The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Innovative Insurance Solutions for California’s Wildfire Crisis Unveiled with Wows Insurance Services

Episode Date: December 18, 2024

Innovative Insurance Solutions for California's Wildfire Crisis Unveiled with Wows Insurance Services Wowsinsurance.com About the Guest(s): Robert Feldman is the CEO and co-founder of Wows Insurance Services, specializing in providing innovative insurance solutions for homeowners in high-risk fire areas, particularly in California. With over 25 years of experience in the insurance industry, Robert is a recognized speaker and thought leader, specifically in the realm of uninsurable properties. He has also served on numerous task forces working with senior leadership in various insurance carriers to address and mitigate insurance crises in states like California and Florida. Episode Summary: In this intriguing episode of The Chris Voss Show, host Chris Voss sits down with Robert Feldman, an innovator in the insurance sector, to discuss the burgeoning challenges and solutions in the field of fire insurance. As the CEO and co-founder of Wows Insurance Services, Robert explores the multifaceted crises the insurance industry faces due to increasing wildfire risks in the Western United States, particularly California and Nevada. Listeners are provided with a comprehensive overview of how these developments could transform the existing paradigms of risk assessment and insurance provisions. Robert elaborates on how Wows Insurance Services is addressing these challenges by implementing innovative insurance programs that not only aid brokers but also provide viable options for homeowners. The conversation delves into the intricacies of transferable insurance policies, actuarial sound practices, and the potential expansion into other markets, all of which promise to bring about significant change in the way insurance is offered and managed. Robert also highlights the critical role of Cal Fire and other technological advancements that are making homes more defensible against wildfires, setting a precedent for future residential safety standards. Key Takeaways: Wows Insurance Services is pioneering new and flexible insurance solutions for homes in high-risk fire zones, including transferable policies from sellers to buyers. The insurance industry needs a paradigm shift to adapt to climate change challenges, including more regionalized and risk-specific insurance approaches. Technological advancements and improved fire hardening techniques are crucial in reducing the destruction caused by wildfires. Current insurance premiums are skyrocketing, especially impacting seniors with fixed incomes, prompting innovative responses from companies like Wows. Notable Quotes: "Anything's insurable, man. It's just a question of cost." – Robert Feldman "Insurance companies have been the definition of Einstein's theory of insanity, doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result." – Robert Feldman "We're really working to fix the crisis of what's going on right now." – Robert Feldman "If you don't have insurance, guess what? You don't have a house." – Robert Feldman "Stop thinking that there's only one choice or you have no choices. There are always choices." – Robert Feldman

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. Get ready. Strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms, and legs inside the vehicle at all times, because you're about to go on a monster education roller coaster with your brain. Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. Hi, folks. It's Voss here.

Welcome to the Chris Voss Show from the Chris Voss Show Studios in Chris Vosslandia. Fucking stupid shit I make up in the ramble thanks for coming on the show welcome to the show ladies and gentlemen we certainly appreciate you guys being here because without you we'd just be talking to i don't know our guests and we'd just be sitting around going it'd be great if someone else will listen to this for 16 years we're bringing the chris voss show over 2200 episodes if you haven't listened to every damn one of them, go back and listen to them. Actually, I don't listen to the early stuff. It's kind of shitty. But go listen to them for fun anyway.

You can see how much we've progressed. As always, go to goodreads.com, 4chesschrisvoss, linkedin.com, 4chesschrisvoss, Chris Voss 1 on the TikTokity and all those crazy places. Today, we have a returning guest. We had him on a few months ago, and he's bringing us the latest breaking news and updates based on fires and insurance in California and Florida. And all the crazy stuff that's going on in our environment. The world is just on fire. And that's just from the Taco Bell buffet I had last night.

That's a whole different story. Today we have an amazing young man joining us on the show. We're going to be talking to Robert Feldman. He is a specialist insurance and fire zone and hard to place risks. I should have put my first seven marriages with him. He's an insurance professional with over 25 years of experience. They all went bad. And he's going to be talking to us about what his company wows insurance services that he co-founded

is delivering insurance solution for homeowners who struggle to secure fire insurance in california and i think they'll be eventually expanding to other parts of higher estates due to his expertise robert has been a sought-after speaker in the california association of realtors educating realtors about how to secure insurance for homes that are deemed uninsurable, which is my shack, my van down by the river that I live in. Feldman serves on numerous task forces, working with senior leadership for many insurance carriers to solve the state's current insurance crises.

Welcome to the show. How are you, Robert? Good. How are you doing, sir? I am doing excellent. Can you insure my van down by the river? Yeah, it depends, man. How are you, Robert? Good. How are you doing, sir? I am doing excellent. Can you insure my van down by the river? Yeah, that depends, man. How cool is the van? Anything's insurable, man. Anything's insurable, man.

What's that old story? We can get it. That's the big thing that we always stamp out, man. There's a cost, obviously, but anything's insurable. It's that A-Team van from the A-Team. Remember the A-Team TV show? Yeah. Okay. Now you're cool, Chris, but you're getting cooler by the moment, man. That's legendary. The wheels are gone. It's just on bricks, man.

It's okay, man. It works. Hey, man, we'll get tires for that one back. You know, it rocks when the girlfriends come over. Anyway. Oh, man, oh, man. Give us your dot coms. All right.

So, obviously, thank you again, Robert Feldman, CEO, co-founder of Wow's Insurance. You can easily find us at Wow's, W-O-W-S. Now, everyone forgets the S, W-O-W-S insurance.com. And actually email me, Robert at Wow's insurance.com. A lot of good information. I had a great time with you last time, Chris. And I thank you for so much for having us back. Yes, thank you for so much for having us back um oh absolutely right now it's kind of the kind of upstates in the news is obviously everyone's seeing you know all the fires are happening currently in malibu and in

southern california thank goodness this we're probably on the back side of it now i mean obviously they're still fighting the fires first and foremost a shout out to Cal Fire, who has done an incredible job in this fire. I mean, I'm sorry to say there are still homes that went down, but we can flash back to the Woolsey fire that just happened, you know, five years ago, basically. And I mean, those were where you had, I mean, well over four or 500 homes that went down. This time, same size kind of fire, same kind of thing. And there's going to, as of right now, as of this morning, there were seven.

Oh, wow. That is a big difference. So one of the things that we're really, when I, when I work with reinsurers and all the big reinsurance in London and different parts of the world, that's one of the biggest things I really talk about again is how incredibly better i get the same proper way the the great job that cal fire has done and gotten better how the technology is getting better and that the ways we're getting defensible to help defend homes basically yeah so give us a 30 000 overview what you guys do there we are an inch we are a wholesale with this classified as a wholesaler or what's

called an mga managing Managing General Agency. We help build and bring insurance programs to the Western United States, primarily in California, but we'll be expanding soon. We work with Nevada. A shout out here for my Nevada guys. I love the Department of Insurance in Nevada. They are absolutely incredible. We really are working to try to fix the crisis of what's going on right now. I mean, obviously this Malibu fire is a microcosm of the bigger problem. Fires happen in the Western United States.

And how are we going to change? You know, I said it in our last pack podcast and nothing's changed. Insurance industry has been the definition of Einstein's theory of insanity. Chris, you're doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results. And we're,

we're affecting change. And that's really the big thing. I've been trying to put all the fires because Smokey the Bear used to talk to me through the TV and said it was only me who could prevent forest fires. But I just don't have enough time, man. Exactly. I can say I got a size 12 shoe, but it doesn't work that great to stamp those fires out. It can't be everywhere at once. I live with the guilt i see a

therapist daily um thanks smoky the bear you fucking asshole yeah i'll tell you a side note man chris crazy back in the day and that woolsey fire that fire blew right through where i live oh and i can't oh yeah and i can guarantee i give you a way if you want to really upset a spouse you can do what i did basically where I followed her. Tell her she looks fat in that outfit. No, I know better than that. I'm surrounded by girls, Chris. I don't go anywhere near that. I have two daughters that would smack me ruthlessly.

No, but what you do is you start to follow them out and then you turn around and basically fight fires for three days. That's a great way of upsetting a spouse. But again, these are the things, there's a lot of things that are changing. We're affecting change with the insurance policies. There's a lot of information we're getting out. Your show was incredible last time with us. Your listeners were great. We cannot thank you enough. We want to make sure we're giving you insurance updates, whether it's on the East Coast, West Coast, every time there's a major catastrophe, we'd like to make sure we

continue to be your kind of source for insurance because we're really working with every major decision maker really in the insurance industry. That's what we do. Now, you referenced a crisis, and I believe, isn't that – I mean, not only the fires of crisis, of course, but I think there's a crisis in a lot of insurance you're pulling out of California. Yes. I believe Texas and Florida are impacted as well. Talk to us about this crisis and how that's affecting consumers there. Really what happens, and this is conceptually really the idea of insurance, is the problem that you run into with insurance, if you look up the definition of insurance,

by definition, it's a diversification of risk. So a spread of risk so that it allows you, an insurance company, to be actuarially sound. And so the problem is a lot of insurance companies have gotten clustered up in different parts of the United States where they end up with oversaturation of markets. And then when a catastrophe occurs, it knocks them out of the box. So what you're seeing is a little bit more of a spread of risk. This is one of those, we're all hands on deck. This is going to involve insurance companies, reinsurance companies, and consumers. It's going to require to involve government. In California, they have the California Fair Plan. In Florida, they have citizens

insurance for the wind hail. These are all things that are going to really need to happen and in combination to make the changes that were necessary to make sure we can fix things going forward. California wildfires are growing in frequency and severity. We've seen this where climate change is pretty much undeniable at this point.

California had its first, what, hurricane or something? A couple years ago or a year ago. And you're just like, what? Yep. It's crazy. That's the whole reason I lived in California is because I'm not in Florida. And since 2017, 11 million acres have burned, destroying nearly 50,000 structures, many of them homes.

And then, you know, you can't, my understanding is you can't sell a home or buy a home if it, if you can't cover it by insurance. Exactly. We know Florida's having that problem massively. It's crazy. And this is not just happening from a fire standpoint, not just in California, but it's starting to happen in Nevada. And it's happening in Washington and Oregon and Park City, Utah and, and, and Aspen, Colorado, and all the areas that are considered fire zones. So this is, as the United States goes for all our different areas,

there's different sections, there's different things that cause. So for example, Southeast is going to be wind, hail, and hurricanes. You have the Midwest with tornadoes. You have the West Coast that's now more and more fire. These are all interesting challenges, but it still, Chris, comes down to the same thing. It's a reorganization or directional change. We can't, you know, you have insurance companies that are trying to be cookie cutter. So they're trying to say that they have the same risk in California as they do in Florida. Those are completely different risks.

True. in Florida. Those are completely different risks. And you really have to think of things differently and be able to involve and really make changes. I mean, God, one of the great things about us as a society is, as I would say, is that when things happen, there's crisis happen, the evolution of how to make things and change. I think I mentioned it last time. There's an incredible shout out. I have no ties to them, Chris, but it's a great shout-out. There's a great company called Burnbot. In California, it's really hard to do control burns

for fire. This company created a machine. It looks almost like a little mini tank. It goes over and does a control burn, but instead of having smoke come out and let it be out of control, the fire is internal inside of this tank. And so it puts water to the smoke, which then fertilizes and revitalizes the ground, but at the same time, clearing everything. I mean, just the

concepts of things that are coming out, Chris, are just incredible and are vital to fix the industries. Because to your point earlier, man, if you don't have insurance, guess what you don't have? You don't have a house. If you don't have a house, how do you sell a house that can't get insurance? You can't sell it. You can't do it. That's the problem they're having a lot in Florida. I don't know about California.

I haven't seen anything, but imagine the same. Oh, and Florida is terrible right now. Yeah. You got a lot of people that have just, they can't the premiums, and they've just given up the insurance. That's the saddest. This is a lot of people's mortgage wealth and appreciation is about the only avenue left to people unless they can get lucky on Bitcoin. Yeah. Unless they didn't trade.

What was that story where the guy traded something like 12 coins or something like that for pizza oh yeah i remember that oh my goodness i saw the news and my business partner drew ingler just kind of was joking about that going man i wish i would have bought the pizza for the guy do you know kind of i remember i bought bitcoin below 600 and and i think up to 600 I bought it I sold it like 32,000 yeah and fortunately unfortunately I didn't own enough but to may really make it any sort of dent but I spent on cocaine and hookers basically you sounded like Danny DeVito that's the great that's the greatest line with a great line it was just it was like half a ball and one hooker wasn't enough to buy two. That's a joke. People don't write me. But your emails are blowing up as you speak.

Yeah. The audience knows the callback jokes we always pull on the show. He did the hooker joke. Next up is the money jokers. It's probably all this people are keeping. Let's see. It's like it's Chris Voss show bingo over 16 years which callback joke will he use today yeah bingo yep that or it could be it could be kind of an

interesting drinking game right yeah it's a little shots thing hey put out the put on the board if chris mentions the following things everyone takes a shot i've heard my voice makes people want to drink so i choose my close friends and relatives i I was going to say, I do that too. I swear I usually get thrown out, Chris, because having a deep voice, my voice echoes through walls. So no one's ever heard me be quiet. Yeah. That's the problem I have with hookers and blow in hotel rooms in Vegas. Never mind.

I just had to set that up because it was right there. So you guys are trying to really innovate the industry. You're trying to bring innovative products to both brokers and homeowners. Tell us how you help brokers and then tell us how you help homeowners. For example, in California right now, we're starting to bring in some of the big, what's called reinsurance companies. They're the ones like the Munich Re. Munich Re is one of the largest reinsurance companies in the world, if they're not the largest. They're just massive. They have a program that's in California. And what we did, besides our own WOWS program, we're what's called wholesaling. So we have over 3,000 brokers appointed directly or indirectly through

associations. And we're just bringing these things to market because the market didn't have access to it. So there's a lot of consumers being canceled and not knowing that this is a viable product for them so that's just one of many we've we've launched two or three others and what's continue to bring more we actually have one we we kind of smile we ink the deal and we're kind of excited because we can almost pre-announce it right now. It's another one of the companies that we are now wholesaling for. As of tomorrow, we'll get the keys to the car, as they say. We get to test take that car out for a ride. And so we're doing this.

So there's two different parts of us. We have a wholesaling that works directly with brokers. And then we have a program that works with brokers and consumers. So the program is for the larger homes. We're very close to having that one done. That'll be the game changer, Chris. We're doing some really incredible things. Our WOWS program is going to, for consumers, is going to flip the script. It will be the first policy in the history of California that we can find that will be fully transferable from sellers to buyers.

Oh, wow. So as a consumer, it'll just change how it works. We built it on a model that will reduce premium costs over time. These are all things that make sense from an actuarial standpoint for the insurance company. And it's also great for consumers. Wow. So a lot of great things. There's going to be amazing times coming up here.

Yep. Amazing times. We're battling that. It's going to be amazing times coming up here. Yep. Amazing times. We're battling it out. It's crazy. You know, we had, I think it was the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, one of the journalists from one of the top tier news organizations, and he's been spending the last few years traveling around to smaller cities that were being impacted by climate change, you know, fires and stuff like that.

Only smaller, smaller locales that, you know, they don't have the budgets. They don't have the tax base. They don't have the support to do it. And, you know, many of these places, they're kind of small because everyone's moved away. And, you know, it's kind of like places in, I think, Italy or France where they're trying to sell them now because so many people have moved away. And there's so few people there. And they're just, they're just like, in, I think, Italy or France where they're trying to sell them now because so many people have moved away, and there's so few people there, and they're just like, hey, come here. And so he's been documenting the rise of climate change and its effect on these smaller cities, and it's devastating.

Yes. You know, I mean, any sort of loss is devastating. I don't mean to minimize anyone. You know, if you have a luxury home in Cali, you know, that's, you know, it's a palatial home, and they're expensive as hell but yeah just seeing the he kind of talks about and records the economic effect and the fallout from you know these middle america places that they're doing it and and yeah i mean it's it's crazy and in california the cost of homes just saw something. I have to pull it up, but it showed that household debt and costs are going through the roof.

In California, what's interesting was only number four. Utah was only number three. Wow. You could have got me on a bet on that one, right? You could have said, which one's higher, Utah or California? I would have bet you on that one. $100, damn it. Yeah, you did you did now i'm gonna have to pay for the hookers and blow out of my own pocket that's a callback joke of the show today ladies but yeah the the and of course that's household debt so that's everything but i imagine you know it's impactful when i read about you know

people abandoning insurance home insurance because they can't afford it you know some of the people that i've read that are abandoning it are like senior citizens people oh yeah and i see that daily i almost that daily i'm sorry chris it's terrible because what's happening right now in the insurance market we're even seeing the admitted carriers that are still in market are are taking 40 50, sometimes 100% rate increases. And so I have one right now and there are some interesting scenarios because there's a California law that was passed that basically puts a moratorium on cancellations if you're in zip code or zip code affected is what they classify as a state of emergency.

And I was referred to by a realtor. Again, we're a wholesaler. We generally work with brokers, but we do a little bit of retail is what I would say. I do it as a way of almost keeping my finger on the pulse of knowing what's going on in the market. And a consumer was referred to me by a realtor. And I'm very protective of seniors, Chris. I just am. But I get a little sweet little lady that's been in her house for 40 years,

50 years, you know, I'm really getting protective. And we had to have a really tough conversation because it's a conversation about the fact that she's on a fixed income. She has a house that's worth, you know, millions and millions of dollars.

Okay. And, but it's what they're in real estate. I guess the realtors would say is, you know, they're, they're house poor, meaning that they have this incredible house,

but they don't have, they don't have the resources really as these rising costs occur to be able to help maintain it or at the same time, you know, pay for the insurance. So eventually it forces them out of their houses. Yeah. And that's terrible.

Yeah. It's not a good one and usually those people they have massive equity and yes net worth built up in their homes oh absolutely i remember reading about a guy in florida and they had i think they had seven hundred thousand dollars worth of free equity in their home and they you know they were paying i think it was paid off some of i think some the times of getting away with it, it almost paid off. But still, if anything happens at home, it's kind of like having cash under your mattress. If your mattress catches fire, your house burns down. You just lost a lot of cash.

You lost all your money. Yeah, it's gone. And this example, actually, it's funny you say that. Her house is probably somewhere between $3 million to $4 million in the Pacific Palisades. It's completely paid for. Wow. And her premium is going to go from probably, if scary as it sounds, $5,000 to $20,000 or $30,000 annually. Tell me that's not a month, right?

Yeah, it's a year. Yeah. I mean, but for her, though, that just jumped from $5,000 to even $10, 000 is going to make her shit you know potentially knock her out of the box and so then you know here she has lived in this house i mean it's a really sad story that i hear too often you know spouse has passed away her children were raised there they've been in that house 30 40 50 years and now they're having to think about selling their house and moving somewhere else because of it that's's scary, but we're going to fix it is the key thing. Let me go from sad to good.

We're fixing this and we're leading the charge and we're really helping. I mean, because the market has gotten so crazy. There's, there's a 400% variance to cost right now for insurance. So using most insurance companies, whether it's admitted or not admitted, Chris are very tight.

They're really close. Years ago, the, you know, the joke I, when I used to do, I would do barbecue lunch and learns. That's how I got in with all the realtors, right? Do you have to have a lot of fun doing competition barbecue stuff back in the day and that's a whole conversation for a different day, all the barbecue things I do.

And so what was interesting is, you know, I'd go in there cause I represent a couple of companies and we're in this like the joke 50 cents apart from everybody else. Now we're seeing quotes where someone's at, you could have a quote ranging from 6,000 to 24,000. Holy crap. That's just insane, man. I mean, and it's just, it's just a matter of just how crazy it is. And we're just trying to get the word out because there's a lot of consumers right now that are getting stung.

They're being told, one of the things we educate brokers all the time on this is, I mean, stop telling people that the California Fair Plan is the only choice. Like citizens, the only choice. There are other choices for different markets. We've been able to successfully bring in carriers on the West Coast to really support and really keep this thing moving, to keep the market alive. And we continue to do it every day. I mean, I was on every day now. It's terrible. It sounds like London's eight hours in front of us on the West Coast.

And so every day, usually around, I go to the gym early, about 5, 530, and usually either before or after the gym is the joke. I'm on with London at this point because they want updates on the fires. But also, it's to give different programs. And as we keep bringing it in, that's going to stabilize this market. And even down to one of them, Chris, we're helping re-engineer. We have a great company that we're working with that we wholesale that has a maximum coverage of 2 million.

They want to write above their 2 million. So I brought an access company together. We're piecing that together now. Oh, that's awesome. So we're doing a lot of creation is what we're going for, which is what's needed, not just in California, not just in the Western United States, but this kind of concepts need to happen across the United States. Yeah.

I mean, the insurance companies, it needs to be fixed. So brokers can reach out to you to find out more. Yep. And then can homeowners contact you directly? Absolutely. Absolutely. We'll get them to the right places. Yep. And then can homeowners contact you directly? Absolutely. Absolutely. We'll get them to the right places. We work with brokers,

so a lot of times we'll put them with brokers, or every time we'll put them with a broker, but we'll make sure we almost play, I hate to use the military, and we play Overwatch. So if a consumer reaches out to me,

I'm going to want to watch to make sure this is getting done and it's getting done the way it needs to get done and they're getting access to markets. And, you know, because right now, this is why I am so thankful for being here you have a great you have a huge audience great

audience chris and what happens is every time we can get the word out on into your show you know and get it out to consumers that get rid of the myths you know like i said earlier stop thinking that there's only one choice or you have no choices. There are choices. Everyone has choices. 99.9%. Like in California or the West United States, if you have an old wood shake roof, I'm sorry, you're going to have to replace it. If you're in a fire, you're going to have to replace it. But there's always a choice. And that's the thing we're trying to get out the word out. Most definitely.

There's always a choice, people. Always a choice, man. Always a choice. You know, we need as many options as we can get. But, you know, today insurance is so expensive. And then you've got car insurance that's also gone through the roof. Yep. So that pushes pressure on other people.

And I'd just like to say here, as always, you can set up to gift your estate and your house and your will to the Chris Foss Show. That's great. Just set it up to go automatically to Chris right there. I used to read a lot of Southern Baptist newsletter from churches and stuff. They'd always do that. They'd be like, don't forget to put the church in your will. Yeah, exactly. Make sure you can leave all of it to us.

Don't worry, we'll handle it for you. Hey, somebody make an advertisement on the Chris Voss Show for that. You guys are really trying to do it. You guys are out educating. You're out sharing data, trying to let people know there's better options out there. You guys are really trying to innovate and educate the industry. Can people reach out to you from other states yet? You know what's funny?

We're always going to help. We're always going to help and get people to the right spots. So as I mentioned earlier, you can go to the WOWs at wowinsurance.com or send me an email personally, robert at wowinsurance, W-O-W-S insurance.com. We're going to help people get to the right places. We work with brokers that are appointed through us that are nationwide brokers, so we can easily get them to brokers to help. That's all i would say and then i'm noticing some things in your background on your screen there that you've got the policies transferables from seller to buyer yep that's probably real important if you know that's that wows program we were talking about so that's really kind of a really great thing you know actuarially sound you know you know chris it drives me crazy the thing that

made me crazy for the 25 years as a broker working with senior leadership of multiple companies is when I would get to an underwriter, I'd go, can we do something? This, this makes this change. This should work actuarially. And I would go, they would go, we can't do it. I go, why? And they would go, because this is the way we've always done it. And I'd go, I mean, if you, if you want to send me off the deep end and see me go crazy and get the crazy people in my head going, just tell me. We're doing this because this is the way we've always done it. Yeah, that'll do it. That'll do it every time.

You write about that in our books about entrepreneurism. Why do we always do that? I don't know. They taught me to do it. Same way. But yeah, I think climate change and stuff that's impacting our world. It has to make changes you know and now if we just get insurance for stupid people we could we could have something

really going on with their i don't know about that one though i think there's a lot of people out there to agree i don't know we can ensure that it's the joke you know what i need is if i ever get married that's the joke that's the reason we do the multiple marriage jokes i've never been married you know I need his marriage insurance Yeah, it's good It's called a prenup right yet that a good turn you do that for you I don't know they figured out a way to break those down on something better Yeah, exactly. I've joked about divorce insurance for I don't know a couple decades now

Where you should just start paying every month for the divorce you know you may be it's a retainer fee for divorce basically your first month of marriage you start exactly start you just make a monthly payment i'm sure that would go over really big with your spouse at that point okay what's this bill what's what's this check going out for this amount for oh it's for my divorce insurance it's for the retainer fee it's cheaper to prepay than the most pay them yeah oh god i might i'd be dangerous the average divorce or the average marriage only last seven eight years now oh goodness yeah and that's i've been i've been very lucky been lucky to be married for 25 years i have a beautiful wife and great job and two daughters that like to tell me why I'm

wrong. So it's a good thing. That's why I've seen that with the pseudo stepdaughters I've had. They come in the room and they're like, you're going to wear that tie with this? And you're like, you're three. Shut up and go away. You're three. Yep.

The problem is, though, they probably still have better. They can pick out things better for that weekend. Yeah. I'm sorry. It's just born to them. It's in their DNA that they're fashionable. Exactly. Goodness gracious.

Yeah, but I'm a man, and it's been my DNA that I'm unfashionable. Exactly. I get told that all the time. Yeah, I do. I mean, people just hand me money when I usually go to the store, and they're like, get some food, man. Get some food. Are you warm? You need some gloves?

That is so great. That is so great. Walking around in flip-flops and shorts like I do in Las Vegas up here in Utah where it's freezing fucking cold. And people are like, do you need some cardboard? Exactly. You'd hang out with my business partner, Joel Silver. He's a big guy, 6'6", 300 pounds. He believes there's no such thing as cold weather.

He just wears a jacket and shorts. Yeah. People ask me, they're like, are you freezing? I'm like, nah, I was in Nam. I got a plate in my head. They're like, you were in Nam? And I'm like, I stole this from a movie. And they go, you were in Nam?

You seem too young. I was in Nam, dude. What the fuck? I killed like 20, I killed 20 Vietnamese. And they're like, really? Okay. All right. If you say you were in Nam, you know, you're kind of young.

And I was like, I was there last week. Killed 20 Vietnamese. They're still looking for me. Anything more we need to talk about that maybe we haven't touched on that you want to tease out? Really, the key thing I would tease out is, like I mentioned earlier, we're excited for California and some of the western United States. We're going to be bringing products in to be able to write insurance. We're plugging holes. We're getting the keys to another insurance company tomorrow.

So the great thing about, for the brokers out there that are listening, the insurance brokers that are listening, you can reach out to us to get appointed. For consumers that need help, we're here to help. We'll get you to the right spots, which is really, again, I hate to use the term Overwatch. It sounds like a military thing. But really, that's what we play a lot of for consumers, just to make sure they're getting the right spots. It's kind of like soccer. You know, it's that police song. I'll be watching and you i remember i listened to that for the first time i'm like that that's the sound of his business exactly it's pp thomas say your window what's

going on sting you can't get girls or something you're the lead singer of the band what the but you know it's kind of creepy but yeah reducing costs you know you don't have well it's in coverage yeah no maximum limits so the wows program we're launching coming up there's no maximum so it's going to be able to take care of the hardest hard hit ones i should say the hardest hit ones there are the really the homes that are really over four million on rebuild these are the large homes in california the carriers have pulled out of that market there's very few that's why we stepped in. But what's great about the Wiles program is as we continue to launch, other ones we represent are already looking at potentially

picking up some of the things we offer inside Wiles. So again, we're two different animals. We have our own program, but the greatest compliment about us doing our Wiles program is that we're accessing other companies to wholesale, to bring into brokers, to bring a, you know, this little supply and demand thing. You got to have supply because there's sure as heck a lot of demand. So we're going to, we're going to continue to bring in additional options besides our program to really help consumers and to help the insurance brokers. We did a trade show not too, a couple of months back, and it was amazing how many brokers would approach us and that had zero access. So how do you sell insurance to a consumer if you don't have anything other than California Fair Plan?

And so it was just a crazy, crazy thing. So continue to bring on, and we're going to keep fighting the fight. Yeah. Hey, let me ask you this. I was reminded of the of the maui red roof did the miracle house it was a hundred year old home and it survived yep and i i guess the thing about it was number one it had a metal roof but it it also had a special lack of vegetation along the drip line whatever that means and And I think they also, I think it had been renovated with the latest, you know,

siding, roofing, cofing, whatever. Yep, yep. And so it was designed to survive. I know that some of the new homes that are being built in Florida with that. Is that something that's going to help? Absolutely. Absolutely. In the western United States, Cal Fire is kind of leading the way on this.

What's called Lean, Clean, and Green. Anybody can go to calfire.org and see a whole thing on Lean, Clean, and Green. Basically, obviously, Chris, I've been in every major fire in California. I have consumers that go down to every major fire. And so this is why we were able to launch WOWZ and really be successful with our numbers, our actual numbers, is we can show what houses win and survive

and which houses don't. And so what you will see coming up is a lot of the homes have what's called open exposed eaves. That's if you look at the edge of a house, as the roof goes over top or overhangs over the edge of the house, you'll look underneath. You can see open exposed wood. Those homes burn.

Yeah. If a fire is anywhere near it, the embers catch underneath those eaves. If it goes under those eaves, that house is gone. Cal Fire can't stop it. So there's a lot of mitigation that's happening right now. And this is part of why I think Cal Fire is doing such a great job in this fire, in the Malibu fire right now. As horrific as it is, 4,000 acres, it's been growing. But there's still, as of this morning, there were seven homes burned, I think eight or nine damaged.

That's versus four or 500 homes lost last time. Yeah. I know that's not, you know, four or 500 homes lost last time. Yeah. Yeah. I know that's not exactly the same, but what's happening is consumers are getting better about fire hardening in their house. They're, they're doing the lean, clean and green. As you mentioned, getting no vegetation within five feet of the house.

Think about this. Yeah. Think about this though, for a second. If you, if you think about it, you have open exposed eaves, right? And then you have vegetation that can catch fire underneath those eaves. Yeah. So when it catches fire, it goes straight up in the air, right? Straight up in the air.

Straight up in the air and burns the eaves. It catches the fire of the eaves and burns the house down. There's a lot of common sense things that are occurring now that are making this to be able to get better. You know, that's the great thing about Vegas. You have everything zero skate, so there's not a lot of vegetation. Yeah, that's like Arizona's the same way. Yeah. Arizona's the same way.

And the Las Vegas fire code and fire department, I mean, they're more powerful than the governor there ever since the MGM fire. It's insane what you go through. I mean, I remember we opened an office one time. It took us forever just to fucking get them to come by and do their job. Yep. Because they had so many things they had to look at. And, you know, they basically put me in those fire suits and said,

you have to wear this when you're in the office. Wow. You guys are really scarred from that MGM thing, aren't you? It was the 80s, people. Yeah. And we were probably all drinking and smoking back then, so that probably didn't help. But yeah, I'm looking at that 100-year-old wooden house, red, they called it the red roof. Yep.

And to see that thing survived. And I think I saw some. It's an example of what needs to happen. Yeah. I think I saw that also in Florida. There was homes that survived the hurricane because they'd either been rebuilt or remodeled to to do it and they're just like standing there looking pristine and everything else is yeah i mean a lot of the ones on the southeast when they

get into hurricane areas the first layer the first level for flood is you don't have the houses are built so that everything's really second floor up like a garage is the first floor and that the first floor or first area blows away so that doesn't blow the house away it'll blow away these it's a releasable with wind they're destructive structures they're doing now are just incredible we we continue to get better and better with our technology of how to survive fires and wind storms and things. We just have to make sure we implement them. Yeah.

And then we just go ahead and pollute more then. Put more plastic in the ozone. You know what's funny? Actually, a lot of the ones I've seen on the southeast for the wind ones are not. They're doing a lot of biodegradable things, which is great too. Yeah. I had my water purifier break down. The RO filters and stuff all ran out at the same time.

They do it every December. And so it just kicked off. And I use purified water everywhere. And so I had to go buy some water, like people do where they buy the giant things of plastic water. And I bought this whole rack for $5. And it was like, I don't know, like 40 bottles or something. And they're like.

Like Costco has those all day. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I never buy them because I think, I don't know, I come from an age like you do where it's like, if you would have said in the 70s and 80s, hey, we're going to come up with a way to make people pay for water, you would have laughed out of your. Oh, they would have laughed you right out of the room. mean if you were if you if you and i were an investment

like we're starting on our company we're gonna bottle water we would have had no investors they would have laughed at us they would have put us in a home yeah exactly with a funny farm but so i bought this big rack of plastic and i've seen people you know loaded carts going out with this purified water crap yeah god knows how much it's leaching plastic into the car and so i sat there i bought it and it was like 586 i think or something and i'm like holy crap this is not only incredibly cheap but what is the cost of you know i mean how many seals is gonna end up in or something or whatever and landfills and and stuff and so i was just aghast at it and thankfully my filters came in so we're back on business but yeah i'm like there's people that do this all the time

that's how my god wow so it's probably a $300 filtering system, guys. I have one. I just, it's 300, I think the 350 I paid for mine, and it does RO. It even has the UV light now. Yep. So, it does the reverse osmosis. You got to have that. Is there any insurance you can get for me?

Because I live in Vegas, and every summer, it feels like I'm about to burst into fire. Is there any fire insurance I can get for my house? Yeah. Not for yourself, obviously. If you're your house you can always get them yeah you burst into flames that could be a whole other conversation yeah you know why and what the story is for that but stop soaking the clothes in gas please anyway it's vegas you do that to keep the tourists away from you because exactly no one wants to get near you at that point yeah yeah he smells bad that's why i only pay every two weeks anyway robert thank you very much give us your final pitch out tell people yes and on board in the dot com absolutely you know everyone out there is listening right now

please realize like we've mentioned there's obviously options and choices things as bad as they are in the insurance community we're getting better i do think we're starting to turn the corners if you if to really get it to be better if you have any questions we're getting better i do think we're starting to turn the corners if you if to really get to being better if you have any questions we're always around my name again my name is robert feldman i'm the ceo and co-founder of wows insurance you can find us at wowsinsurance.com and remember only you can stop firefighters i'm talking to you bob in the audience knock it off not robert bob but we always use Bob as the callback. We blame, everybody

blames Bob for everything. Everyone blames Bob. Where's Bob? It's What About Bob, right? There's a whole movie about What About Bob. That might have been where I stole that callback from. Anyway, thanks, Robert, for coming on the show. It's been fun to have you as well. Look forward to the future. Anytime you have any catastrophes or things

going on, man, when it comes to insurance world, let me know. I'd like to be your guy. I'll call you for my next divorce. Thanks for coming by. We really appreciate it, Robert. Thanks for tuning in. Go to Goodreads.com, Fortress, Chris Voss, LinkedIn.com, Fortress, Chris Voss. Chris Voss won in the TikTok and all those crazy places on the internet.

I'm so sick of saying it. I'm just going to say it this way. Be good to each other. Stay safe or else I'll see you next time. Bye-bye.