take you away from the episode, but as you know, we do not run ads on this show in an exchange for that.
I need your help. If you're loving this episode, if you enjoy this podcast, whether you're watching on YouTube or you're listening on your favorite podcast platform, I would love for you to subscribe, share, comment if you're on YouTube, leave a rating review if you're on Spotify or Apple iTunes, etc.
This helps the show grow. It helps me bring more guests in.
We have a tremendous lineup of people coming in, men and women who've done incredible things,

sharing their stories around peak performance, leadership, growth, sales, the things that are going to help you grow as a person and grow your business. But they all check out comments, ratings, reviews.
They check out all this information before they come on. So as I reach out to more and more people and want to bring them in and share their stories with you, I need your help.
Share the show, subscribe if you're not subscribed. And I'd love for you to leave a comment about the show because I read all the comments.
Or if you're on Apple or Spotify, leave a rating review of this show. I love you for listening to this show and I hope you enjoy it listening as much as I do creating the show for you.
All right, I'm out of here. Peace.
Let's get back to the episode. Pretty much.
I can't say this unequivocally, but I think it's fairly accurate to say that certainly the top 10 PNC carriers in the country, like the core of these businesses are still running on old AS400.

You know, I mean, they still have server rooms that are, you know, the size of both of our houses combined,

a full cloud migration.

Like, it's just, it's mind boggling.

And, you know, I think that, so like, I get it.

I understand the struggle there.

And I also think, and something that we've seen

and experienced a lot as well,

is there's so much danger in those migrations you know and those innovations right because i mean you know we've all heard the horror stories right of trying to move on to you know a new policy management system or whatever and you know i mean millions of dollars sometimes tens of millions of dollars get spent and a five or six year migration. And it literally never like they never get to the end goal.
You know what I mean? It just becomes a huge money pit. And like they just couldn't actually get it over the finish line.
And like there's a very real risk of that happening, you know, so that can certainly understandably perpetuate that mindset of, to your point, hey, you know, things are running, right? Like we're writing business. We're making money.
Although, you know, today and this year, maybe we're not making money. But, you know what I mean? Like the wheels aren't falling off.
We're not crashing and burning today. And, you know, we don't necessarily't necessarily see that happening tomorrow.
So there's, there's just, there's a lot of hesitancy, you know, there to, to make those tough decisions. So for your business, particularly, what other pressures do you see coming from carriers? What are the things are you hearing? Like, like when, when you're, when you're talking to a client or a customer and they're walking through the things that are important to them, like what, what's on their brain? Like, I love getting perspectives, you know, so, so often, you know, just cause it's where my area of expertise is we talk through the framework of the agency space, but I'm really interested always in the challenges, the frustrations, the, the, the things that people are excited about that, that aren't necessarily that vantage point.
So when you're sitting there and you're like, this is going to be a big change, or man, maybe everyone doesn't see this problem coming. What are some things that are like high on your mind? Yeah, I mean, it's so interesting because the industry is just, it's so fluid, like things change so quickly.
And there are so many different factors, right? Like, I mean, insurance is complex. The ecosystem sometimes feels hopelessly complex, right? And I certainly, you know, am no expert.
I quite frankly have a pretty narrow, you know, scope of expertise in the industry at large. But, you know, but I am absolutely fascinated by, you know, this current hard market cycle that we are in and how that's going to play out.

because and i have these conversations with a lot of our you know carrier partners um you know that

nobody knows how this cycle is going to play out but i think everybody agrees that this one is different than anything that we faced in the past because we have this confluence of factors

you know all coming at us at the same time that we've never had, you know, in this specific combination before. And I mean, you can tie that back into, you know, COVID or whatever, right? Like, it's like the, you know, the word of the day continues to be unprecedented.
And, you know, I think the industry as a whole is in uncharted waters, right?

And we don't really know where it's going to go from here.

So, you know, but with that in mind, you know, I think with our clients and folks that we're working with on the innovation side, and again, we are, we are strictly, you know, kind of in this little, little niche of the under, you know, underwriting for, for property and casualty and, and even more specifically than that, you know, just residential homeowner stuff, right? Like that's what my company is, is laser focused on. Like that's, that's where our expertise lies.
And I try not to get, you know, to chase every opportunity that comes our way. Right.
I want to be master. So no commercial property, no commercial property.
We're not doing anything with commercial stuff right now. And maybe we will at some point in the future.
But again, we're, we're, we're mastering what we're best at right now. So, you know, so, but, but from that perspective, I think with that kind of uncertainty of how things are going to go, you know, moving forward, I know that, you know, carriers are absolutely, you know, looking for options and opportunities that are going to move the needle for them, you know, meaningfully.
And because, again, any, you know, any improvement that can come is going to, regardless of how things evolve in the next few years, you know, any improvement is better than no improvement, right? And I think everybody realizes that, hey, the status quo is not good enough anymore, right? And so, you know, especially when you look at some of these, you know, really tough markets, you know, like California, you know, West Coast, all the wildfire issues, you know, all of the coastal stuff as well. I think that a growing number of people understand the fragility, maybe, you know, kind of of these markets and, you know, knock on on wood, but, you know, thankfully we kind of made it through this year with the wildfire severity this year was super low.
We did not have, especially versus last year. Right.
I mean, it wasn't last year, like where it was like the California's on fire the entire, entire year. Yep, absolutely.
And I mean, and even thinking back from that, I mean, you know, 2017 was really kind of the turning point, like the, the Jesus moment, you know, with with wildfire. And then but again, you know, and this year we we kind of dodged the bullet with Atlantic hurricane season.
Right. And we didn't have, you know, any of these, you know, major multi hundred billion dollar cat events.
Right. But I think everyone understands.
And, you know, like if you look at the Florida market specifically know all of the issues and the madness that's going on there um i think that people understand that you know we we really are kind of in a fragile place where if sometime in the next handful of years you know we end up having a bad year you know if we had a 2017 wildfire year and you know and then, you know, a two or three major cat events, you know, coastal exposure year, like, like that could blow things up in a, in a way that no one has ever, like, we're just not prepared for that, you know? So, so you, so, so we're that close, you know, it's interesting. So I think that's a really interesting perspective.
And I would love for you to just maybe expand a little bit on that because I don't think most of the people who listen to this show, myself included, I don't think most people are aware of that or have spent the time to think about it. Maybe if they really sit down, they could rationalize it.
But the idea that our industry could be that close to, to, to like true, like the world's on fire. We don't know how to pay things, you know, large carriers going out of business, M&A activity, you know, bailouts, like that we could be that close to that.
Most people are probably don't have their head wrapped around that idea. So if you could just, you know, any insights that you have there, you can expand upon.
I think it'd be really interesting because I don't know that I've spent any time thinking about that. Like, geez, what would happen if we had, you know, you know, Mississippi Delta flooding, some, some, some, some wildfires going on in California and all of a sudden a hurricane smashes into South Carolina.
What happens? You know what I mean? Like, like, how does that, you know, are we able to sustain that? Who, you know what I mean? That's the kind of thing. Yeah, no, absolutely.
And then on top of that, I mean, the, you know, the huge surprise this year was the, you know, they call SCS they're being referred to, right? Severe convective storms, right? And I mean, through the Midwest, you know, we had, you know, multiple billion dollar plus SCS events that, you know, are not necessarily, you know, categorized as cat events. But like collectively, those added up this year,, to, uh, I don't remember.
I looked at the figure the other day when it was over a hundred billion dollars, you know, this year of losses, you know, from these tornadoes and whatnot, you know? So, um, and that's, that's unprecedented. Like we've never seen that.
Right. So, um, you know, I think between those, I'm sorry, I keep interrupting.
We keep saying things that that I'm interested in, so I apologize. So an SCS, I never heard that term, severe connected storm.
This would be something like a swath of tornadoes touching down. Okay.
So when you say, you know, we saw 100 billion in losses from that and that that's kind of an unprecedented number. Is that have to do with and this is just something I'm interested in in general.
Is that have to do with the number of storms and the power of the storms or or is it some combination of that and the fact that just everything seems to cost more today? Like what is the percentage of kind of why it's that high, if that makes sense? Yeah, no, it absolutely does. And, you know, the simple answer is all of the above, right? Like the number of storms and the severity of those storms was actually, you know, significantly higher this year than we've ever seen before.
But then also, you know, that's combined with, you know, this, this explosion of loss costs, you know, because of inflation and all of this, you know, all of these things that are going on. You know, so all of it's like a, you know, it's a perfect storm, right? It just, it truly is in every way.
So anyway, yeah, I guess, you know, and I don't, you know, I don't like to be the doom and gloom type person. Right.
But at the same time, I think we have to face reality, you know, we, you know, sticking your head in the sand is not going to, you know, it's not going to help. And at the same time, none of us have, has a crystal ball, right.
We don't know what the future is going to bring. However, you know, when, look at just the past decade, you know, and you look back at 2017, you know, and you see the wildfire season that happened in California and how devastating that was, not just with property, but loss of life, you know, and then you look at some of the worst hurricane years that we've had, you know, with coastal exposure.
And then this year with these severe convective storms, like we've never had before. And again, I'm just looking, you know, subjectively and saying, look, you know, if we had, you know, 2017 and say 2021, and then, you know, 2023, with those three specific, you know, perils and cat events, and you put those all together in the same year, you know, that, that would be catastrophic for, uh, you know, for a lot of, um, you know, regionals.
And I'm not saying that, you know, top 10 carriers are just going to, you know, fold overnight. I certainly don't think that that would be the scenario, but it is going to have a massive impact that, that trickles and impacts everyone right and like you know you don't have to do much research at all on the florida market now to understand what a mess that is um you know and and and policyholders and same thing in california um you know but if if you're in these high-risk places you know people are it's just become completely unaffordable.
Right. People can't afford insurance.
It's more than their mortgage payment. Right.
And they're seeing, you know, premiums increase by, you know, 50, 60, 70, 80, sometimes 100 plus percent, you know, year over year. And and sometimes that can sound like hyperbole, but it's not like that's the reality for a lot of people.
Right. Like their insurance costs more than their mortgage.
Right. And, you know, the average person that they can't do that, right.
It's not sustainable. And that's why, you know, in Florida specifically now, the last figure that I saw was over 20% of people who don't have a mortgage that requires insurance.
They're just foregoing it altogether, right? They're, they're going bare, right? No homeowner's insurance. Um, and you know, that's everyone's individual decision to make, but that is, you know, that's, that's terrifying.
That's not good for, that's not good for anyone. I wonder, are they also going without liability? Can you get a liability only policy on a, on a homeowner's? Like, I don't, I've never heard of that, but like, you know, cause I could see like, I mean, honestly, with some of the premiums that I've heard, you know, which I've absolutely heard all these stories too.
And I got friends down there who agents and it's just, it's a bedlam, uh, you know, you're 100% right. And, uh, you know, it's interesting to think like, is there, would I go, if I knew I kind of had a hurricane roof, a home, whatever, and up to date, would I go drop the property and just carry the liability in case that happened? And you probably cut your – I mean I'm assuming most of the loss comes from the property, not the liability on these places.
I don't know that there's a drastically increased liability exposure in Florida. It's all the property stuff.
So I wonder if that's a product that comes out, if the industry will adapt and morph to make money off these people who don't have property. Maybe I just threw out a new idea.
If there's any carrier people listening, there's an opportunity for you. Liability only homeowners in Florida.
I mean, it's, we laugh. It's sad that, you know, that we would end up in a scenario like that, but, um, but yeah, who knows? I mean, it's, it could definitely be a thing.
You might be onto something there. But I think, I think what's important on this topic is that the insurance carriers don't have infinite money, right? And that all these factors do play a role in what we do.
And I think, you know, especially where you sit, you have kind of a unique perspective in that you're the ones out there looking at these properties and coming back and understanding how the valuations increase and change. I remember like back when I first started writing insurance, I mean, this is 18 years ago, but like we would just do like $142 times a square feet.
And like, that's how much, you know, we'd put on there. Now with the way the homes are, and some of this is the technology in the homes, et cetera.
And, you know, it's just, I don't know, it's just completely different. Like you, you, you need to do this type of deep analysis to understand what it would cost to replace it.
Yeah. And I, and everything's so expensive.
Yeah, no, absolutely. And I do think, um, yeah, it has become abundantly clear to me just even just in the last three years, um, that, you know, unfortunately, you know, the, for a lot of carriers, like the the the chickens are kind of coming home to roost um and i you know i post a fair amount about this on linkedin but uh you know the fact that there are to varying degrees but there are a ton of carriers out there that um again i mean it kind of ties back in a weird sense.
There's a parallel to that technical debt, right? But if you have a book of business, you know, with whatever, you know, but hundreds of thousands of properties for some of these larger carriers, millions of properties, right? And literally 80% of that book, they have not looked at in, you know, five years and 50% of it, they've not looked at in 10 years. That is a huge liability for them, right? And I think that, you know, we'd be foolish to think that that fact is not at play um And especially when you look at, you know, just the way that the world has evolved and that culture has evolved, you know, the ever-increasing litigious society that we're in, right? Like all of that kind of plays into this.
And quite frankly, you know, macroeconomics as well, right? Where people just don't have the money to take care of their homes and properties the way that maybe they used to. And obviously inflation plays a big factor in that, right? Where it's like, Hey, maybe, you know, eight years ago, I could have gotten my roof replaced, you know, for seven, eight grand.
And now today it's going to cost 25 grand to get my roof replaced. Right.
Like that's just, you know, people can't. And so like all of these things kind of snowball.
Right. And they, you know, they, they exacerbate each other.
And so all of that to say, right. Like, you know, when you look at, at 2023, the final numbers aren't out yet.
I had posted about it the other day, but you know, just the first six months of 2023, you know, homeowners underwriting losses as a whole were just like through the roof, right? Like nobody's making a profit on the underwriting side, you know, on the, on the personal lines, homeowner side, right. And, and massive losses.
Right. And that's, you know, I think that's a big part of it, right? Like the longer that you go without getting eyeballs on the risks that you're insuring, there's a time we see them every day and have been posting, you know, posting glimpses of them.
But like we literally look at them and we're, you know, we're processing 40,000 inspections a month now. You know, self-inspections and field inspections.
And like, so we look at a boatload of properties and the stuff that we see coming through for carriers that finally are doing more renewal inspections because they understand holy cow you know our losses are piling up based on you know all of this old book that we haven't looked at in forever and we we have no idea what's going on right with with all of this stuff that's you know we haven't looked at in a decade. You know, but there are, there's interesting aspects, aspects to that as well.
You know, even when you think about the, you know, the societal issue, I guess, maybe that's not the right word, right? But it's like, it's tough. Like, these are hard problems because, you know, for instance, so you do a renewal inspection project, right? You know, and you're going to identify a ton of properties that are not a good risk, right? You're going to identify those homes that, you know, have a roof that is 10 years past its lifespan, right? And these are just major claims waiting to happen.
And so, you know, those people are going to get non-renewed, right? Or they're going to get a correction letter that says, hey, you've got to replace your roof in the next 60 days or we're not going to extend your coverage, right?

And that's tough because that puts those consumers in a hard spot, right? Like, and again, as, you know, as carriers are becoming more in tune with this and, you know, if you've got a roof that is 10 years past its life expectancy and is falling apart, like nobody's going to insure you today. Or if they do, you know, it's going to be a stripped down policy and it's going to cost you as much as.
Yeah, like an H01 or something. H02 at best.
Yeah, exactly. So it's tough.
I think the next, you know, if I were if I were a bold carrier exec right now, which I'm not sure that that exists. But if it were, what I would be doing is spinning up a finance company on the side and saying, hey, you got 60 days to redo your roof.
And if you can't pay, we'll help you finance it. Yeah.
That's a fucking billion dollar idea right there. This is the second billion dollar idea.
We've got the liability only policies in Florida. Yes, yeah.
And now we've got- Throwing them out there. If I say the word patented, can I get credit for that if it actually happens? I don't know how to create a liability only homeowner's policy, but I'll tell you what, the financing home improvements alongside your insurance policy is brilliant.

And since you probably already have all the correct filings to make that a reality, as long as it's a separate company, you could probably spin that up pretty quick if you're an insurance carrier. Yeah.
And there's there, there are cool things happening kind of along those lines anyway,

with, I'm not sure if you're familiar with the fortified program, right. Where, um, you know, you can get a fortified, a certified roof, right.
That's, that's fortified to, you know, withstand, um, you know, whether it's coastal exposure or, you know, this kind of SCS stuff in the Midwest or whatever. Um, you know, and there are a growing number of number of carriers that you know will provide significant premium discounts right if you have you know a fortified certified roof that you know is has proper strap downs and all this stuff you know to withstand these these larger storms and whatnot but um you know so there are some incentives there and i i'm i'm excited about some of the stuff that's happening in california as well on the wildfire front.
You know, again, there's tons of work that needs to be done there, but there are some, you know, some innovative ideas out there.

I think the big picture is that, you know, I foresee moving forward, you know, the industry as a whole, like we need to do a much better job of educating, you know, general public, right?

Educating the consumer, educating the policyholder. And I guess the angle that I'm excited about is when you look at, you know, markets like Florida, other coastal exposures, California with wildfire, people that are in these high risk areas, right.
That are experiencing these insurance issues firsthand, right. Like they're feeling the pain.
Um, and people are just, they're not, they're not taking insurance coverage for granted anymore. Right.
Like it's not just an auto, it's not automatic, you know, you don't just have to make a phone call and, you know, have a conversation and write a check and you're good to go.

Right. It's way more complicated than that now.

And so that that is beginning to tie in with, you know, this this concept from the carrier side of the more predict and prevent mentality. Right.
And engaging policyholders in active mitigation, you know, for their home and property.

Right. Whether that's again, you know, wildfire is kind of the lowest hanging fruit there and where a lot of activity is focused.
But at the end of the day, I think that's a big part of the answer to the, you know, the big picture issues that we're facing is, you know, that people's risk needs to be minimized, right? Carriers need it at a macro level. But engaging policyholders in that process and educating them on, you know, why this is important.
And quite frankly, the tough part about that is it's like, that's a big change. You know, that's a huge change.
It's a huge mindset shift. And, you know, at the consumer level, we need to educate consumers and somehow convince them that, yeah, you may not like this, but like the world has changed.
Things have changed, right? Significantly. And we're doing, I mean, I see this every single day firsthand just with our self-inspection initiatives, right? Like, you know, our company contracts with the carrier and then, you know, guess what? Your policyholder is getting a text message and an email from us saying, hey, here's an invitation to do your self-inspection, right? And people, we see the feedback on a daily basis.
You know, I've been insured, you know, with XYZ company for 26 years and I've never had to do this, right? Well, yeah, that's absolutely true. You know, you never have, but we're not living 26 years ago.
You know, we're living in today and we have major problems today. And this is one of those solutions and it takes work from everyone, right? So I think we're moving towards that insurance for the consumer no longer being like this set it and forget it type thing, right? Where it's just completely out of sight, out of mind.
And especially on the wildfire front, you know, because effective wildfire mitigation is not a once a year thing. You know, when you look at these highest wildfire risk factors, like tree debris on your roof and in your gutters, right? Like, and, and, you know, all of these types of things, defensible space, these are very fluid factors, right? Like you don't just trim back your trees and handle defensible space once a year and then you're good, right? Like all of that stuff grows back, you know, so those risk factors are very fluid and we need to get to a point where we're, you know, again, I think education is the key, right? Because it's tough to, you know, throw these things at the consumer and they're looking at it as additional work, right? Like you're telling me that I have to do this now and I've never had to do it before, right? That can be a tough pill to swallow.
But again, I think that's where the education piece as a whole is one of the biggest tasks that we have in front of us. I think you're 100% right.
There is an enormous opportunity for an insurance carrier to step out front and lead with education that doesn't also come with a right hook, right? You mentioned Gary Vaynerchuk, famous for jab, jab, jab, right hook. Our industry tends to be right hook, right hook, right hook, maybe a jab, right hook, right hook, right.
You know what I mean? Like we can't, I mean, you could just do a whole series of PSAs and educational things and segment them. And the way the internet works now, you can literally create specific, you know, specific pieces of content that are distributed for California homeowners and Florida homeowners.
And there are there are entire veins of educational content that these carriers could invest in and and think through and really, I think, define themselves as market leaders in the education space. And they just don't want to do it.
And again, a lot of that goes back to, you know, that feels, and I've talked to the, I've talked to some carrier people about this before and it's one, it's culturally not what they're used to, right? Very much. Our industry has always been, if you want the information, you have to come to me.
We've been gatekeepers. And I remember back in 2012, I was telling people, guys, we're no longer the gatekeepers of insurance information like it's out there in the world now

you know and it's still it's still a concept that people have not grabbed onto uh i i think what you have described is a reality that we don't have to like but is absolutely what the world looks like and while it may not be what we're used to, it certainly only creates new opportunities for the people who want to adjust, adapt and grab hold of it. And for the insurance agents that are listening to this, particularly those that are in the PL space, but also in the commercial property space, like these are opportunities to set yourself apart for all those, you know, I'm a trusted advisors out there.
Like this is what being a trusted advisor is, you know, walking through, how do you properly trim your trees back for your home? How do you properly make sure that there's drainage in case there's flooding? How do you properly insert whatever the thing is? And I know some people do this, but it's very, very rare. There is so much opportunity in the educational space in our area that if every agent was creating educational content, there still wouldn't be enough.
So I think that, I love your point. This has been a tremendous conversation.
I appreciate what you're doing. I appreciate your perspective.
And guys, Curtis is a tremendous follow on LinkedIn. I just looked and you only have like, I shouldn't say only, but you have 2200 followers.
That is freaking crazy because dude is sharing awesome information. I love it.
It's one of my favorite, one of my favorite follows on LinkedIn. The memes are just hilarious and, and real and thought provoking.
And I highly encourage everybody listening to go and connect with Curtis on LinkedIn. I'll have it that in the show notes.
Where else can they learn more about it? Or, or if, you know, for the carrier, people are listening, if they don't work with you or just want to connect with you, you know, like where's the best place for people to learn more about what you do? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, connect on LinkedIn, you know, shoot me a DM.
I'm, you know, getting those on the, on the daily now, you know, nationalis.com is, is our website. Um, and, uh, yeah, I, I love, uh, you know, my, my network is kind of exploding here over the last few months and it's super fun.
I love meeting new people and having conversations like this. There's a ton of great people out there that are working on a lot of

these problems that we've kind of discussed here today. And I'm excited for the future.

Lots of cool stuff happening. Awesome, man.
Well, I appreciate you. Wish you nothing but the best

and so glad we had a chance to connect and have you on the show. Yeah.
Thanks so much, Ryan. Lots

of fun. Thank you.
I'm out. close twice as many deals by this time next week sound impossible it's not with the one call close system you'll stop chasing leads and start closing deals in one call this is the exact method we use to close 1,200 clients under three

years during the pandemic. No fluff, no endless follow-ups, just results fast.
Based in behavioral

psychology and battle-tested, the one-call close system eliminates excuses and gets the prospect

saying yes more than you ever thought possible. If you're ready to stop losing opportunities and

start winning, visit masteroftheclosed.com.

That's masteroftheclosed.com.

Do it today.

The best cars for the money are Hondas.

Save big with 0% financing.

The 25 Accord Civic, Passport, and Odyssey

have been named the best cars for the money

by U.S. News and World Report.

Save thousands with 0%, like the 24 Prologue with 0 APR. To drive the best, ask anyone who owns a Honda and search your local Honda dealer.
See dealer for financing details. Financing on credit approval.
Offer ends 4-30-25. View U.S.
News best cars at cars.usnews.com. Did you know 39% of teen drivers admit to texting while driving? Even scarier, those who text are more likely to speed and run red lights.
Shockingly, 94% know it's dangerous, but do it anyway. As a parent, you can't always be in the car, but you can stay connected to their safety with Greenlight Infiniti's driving reports.
Monitor their driving habits, see if they're using their phone, speeding, and more. These reports provide real data for meaningful conversations about safety.
Plus, with weekly updates, you can track their

progress over time. Help keep your teen safe.
Sign up for Greenlight Infinity at greenlight.com

slash podcast.