Finding Peak w/ Ryan Hanley - Matthew Sutika on Who You Should be Stealing From to Win

Episode Date: January 10, 2021

Spartan philosophy, built in the black-ops lab of business: https://www.findingpeak.comFinding Peak podcast: https://linktr.ee/ryan_hanleyMatthew Sutika, Chief Insurance Officer of Obie, a former State Farm turned Independent now turned Insurtech innovator joins the show to talk about the mentality he used to build his habitational insurance empire. Get more: https://ryanhanley.com/--Recommended Tools for GrowthOpusClip: #1 AI video clipping and editing tool: https://link.ryanhanley.com/opusRiverside: HD Podcast & Video Software | Free Recording & Editing: https://link.ryanhanley.com/riversideWhisperFlow: Never waste time typing on your keyboard again: https://link.ryanhanley.com/whisperflowCaptionsApp: One app for all your social media video creation: https://link.ryanhanley.com/captionsappGoHighLevel: It's time to take your business workflow to the Next Level: https://link.ryanhanley.com/gohighlevelPerspective.co: The #1 funnel builder for lead generation: https://link.ryanhanley.com/perspective--Episodes You Might Enjoy:From $2 Million Loss to World-Class Entrepreneur: https://lnk.to/delkFrom One Man Shop to $200M in Revenue: https://lnk.to/tommymelloIs Psilocybin the Gateway to Self-Mastery? https://lnk.to/80upZ9This show is part of the Unplugged Studios Network — the infrastructure layer for serious creators. 👉 Learn more at https://unpluggedstudios.fm.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

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Consider subscribing, rating, and reviewing the show this holiday season. It really helps the show grow. From all of us at Believe, have a Merry Christmas, everyone, and a happy holiday. Crude Laboratory in the basement of his home. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the show. Today we have a dynamic guest for you, a dynamic conversation because today's guest, Matt Sudeka, the chief insurance officer for Obie. Many of you may know him from when he was one of the co-founders of Skylight Insurance,

now Obie. Matt has gone from State Farm agent to independent agent, now to InsureTech Innovator, and anyone who's played in that many orientations of the insurance universe is going to have some unique opinions, is going to be pushing the envelope in ways that maybe some of us just wouldn't even consider doing, and that's exactly what we talk about today. What are the mindsets? Because not everyone's going to want to have a business like Matt's,

but you certainly can learn a lot from his mindset. And he actually shares some other companies that we should be following along with in order to, I don't want to say steal, but learn from, learn from the things that they're doing and apply them to our business in the way that makes the most sense. You're going to love this episode. Before we get there, I want to give a big shout out to the newest sponsor of the Ryan Hanley show. It is Premier Strategy Box.

This is Mick Hunt's company. These guys are doing some dynamic things in our space. And whether it's sales management, building out automations, operations, operations management, marketing assistance, HR. What Premier Strategy Box does is give you the expertise in the places that you, You need it in your agency, whether it's making sure that your producers are hitting their sales numbers and having someone who can follow up and be a true sales manager if you as a principal can't do that or are unable or unwilling to do it.

Or you need someone who's going to be with your service staff making sure that they implement your processing procedures the exact way that you want it done. Premier Strategy Box is the solution. I think the world of Mick, he's been a guest on this show. If you haven't listened to that episode, go back, find it. You're going to love it. Mick is a treasure in our industry. He's an absolute treasure.

Every time I see my phone ring and his name comes up on it, you know, I'll put my wife on hold if Mick's calling. I'm just kidding, Shorthy. I would never do that. But, you know, maybe I would. I don't know. Premier Strategy Box. I'm telling you, check it out. Go to my strategybox.com.

MyStrategybox.com. My strategy box. dot com check them out get to know them because there are things in your agency that you need help with and premier strategy box is the answer all right let's get on to matt yeah i get that i uh thankfully i don't have to worry about that because my wife goes into her office every day but you know like today we have a contractor upstairs who's we're redoing like a small bathroom and you know so if i walk upstairs there's mats everywhere and contracting gear and saws and hammers and, you know, they just had to come down here

and turn off the water, which is in the cubby right behind me. So it's just like, you know, he tries so hard to really dial in. And, you know, it's one of the things about an office space that I feel like a lot of people, I think, who've been in an office for a long time, they're kind of jaded. And I think they say, oh, you know, working at a house space. home I get so much more done. And I definitely think that's true, but to certain extent, but the pendulum swings both ways. Like, I look at an office right now and I'm like, I would love to have some office space. Doesn't have to be some big huge corporate thing. Just some space I could go to that was away from my home that I could sit in that I don't have to hear the doorman, you know,

the post, you know, the FedEx guy ring the doorbell and, you know, every contractor that comes in and, you know, all this stuff, like just a space to get away. I would love to have it. So it's like, you know, half a dozen to one, six of the other. I am 100% with you. So I actually just got us a space. And when we were, and my brothers are at it right now. But we got shut down for IVF.

So we did actually our transfer yesterday, which is really great. But starting on like it was like the 28th of December 25th, we have. had to go into quarantine, not just COVID quarantine, but just like germs. I had to take, we literally had to take like Z-PACs, like all this thing. So I had to come home. And so, and I hate it. Like I was so productive in that office because like just mentally I was there and just, you know, you're there for work. Like right now, like already this morning, like I've probably made more drinks than I normally would. Like just, it's just, it feels like college when you're around your dorm room and like how I had to just like get to the library or otherwise

they're just always a shirt to put away or you know or something. I completely agree with you. I'm the same way. I drink way more coffee because I can just make another pot, you know, a scoop and some water and I got another pot of coffee and I drink too much coffee to begin with. So like it's not like when you go to an office and I know everyone has a coffee machine at their office, but like I don't know, it's just something different about when you're home. You're just.

Yep. I constantly have a cup of coffee. front of me. I go walk upstairs and I grab this out of the cupboard or like you said, this needs to be put away or that needs to be put away or the kids left toys out on the floor and you walk past them to the third time. You're like, screw it. I'm just going to pick them up. Well, that's three or four minutes out of your day. And it's just all these little things constantly distracting. And I know all that stuff can happen in an office too, but I, I'm not far off from I'm actually looking at a few inexpensive office space. I have a co-working space now,

really I'm looking at a few inexpensive spaces right now to move into. I just can't do 24-7 from the house anymore. It's starting to be a hindrance. 100% agree with you. Yeah. So, dude, let's talk about now that we've gotten our obligatory small talk, COVID stuff out of the way, what, dude, so we had a bunch of conversations. when I first started Rogue, just in general, just talking, shop and learning more about

what Skylight was all about and a little bit about like, you know, before you got to, OB and create, you know, and all that, like created that thing. Like, I'm, you just have such an interesting business model and what you're going after. For people, I will not do it justice. So for anyone who's listening who maybe doesn't necessarily know, you know, what, what your work is all about, like kind of break down where you're at and what you're doing. Yeah, so yeah, it's a good question. And really, yeah, I think we were heavily COVID impacted as a business. But, you know, if I can say this without people throwing, you know, cake or bananas at me, but like COVID helped our business in a good way. And for us, it was, it like focused us, right? And so I had Skylight, which was always real estate based. You know, we did all the, you know, the home insurance for Century 21. And then, you know, I always would describe us, like, if it's a building or some type of, like, fire structure, like, that's our, that's our business model. You know, you know, we weren't doing the workers' comp.

We weren't doing, you know, the flower shops. We were doing the buildings. And so, long story short, we had been partnered with OBB for a while, the two founders, Aaron and Ryan. and they had a platform where, you know, owners of property could put their properties on their platform and, you know, keep track basically almost like a virtual dropbox, if you will, for lack of better term. And so the first thought was like, oh, we could provide insurance to our clients. And so we were doing that for a while.

Skylight was working with Obie. And through that, they went to YC out in California. and long story short, we all realized that there was a big need within the insure tech space on the commercial end. And when I say commercial,

to keep it from being so loose of a term, the habitational commercial end, specifically in the one to, what's call it, 100 unit rental space. You know, you have the hippos and the lemonade, attacking the home insurance.

You have, you know, the next and the end brokers attacking like the business space. You have some, attacking the E&O, you have the roots going auto, right? And so we kind of started this venture of like looking at how can we be the hippo, if you will, for the habitational space. And so OBE ended up purchasing Skylight in April. I came on board to kind of run the insurance end of things. And so going forward, we have kind of two pillars. So we have our old school broker still doing all the

apartments and condo associations just like normal. But we're also launching this year our own product. Like I said, very similar to Hippo-based. We're starting one to four units in about four to five states, very similar roadmap to all the other insured tech carriers, where people will be able to go on in, you know, seconds, minutes. And the engineering team will kill me if I give like an exact time right now. But, you know, same type of thing.

Going through the colorful screens, I call them the, you know, insurance, you know, made simple type feel and getting those instant bindable rentals. Because, you know, we feel that that space is so underserved. You know, you have the travelers and the state farms and all states of the world trying to like flip an HO3 to a DP3. And then they have like, you know, some of the carriers only let you have four or, you know, things like that. So that's really been our focus is doing that. And then, you know, what got us kind of chatting again is we just put out our video of kind of what that, a little bit about what that user experience will, will look like. And we're hoping to get that from four units up to 200 units over the next six to 24 months. And then, you know, of course,

go nationwide as far as the states and access and everything. It's awesome. So I have so many questions. I'm trying to figure out where I want to start. All right. I'm going to go back and then we'll work our way into this because I just, I think this is awesome. Century 21 and Obie, right? These are both bigger partnerships that I think a lot of agents look at this and look at these type of larger partnerships and they're those kinds of things where you go, ah, you know, man, it would be great to partner with a company like X that has access to this similar market. And then they never actually do anything with it, right? Or they never actually make the effort to reach out or they never actually form that

partnership that gets them the scale that really pushes the business to the next level. How do you form a partnership with Century 21? Like, how does that happen? Where does that even come from? Yeah. So I get this question a lot. I think it's spot on. And at first, I struggled to answer this question because,

My answer was just like, it was very bad. It was like, this is just like this me, right? Right? But I realized that helps no one, right? Just say, this is what Matt does, right? So, you know, I think of the concept is, I remember chatting with my friends growing up, you know, when we were younger and we were going out to the bars and, you know, trying to, you know, meet the future misses, right? And, you know, there was always that concept of like, oh, I'm not going to go ask out the pretty girl at the bar because. I bet everybody is asking her out tonight, right?

Or asking to have, you know, a drink or chat, right? And what ends up happening is no one goes and asks that girl for her number or, you know, for the drink, right? Everybody else gets asked in the bar. And so really what I've found is actually a lot of the low-hanging fruit, like people assume is low-hanging, you know, they think it's easier, right? So they'll rather, people are, you know, rather spend 10 grand a month on internet leads. They'd rather go sweat out at the county fair giving out obstacles.

They'd rather, you know, try to sponsor a JA class. Like all these other things that they can throw money at, which is people's biggest mistake of like, how do I, I can just throw money at this and I'll get leads. And then they never go out. They got, they're literally their neighbor runs remax, you know, for all of Georgia. And even though they talk to him every day about how, you know, how his son's baseball team is, like the fear of asking them and getting

rejected on something so large, right? They just don't do it. They'd rather go ask out, you know, all these other ones. So for me, it's find that person. Everyone probably listening to this has that huge lead source that they've always wanted and go for it. And then my next thing to that is most people, and I remember the, I call them the bobblehead boys, right? The boys from GMN. Yep. And they. talk about this. I think I was out at the IAOA or whatever conference about like don't go in and just blabber about, you know, how your grandpa did insurance and how you're going. You know, get that person to like you, that male or that female or whoever that you're going after.

Figure out how over the course of six months to just get integrated in their life, right? And don't talk about insurance one dang time. The first time you talk about insurance is when they bring it up. right just start being on their social media and interacting start um you know maybe your kids play baseball together sit by them and hand them some sunflower seeds like whatever it is just get in there because the people don't like to do business with people because they on Facebook say oh my god I've done so much business this year like you know come for me for a quote that doesn't attract people in my opinion but when I see people doing great things in social media or

the community or I become a relationship with them. And then I find out they happen to do insurance, then I'm interested, right? And I'm through a lot of the walls and the barriers, right? Like, you and I have known each other long enough where we can get right to stuff. Now, we'll still do the formalities at the beginning of how are you doing and complaining about our, you know, living situations, all that. But we can get rid of business if we want to, right? Because we've, we've got to know each other, right? So similar to when I first reached out to you, right? That wasn't the first time we've, like, interacted when I finally said, hey, let's chat, right?

Yeah. If your thought was like, who the heck is this guy? I've never heard of them. It would have been harder to get that yes to meet with you, right? So that's kind of worked for me is I become ingrained. And then I'd rather spend a lot of my time trying to find the head of the sword or the head of the decisions than what I used to do back in my state farm captive days is, you know, I would try to entertain 5,000 realtors with steak dinners and all the stuff.

and they just produce 12 houses a year, right? And you just can't scale that. So I'm also looking for if I'm going to do a partnership that it scales. Yeah, I think that's the perfect answer. I think that's the hard answer for people to hear because what everyone wants to hear is the magic bullet. You know, it's three LinkedIn posts, a voicemail drop and a phone call. And all of a sudden, here it is. All your wildest dreams come true.

and, you know, what I've really, what I've learned, you know, just over the last year, one of the lessons that I've learned is how much your business in your life can change in a year. And what I mean by that is like when I started this year, I was doing what everyone does, which is everything I can get, you know, every nickel and dime, every penny account, you know, whatever, boat only. Sure, hey, you know, I'll write that, you know, $32 in commission. Yeah, let's go. And just recently by focusing, one, focusing in on workers' comp in particular, and two, even dialing a little deeper into those.

And then, like you said, starting to work on these larger relationships, you know, I look, like I have one relationship that I just put in my pipeline that if it comes through in this first quarter, which it might, it's not a century 21. but man, it's a game changer. It's a game changer for my business. And, you know, I look at that and I'm going, you know, if this hits and these guys say yes and we get a contract and we move forward, that puts me to another level. And then I put another one of those on and you go to another level. But those might take a year at a time. But you do five of those deals one every year for five years. And five years from now, you're in a completely different place.

You're not even in the same strategy. And I think that type of thought process is very, very difficult for a lot of people. Yeah. What do you think is about you or just, you know, why, what is it about you or how have you been able to develop that type of mentality where it feels like a lot of our peers haven't? And that's not a, that's not a knock on anybody. Just, you know, I think this is something a lot of people strive to. You seem to have developed this thought process.

How do you think you got there? Yeah. You know, I answer your question, but you brought up something. And just the point is, so century 21 is not where I started, right? And I think that will help your, your viewers and stuff because I listen to a lot of podcasts and I hear them talk about and result if they've been working for 30 years. And it makes me feel bad. Like, oh, my God, I'm not there.

Like, I started my state farm at 22 years old. You know, that's 13 years ago. So, like, century 21 is like my 50th partnership, right? Yeah. I mean, my first one, I think I was like, I did a partnership with the three-year-old girl selling lemonade, you know, like, and it's like, hey, how do I, you know, how do I sell insurance to your customers? You know, like I started small too, right? Like, but the reason I bring that more than anything is not to just make people feel good, but like when you establish your bubble gun card,

unless you're Bryce Harper, you don't go from high school to the pros, right? You do single A, double A, triple A, you know, all the way up, right? Sorry for those who don't like sports, but I do and that's always what my metaphor. friendly show. If you're listening to the show and you don't like sports, you've given up a long time ago. There you go. So, you know, you're building that up. You're building up your bubble gum card. And really, when you start small and you build that up, you know, the next one kind of almost, it sounds weird. It comes to you, right? Because someone sees what you're doing. Since you're 21, I was asked for that, right? I was pitching another person and working on something. And I got connected,

I said, hey, you need to talk to the CEO of this. And I got pushed into that, right? So now to go into your other question is you have to think different, right? In our industry, unfortunately, and this is my opinion, please do not throw bananas. There's not enough people thinking differently, right? Because our industry is so lucrative, has been so hanging a shingle and you can sell policies. and it's been, you know, people joke about the whole golfing thing with agents or whatever. Like, it's somewhat true.

You know, insurance has been very, very good. If you've been in insurance for more than five or 10 years, it's been very, very good to you and your families, right? And if you've made it that long, you're making some money or you've given up, right? And so you've got to think different. And so how I started mine was when I started in my state farm is I went and met with people, right? And this worked for me, you know, type of thing. And I found out everything they were doing, everything they were doing. And then I wrote it down and I tried to find the 180 version different.

Right. And that worked for me. Now, some of the times the 180 was a terrible idea. But what I'll tell you is that if you're going to this big real estate firm or this big car dealership or whatever it is, they've been pitched the same old thing from an insurance person before. So if you don't go in there with an idea to like change their mind, right, or get them excited, right? You're not, you're not going to get that conversation to go far. And I bring this up is I actually tried to pitch Century 21 or the CEO of Century 21, this idea I had for Uber for insurance, the crazy, spacey idea. We fell into, oh, Matt, why don't you just have a brokerage that does our PNC insurance, very simple old school.

but I didn't go in there like the old school guy being like, hey, I want to write home insurance because they've been there. They've had those donuts. They've had those pens dropped off before, you know? Yeah. So what it did was when I talked to the guy later was he's like, I saw that you had vision for the future of the industry. He goes, I thought you were totally crazy, right? But he goes, I knew it was crazy in a good way. And so that's really what I would bring up is that, you know, we all probably have these great ideas that like sit right back here in the back of our mind.

we've been in insurance, but I see too many people afraid to just go for it, right? Like go do it. Like, you know, you're a prime example. You know, you were doing your thing and you had this little itch to do podcasts and go off on your own and whatever. And you did it and it's successful. A lot of people won't. I think, well, one, I wholly agree with you.

I've also seen in Rogue, I'll just like the crazier and bigger, well, I'll tell you. So David Crothers, you know at least his name. I don't know if you know him personally. But so David Crowler has been a big impact on me. And I was talking to him the other day. And I was actually, I said this to him. I was talking to him. And we were talking about this idea that I have for Rogue,

like basically where I want Rogue to go, what I wanted to be. And he said, well, what is your goal for that this year? And I told him. And he's like, you need to put a fucking zero on the end of that. And I was like, what? He's like, you think in the wrong denominations. He goes, you need to think a zero or two on the end. He goes, the worst thing that happens is you get half of that.

And it's more than what you just told me. And the idea was if you, if you, we got to open our mind up to more than if you want more, right? I mean, there's something to be said for, for doing a tremendous job in your local community and one by one offing your policies and do it, living that life. that is a great life to live. My wife lives that life. It's a tremendous life. Don't get me wrong.

But I think that that life is so saturated, it is very difficult to come in fresh today and make that work. I think if you're working for an established agency that has a brand that has clients, you can continue to do that. No problem. But when Rogue really went from, I don't know if this is going to work to maybe I've kind of found something, which is the way I feel today, was when I went from, I'm not, I am not going to be successful being a local, you know, one-off policy by policy guy, that this is going to be something different and bigger. And, and I think, I think we have to be aware. I think we have

that, I can't get past that idea. I struggle looking at a traditional startup agency today. Now, again, if you've been established for a long time, I don't know that you necessarily have to make this move. But I agree with you that there is blue ocean for big ideas. There is huge blue ocean for big ideas right now. Yeah. I mean, I think the biggest thing too is say yes to everything and figure it out on the back end.

Say yes and then build it. The interesting thing, I inked the deal with Century 21 before I had actually filed my LLC to start my Skylight brokerage. I didn't even have a brokerage. I didn't have a carrier. I didn't have an account. I was literally in between State Farm and the thing. And when we launched the LLC,

I already had that agreement. But when I was in there talking to the thing, it was like, it wasn't about like what I didn't have. It was just like, I'm going to get this deal done. And then I'm going to figure out the rest. You know what I mean?

And it makes sense because no one, if you go get a big partnership or whatever, if you think you already have what they need built, you're kidding yourself. No one does because that's a new partnership. Yeah. Right. So a lot of people will spend so much time, like for me, if I have to do meetings at all, like, I hate my day because, you know, there's always those people that want to like meet 75 times on something, you know, instead of just going out and build, right?

So if you're going to go to a dealership or whatever it is that you want to partner with, go in and just get the yes, come to terms that you know are good, whether it's how you're going to do business, split business, however it's going to work. And then it's your job to execute and go build it. It's not on them. And you'll be a lot more successful that way, in my opinion. What do you think it is about our industry? that it feels like we don't necessarily, well, I don't want to say that because I know a lot of people

that have big ideas that feel repressed in sharing those ideas. What is it about our industry that we don't cultivate that? I think that's really what it is. In other spaces, there is a almost like a culture that cultivates what's the next idea. What's the next thing? How are we going to hit this? You know, how are we going to attack this? How can this be tweaked?

and it feels like only till, geez, really recently, like 18 months, maybe, 24 months, maybe, that there was even, it was almost like we wanted to repress. We actively tried to repress bigger ideas. And the only people that were able to do them were mavericks or, you know, these exceptions, these people who stood outside the establishment. You know, what do you think it is that that is? because you've obviously bucked it. I mean, you kind of come up and you've made these deals

and you never had that mentality sink into your brain. Yeah, you know, I don't know how it did. You know, I come from, you know, family that all own state farms and really be established. Like I come from the old school, you know, take care of the immunity brokerage. I think just, you know, I wanted to be different. Yeah. You know, I do see the last 12, 24 months.

I've seen it too because, you know, it got to the point. where I was so such an outcast even on like the IAOA Facebook group right like I I would post what I was doing or what I was excited about and it was like people were coming with their pails of water and their forks to like defend you know I was mentioning lemonade and people were like like I was stealing their business and you know to the point where almost like stop posting for a little bit because I was like they're not there and it's you know if you're a game of thrones it's like winter's coming right now you might be where you don't believe that the white of technology is coming, but it's coming.

And it's going to break down that freaking wall that you've had for 30, 40 years. And so you can either, you know, I'm going to just go all in on this, but you can either jump on the dragon with, you know, John Snow and go and like, and learn a thing. Or you're going to just be in the battle of your life. Because, and so, you know, I think we're the biggest thing that people are misunderstanding as we, as we go forward is that, you know, embracing. technology or embracing new ideas doesn't mean that the old stuff needs to be thrown out it just means you need to tweak it you would never well most people wouldn't wear their their clothes they were

in the 70s right you know type of thing they might wear something similar it might still wear a polo they might still wear a polo shirt but they're probably wearing one that doesn't say fila on it anymore right it says uh whatever uh burbba i don't you know what that i'm not a clothes guy i don't know i give that example. You know, what's a, what's a, what's a cool? I don't even know. You're talking the wrong guy. Or maybe or something, right? I buy, I just wear whatever my wife buys for me. I just find stuff in my closet. We just need to be ready and go for it. And, you know, if you want, right? Like a lot of people are going to listen to this and they're not in the same headspace as me. For me, you know, I have issues too, right? My biggest issue is like, I can't stop. Like, I always want

to keep going. That's not healthy either. Right. So like, I, all I want to really share with people is just my experiences and not overuse the word in my opinion too much on here. But it really is, you know, I'm hoping that people can just grab some of this. And if anything, just the energy, like the energy that I go about thing and just like whatever you're wanting to do within the industry or your brokerage, just go for it. If that is just like doubling your staff or that is like going from typewriters to monitors or whatever you want, just go for it. It might not be starting your own MGA and getting with Century 21, all that stuff, right?

Like, that might not be for you, but you do have an idea out there of something that you think is crazy, right? It could be a coffee machine for everybody, right? And you're going to pay for the coffee. That might be the wildest thing you have. Friking go for it. Go buy the damn coffee machine. But like, just let yourself go. I agree.

So I think the word that or the part of that that I think is the most applicable is the idea of letting your energy, like using that energy, right? Like I was talking, I was part of a mastermind the other day. And one of the individuals said, um, her prospecting idea for the first quarter was to package up, um, in this case,

she was going after contractors and she was going to put a big box with a hammer in it, like a nice contractor's hammer. And then like the contract, the owner's face on the box, they knew that you'd open it. And like the inside would be a note that said, like let's hammer out your insurance program. That's different.

That dude has never received a $30 hammer in a shoe box from an agency before. Is that some sort of crazy technology thing? No, but I think those are the kind of ideas. Those are the kind of outside the box. I mean, wow, that's a cliche, but you know, this kind of differential thinking that separates you that says, look, I'm not going to approach the way business has always been done. I'm not going to approach it the same way.

Maybe some things are the same, but other things are going to be different. And I think just that idea of bringing energy. Now, I will say I want to talk to IAOA, which I love, but at the same time, I also think there's so many idiots in there. And people who aren't actually idiots, just the things they say online are, I don't know. I feel like there's a lot of people who, who, who, oh, geez, the things they say and do in that particular group are misrepresentation. maybe of who they actually are as people because it's just like, you know, man, you'd think,

I remember when all that was, I remember when you were posting. I remember I called you on the phone. And I said, dude, don't get, because you actually posting the comment. Maybe I'll just stop commenting because you were getting so much crap. And I called you and I was like, dude, don't stop posting. I, you know what I mean? Like, this is stuff that people need to hear. It was particular about the lemonade thing.

And I hate lemonade as a company. in terms of the way that they've misrepresented some things. However, as a business person, as a product, if you're serving your customers, I mean, they write on standard accord paper. Like there's no, you know, accord forms. Like, it's not like, it's not like this is some crazy paper. Like, it's basically the same H.O3 you get from any of the other major companies. So, like, what's the big deal?

It's certainly worth considering. I just have wholly disliked the way they're CEO. has handled himself and some of the things they've said. But that's beyond the point. My reasoning for that is like we can't, when you start to do things different, one of the things that is unfortunate about our industry is people seem to attack. And you can't let that shut you down. And anyone who's listening to this,

if you haven't approached a new idea because you're worried about what the industry would think or what people would say or how they will react to you taking a stance or whatever on something, I do not, you know, call me if you need to talk about it. But like we can't like ideas, good or bad, not surface because we're afraid of, you know, getting trashed on a Facebook group. You know what I mean? And that's not to diminish the value by AOA.

I mean, I'm a huge proponent of the group in general. But yeah, so let's move on from that topic. I really appreciate all those thoughts. So I want to get into, okay, so you have the Century 21 deal. You now, you form another partnership with OB. and, you know, you decide to kind of combine teams, become part of the, of OBB as the, as the operating entity, Obie buys Skylight. And now you're developing this product.

The paper, is it your paper? Lloyd's, as much as you can talk about that, are you, is it, you know, what are we, what are we, is it just kind of standard? Is it, so admitted? Yeah, so it'll be admitted. It is, I can't drop the name just yet. Yeah, yeah. And that like makes me throw up in my mouth. That's okay.

Share what you're willing to share. It's all good. But other than like the name of it, yeah. So it's going to be paper. It's going to be, it's going to go down the same lines as hippo, lemonade, all that as far as, you know, full on NGA with the TPA and everything like that. It will be standard. The thing that's unique really is about it is that I'm able to help because, you know, I've had the opportunity to go. work with pretty much, if you name the insured tech carry at one point, I had the chance of

like job offer, right? And the reason I finally took this one was one, I really like the founders and they're good friends, but like the impact you can do. So what I mean by that is our paper is going to cover what is really needed in the rental space. Like if you have a client that does rentals at all and they are 100% rented all the time, they never need renovations from the time they buy it to the time they sell it it's like they don't touch it like please i will i'm going to try to steal your clients and i and i'm joking but like in the rental space they're always getting renovated they're always vacant for periods they always have some builders risk going on they you know there's always something right and i'll tell you right now if you try to tell me that you can uh

that all of your rental properties that you have in your book right now are not in the gray you're lying to me because, you know, we're like, well, how long are you renovating? Is it, and is it basic renovations or is it cosmetic is the word? Oh, I can put that with the travelers because, you know, by time they do the inspection, you'll probably be done and it'll be rented out or I'll get anything. Like, it's frustrating. Or what you're also, if you're doing it really like, you know, Johnny doing it perfect, you're forcing your client into a three month, six month, nine month builder's risk, you know, you know, for their 30 or 60 days of renovation. and then they're paying for that and they're trying to cancel it or they're paying way on it.

And then you're flipping it to a DP3 if you're doing it like the perfect ideal way, right, which is not ideal for the client. So our product is going to be one product within that space. And you'll be able to within click of buttons flip on. It's going to be renovated, right, and how much I'm putting in. You'll be able to flip that back off when it's done. You'll be able to flip that it's vacant and then to occupy. But you don't have to change the carrier, change the paper, if you will, right?

It's just going to be a change. You're doing on the fly policy changes, form changes. Yeah. So I mean, which makes sense because, you know, with my auto insurance, I can change my liabilities at any time. I can add a driver or remove a driver. I can make all these changes. But in the rental, like really, they limit you to like changing your deductible and

changing your, you know, your building amount, right? And then if you actually change the characteristic, which is the most changed thing, the building stay is pretty same. The deductible, people want. similar deductibles all the time. What changes is what's going on with the tenant and what's going on with the space. So we're trying to build around that. And it sounds so simple for all of you guys are listening. You're all like, oh, God, this guy thinks he's a rocket science. Like, that's pretty easy. And I agree. But no carrier does it, right? Or very limited carriers do it.

Like they either want it like rent it out and occupied and nothing going on or you basically have like the builder's risk type of carriers, right? Very few in the middle. And so that's what we're going out to do. So one, there's not a lot of carriers in that space in general anyway. So big marketplace, big opportunity, but also from just a direct to consumer standpoint in our own brokerage. But then as we open up, because I'm clearly a big proponent of brokers still matter, but brokers need better technology, right?

That's where I stand in the whole big fight between tech and broker. brokers is that we're able to probably get into 100% of brokerages around the country because who doesn't right now need a one to four, what's just say it stays at that unit, quick rental product that is very flexible and easy that pays good commissions for their clients, right? It doesn't require underlying. Yeah, right, exactly. And to your point, they'll have the $1 million, $2 million, too.

so you know, you're hitting requirements for lenders. And speaking, it'll have, and also too, I can go into that. But, you know, it fits a good niche for clients need more access to some products. And also brokerages, it's like the one thing that a lot of, we'll call it personal lines or even into the habitational space brokerages would like to have, right? Every time I post about it, I get messages like, hey, when can I start to sell this? And that's the same question I would be asking if I saw someone else with this. Because if I tried to peddle your, your clients right now, a new homeowner's carrier. Like, I'm competing with a billion people.

Yeah. No one probably really listening to this right now needs another homeowners carrier, right? Like, or unless they're trying to write in Michigan or Florida or something unique. So, yeah, so that's what we have going on. That's awesome. So you guys, so OBB will be the carrier. And then we'll, so then you'll have skylight still writing. as a direct to consumer?

Yeah, so the skylight name is sunsetting. Okay, okay. It'll be, everything will be OBI. So yeah, so we'll have kind of a combo. So everything will go through our site, OB site, and based off the characteristics, so it'll be the same user experience, no matter what you're trying to do in the habitational space.

On the back end, you will either qualify for our, our own MGA product, right? If you're right now in a certain state and the one to four units and it will give you that instant or the experience will still be the same. But at the end, it'll go into more of a old school, if you will, still brokerage type field. Now, you know, we're still doing things a little faster and different. Of course, then, you know, I hate even using the word old school brokerage.

But and so that's kind of where it meets, you know, and eventually as our product, has more units and more states. We'll get more instant for people. But the key for us is still giving the same user experience all the way through regardless. And you see this with a lot of companies that you go on outside of insurance. I does this same thing, Hi, you know, you go through whatever, even outside of insurance, right? You go through and you either hit their like instant product or they say, hey, a rep will contact you. Because you clearly didn't hit their, you know, fast easy thing.

You know, I'm sure this happens on turbo tax for your taxes, the whole not. You're either like an instant return or we need a accountant to look at this. So it's very similar. Yeah, that's awesome. That is, that is awesome. Now, okay, so you have one to four today. How do you move to 200? What does that look like?

Very similar. If you've studied kind of the past of, you know, I keep using Hippo. So they owe me one because I'm just like name dropping. I'm crazy here. So, and I don't get paid like 10 cents. A lot of people think I don't get, I don't get paid by Hippo for a drop in their name or anything. I feel like a,

and they're like a law now that like if you're a celebrity, and I'm not celebrity, but like you post about a product, you have to be like, I'm a user or I'm not. Yeah, if you're an influencer. You got to get your influencer tax.

I have the most money I've gotten from Hippo is I have like 45 of their soft teeth and that's been my biggest compensation. So it's full of sclerler. But anyways, if you followed the hippo path, they started the same thing. Three, four, five, six states. They, you know, writing through the MJ experience, they slowly got a few more states, you know. And then they just recently announced that they actually bought out, they actually bought out that carrier. I believe it's Spinnaker or what I can't remember.

Yeah, I think it is one it is. It's like what Metro Mile did with Mosaic. Yep, the same thing. So we're going to probably, um, the, the, the, the, paper that we're using is probably a little too large for us to ever purchase them just as a full disclosure. But we're going to go to sit on the same route. So we'll hopefully build with that carrier as much as that they'll allow us to go statewise and unit wise. And then, you know, potentially if, uh, if need be, you know, we would, you know, need to bring in another, you know,

paper, if you will, to get more states, more access. But, you know, that's just basically the simple process. Even lemonade, none of them started in 50 states and, you know, all the product lines that you see today. They all started one state, two states. You know, lemonade was renters only. Then they went into the home, you know, and then pet insurance, I think now they do. You know, same with Hippo. I've been around all of them when they were like, I feel like less than 10 people and it's kind of watched that journey or consult them or help them or just chatted with them or just was a, what do they call it, a fanboy of them or whatever. Um, And they all kind of went down that same path.

So we're going to go something similar. So we got to do good in the first four states with the product that we have. We got to get it in the consumer's hands. We got to get our name out there. And if we're writing the premium that looks good to our, you know, our partner, then I'm sure they'll let us have, you know, more and more access. And if we're not, then, you know, then we got a whole other set of problems. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, and it comes back to, you know, it all comes back to actuarial. Can you, you know, are you, what's the pricing? What's the risk tolerance? All that kind of stuff. That's always my, the interesting part for me, you know, with all the insured tax that come out. You know, and it's why I'm still not sold on, on the, oh, geez, like root, you know, and I'm not rooting against any of them.

Just I'm not sold that the methodology works. because I haven't seen the data come back that shows, you know, is that underwriting method working? I think in Hippo's case, you know, they seem to have figured out, you know, an underwriting model that allows them to be competitively priced with a good product and, you know, not that they're always right everywhere, but they seem to have done the right thing. And that path, you know, we're, what, five, six years into hippo really being hard charging. I mean, I'm not exactly sure when they were founded, but I remember it was 2014, 2050. I think when I first started hearing about them.

And, you know, to think how far they've come. I mean, it's tremendous. I mean, and these are the kind of products that we need. You know, I look at even a carrier like Plymouth Rock here in the Northeast. Nine states started as a very traditional carrier, invested in a different methodology for underwriting. And they're dominating. They're dominating in the states that they're in in terms of how fast they're picking up business. And it's been really interesting to watch some of the more traditional carriers.

react to in particular because we don't have a lot of the more fun carriers don't come to New York because New York is an awful place to do business. You know, we have authoritarian dictators who run our state and regulate us into submission. So no one really comes in here who already isn't here. But having like a Plymouth Rock come in where you can enter, you can enter an address in, click a button and get a rate like. And people are like, wait, they don't need the credit score. And they're like, nah, they've already underwritten the home.

Well, what about, and I'm like, nope, nope, it's an address, an effective date, name of someone. And you have a, you have a home. And that is, it's been wild to see how carriers have reacted to just simple UX changes. We're not even talking about actuarial stuff, but just simple UX changes and policy stuff. It's really wild. Yeah. And my thing is for anybody on the fence with insure tech or technology. in general, you know, it's two things for me. Think back and remember the time, right? Everyone

remembers where they were 9-11. Everybody remembers where they were on this date of X, right? Remember the first time that Steve Jobs showed you the iPhone with no buttons and how you felt about it and where that is today, right? I thought the iPhone was crazy. I will admit to that. And you couldn't get my iPhone from me for anything now, right? And so one, remember that with this technology and these sure tech carriers, that that same thing is going to happen. And then my second thing is, if you're still not a believer and you, and they're your enemy, believe in the phrase of keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer. Yeah. And dive in because the more you know and the more you can keep an eye on them, the more you can do that as well. So that's my.

thing when someone's struggling with technology or these insured tech carriers or whatever is I share those two things. Hopefully that helps kind of help them with the mindset that I believe is important going forward. Awesome. I could not agree with you more. I think, you know, I look at one of the things I said, and just to bring up lemonade again, one of the things I said about lemonade three years ago that got me a lot of heat was that because when they first came out and they're trash and IAs left and right and, you know, these people are lying, you know, saying things like they lie to you and da, da, da, da, da, da. You know, there was a lot of backlash to them. And one of the things I said was, yes, you know, I don't, obviously those things are, I don't appreciate that.

But, man, can these guys brand? Holy crap can they brand? The visually, the, the language, the emotion that they pull out. And obviously you hire Dan Air, I always mispronounce the last name. Arelli, Ariely, you know, I mean, here's one of the smartest, you know, psychologists or business development. You know, behavioral psychologists in it from a business context that exists. And man, are they good?

And if you're not watching them and you're not paying attention, then you're, you're missing it. You're missing what's having them work. And they're not the only ones. You know, so I think you're 100% right. I think that the worst case scenario is I'm just going to flip my light on. and keep plugging away at the way it's always been done and flip my light off and hope everything works out because that's not going to work because today, Obie can drop into your

backyard with some Facebook ads or an email or referral partner or whoever and start taking your clients away from you just like Hippo can, just like any of these other guys can. And those days of local being your defense mechanism are over. You have to be able to play at that level, even if it's on a local basis. And I am worried that it is easy to get overwhelmed by this stuff and that we would allow that overwhelmed to keep us from actually getting where we want to be. Yeah, I would 100% agree with you is, you know, I like what you said and it's scary, right? Like to be honest with you, I think I might have gotten to the insured tech space because I was scared of it and I and I and I and I wanted to be less fearful. And then I fell in love with it, of course, you know.

And now I get to actually, you know, live my dream of actually going for it. Yeah. It's awesome. But I think what's more important than anything is just, like I said, from a simple brokerage of two people. all the way on up is just we need to think of the other industries and what they're doing and we need to watch them. You brought up Lemonade. They built a brand that happens to be an insurance company. And if you think about how fast they mobilized when it took State Farm 100 years to get the brand and the recognition that they have, Lemonade did that in less than a decade.

Yeah. Right. And hippos did it faster than that. Yep. You know, so stop worrying so much what they're going to take from you and start trying to take from them. How can you steal how lemonade acquires clients? How can you steal how hippo quotes somebody? Like, how can you like learn from the best? And right now they are the best in our industry at branding and marketing and the thing. Like I now see, And I'm like still a huge state farm guy just due to family loyalty. But like when I see what Lemonade and Hippo are doing on social media and then I go look at this state farm post of like they're trying to still post like this picture of a family and a tree from the 1980s. Right. You know, it's just like, whoa. You know, it's like it's like someone's still trying to use a monitor, you know, with a 12 inch back to it. It's just like it doesn't make sense anymore. So, yeah.

It's actually been kind of sad to me that State Farm, like their Jake from State Farm, Rogers and Pat Mahomes thing, like it's almost like they have no idea what their brand is. So they're just latching on to Aaron Rogers and Pat Mahomes and saying, geez, I hope people connect with us over these two. Because what is, like today, what is State Farm's brand? Like Jake from State Farm, who the heck is he? It's a completely different guy now. one.

And not that that's wrong, but okay, that, you know, is it, is it, is it the, is it the overweight white guy or the in-shaped black dude or is it Pat Mahomes or, you know, what does Pat Mahomes really have to do with insurance other than he's Pat Mahomes? And like, it just like, nothing against influencer marketing, which is cool and having spokesmen. I mean, for sure. I mean, spokesmen have worked. But like, I feel like they've, they don't have a brand today.

Like it's it's it's your it's your grandparents still still telling the story about how they did it. Right. Or your uncle who joked 10 years ago was funny, but still keep telling it thinking people are going to hear it for the 10th time and still laugh like they did the first time. You know and there's influence or marketing like, you know, like the Kardashians and different things like that. But they're actually like using the products. Like it's not believable. Maybe, maybe Aaron Rogers and the homes have a state farm policy. But it's it just doesn't really correlate. And there's. They're used in this 1980s marketing of like, be like Mike, like Michael Jordan type of like, just put a celebrity and your logo together. Like that worked 30 years ago.

That's not what's integrating, you know, to it. I mean, and plus like it's TV ads and everything like that. And we're all onto YouTube TV and Twitter and things that. I mean, like I'm even feeling old. You know, I'm in my 30s and I talked to my 20 year old brother. And it's like, wow, I don't even know. you know, like advertising through video games, right? Like everybody's doing this, you know, Fortnite and stuff, right?

Like, the whole brand, but, you know, I'm not one to ever rip on anybody. So, like, that's as far as I'll go. It's just more a good example to show that, like, even the biggest and baddest, bigger than number one to combine could take a page out of what's new and going on. And it's not too late. You know, State Farm's going to buy out route. They're going to do something eventually, right? They're too big probably, right?

Hopefully, right? You know, they don't want to be left as the, I'll put it this way, as the person still stuck in their ways and have all these other ones, you know, knock them down the list. So that's kind of still the same type of challenges. If I was talking to State Farm or a broker, I'd say State Farm, have everything you're doing, watch Lemonade. You got more money, people, time and all that to, like, compete with them.

Just do it. Yeah. Right. And, you know, hire the guy that they used, right? Like, yeah. You know. I think you hit on it, man. And it's why I spend so much time on the rogue brand, even though we're small,

is like, I think brand is the differentiator because the clients, the bar, clients expect you to have good products, good service at a good price. That's what they expect. So who cares if you have that stuff? Oh, you're, you know what cares? Oh, we have a good price. Okay. I have a good price too.

You have a good price. Okay. That's cool. But what does the brand? What does it mean to you? Does it, you know what I mean? That idea of brand and lemonade success is wholly because of their brand. And I give them ultimate kudos for that.

And I could not agree with you more that moving forward, it's, it's, I think just to recap this conversation. And I think it's been, I just appreciate it. You've been, this has been awesome is really, you know, allowing our energy to, you know, to kind of release our energy and think bigger about our business. And whatever way that makes sense, whether we're local or we're trying to be, you know, bigger in a, in a, you know, in some way or and to focus on brand and to really dive in and go forward. So, dude, I appreciate you.

This has been tremendous. Just thanks so much for sharing your time, man. Perfect. Yeah. Thanks for having me and happy to chat anytime. Before I let you go, where's the best place for someone to get at you? LinkedIn or what if someone wants to just connect to the other LinkedIn, Facebook, just under, you know, Matthew Sudica for both. Probably people listen to this. Those are probably the two

best because it's, you know, more peer to peer and I'm pretty quick at answering messages and, you know, all that kind of stuff. I think the only thing I will tell you is that if you're like sending a request or whatever, just put in the note up front like, hey, heard you anything. So then I know because, you know, I don't know what happened on those two social media platforms but like the friend requests are out of control now and I can't tell someone that like I should be connecting and I just don't know who they are by name and someone who as soon as I connect them I'm going to get one of those messages of like trying to sell me like ad space in Taiwan. Yeah.

Or you know, uh, online gym thing. So yeah, just put in the note that like you know, your I.OAA or you heard me on this podcast or whatever. So now I can accept me and we can start chatting because I'm kind of like feared to accept now unless I'm like looking at mutual friends. Yeah, yeah. It's wild where that's going. But yeah, get me on both of those, and then we can chat from there.

I'm always, I'm pretty good at getting back to everybody. Awesome. Appreciate you, Bob. Be good. All right. Take care. Two years. Twice as many deals by this time next week.

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