Foreign. Welcome to Elevate with Elsner. Join us for inspiring conversations with individuals who have transformed their lives and are making a difference through the work that they do. And now, here's your host, Blake Elsner. Welcome back to Elevate with Elsner. Today we're diving into a topic that most people don't think about until something goes wrong. Insurance. But here's the reality. One accident, one storm, one lawsuit, or one unexpected event can completely change the financial trajectory of a family or a business. That's why I'm excited to sit down with Dan Luigi. Dan has spent years helping individuals, families and business owners protect what they've worked hard to build. Today, we're going beyond policies and premiums. We're going to be talking about the biggest mistakes people make, the misconceptions that could cost you thousands, and the real world stories that show why having the right protection matters. So whether you're a homeowner, business owner, parent, or just someone trying to make smarter financial decisions, this conversation could save you a lot of money and a lot of headaches. So, Dan, welcome to the show. Hey, thanks so much for having me on. I appreciate it, Blake. Absolutely. So tell us a little bit about who Dan is and how you got into the world of podcasting. I'm sorry, insurance. Yeah, a little. A little bit of both. A little bit of both. Since I. Since I have a hand in both of those. So I grew up in Fenton, Missouri. So local guy. My dad worked hard all his life. His dad worked hard all his life. My mom's dad worked hard all their life. All at the same place, all at the Chrysler factory back when it existed. Now it's Amazon and supplement superstores first form over there. So kind of funny, years ago I got to work out at first form and I'm thinking, man, my dad did labor in this place and I'm moving weights. So came from kind of a blue collar background. Hard work, you know, caring for others. My dad, my dad's a gem. He mows some of his neighbors lawns just to help others keep up with things. You know, he's in his 80s, but yet he's still getting out there taking care of people. So it's kind of where I came from. And a friend of mine recruited me into insurance and took them a long time to bring me over, but, you know, because it's boring, right? So there's no way I was going to do that. And then once I understood, you know, you get to take care of people, talk to lots of people, and Then also, as you referenced at the beginning, help people avoid some pretty big potential mistakes. And that's, that's when it becomes pretty rewarding when somebody took some advice that you gave them or you were able to ask a good question to uncover something and then protect them down the road. So, yeah, they've been doing this almost 15 years now. And yeah, there's been some pretty, pretty monumental things that have happened over the years. Yeah, I think that's the difference between a great insurance agent and one that's not so great is the fact that they ask questions and they. You dive deep into the why and kind of figure out the person's, you know, personal story, what they need, what you know exactly is, you know, their goals in life. So that definitely, it seems to be right up your alley. So when you, like, look at going into like the whole insurance world, were you ever just, were you passionate about that or you started to say someone recruited you, but what, what truly was it just the help of others? Is that what kind of drove you into this business? So it was kind of a strange time in my life. I'd been in sales and sales management for years, had done pretty well, and my wife was tired of me working nights and weekends. She's like, you got to go get a 9 to 5. So I tried, and all of the 9 to 5 places said, no, you can't. You're not one of those kind of people. We can't bring you on no matter what. So the insurance thing, I'm like, well, that, that's kind of nine to five. Like, that fits my wife's qualifications. And then it was still sales. And then after I got in the door, I'm like, oh my gosh, I can do this my way. Like, I can do this in a people kind of way. I don't have to cold call and do all these things like other people do. I can just do it, you know, my way relationally and build relationships with people long term. And that's when I got super fired up about it. I had wanted to be a financial planner years ago. Very difficult industry to, to cut your teeth in. Not that insurance is easy or real estate, it's not. However, you know, make a few right steps, have a few good relationships that can help you along the way, and you can go a long way in all those careers. Yeah. And obviously, you know, you gotta, you gotta enjoy people, you gotta be able to help people. And they're like, you say it's a very saturated market, just like real estate, just like Loan officer. There's just a lot of people that are in it. So in order to separate yourself from, you know, the majority, what would you say is, like, the most important thing that you do to separate yourself from. From the pack? There's a couple different ways of thinking through that question. One is, most of my referrals come from real estate agents, mortgage lenders, financial planners, CPAs, attorneys. So I look to just serve individual relationships in those industries in whatever way I can. One guy's like, man, one thing you do for me that I'd like you to keep doing is whenever I'm around you, I'm a healthier person. Like, I eat right and drink right? I'm like, are you kidding me? Like, nope. Like, that's a massive value for me. Like, I don't need help on the business side. No kidding. And other people have said various things over the years that I could help them out with. Or as you build relationships, you're like, oh, like, they love to go to the Cubs game, or somebody else loves. Well, there's all kinds of different things that people love to do. And sometimes they just need somebody to be there with them or, you know, be a cheerleader for them. So often people say, well, how'd you connect with so? And so I'm like, they. They needed a cheerleader. Like, I didn't have any money, but they could use somebody to fan their flame and help them keep going. So that's something that I think people overlook on that side of things when they're looking to build relationships with people, is that you have so much value to somebody else, and it could be just being there to support them. And then from a client standpoint, just over the years, experience, like working Dave Ramsey courses. So I've led those over the years. And then being in insurance for a long time and understanding it's not always about the lowest cost. Typically, people don't actually want the lowest cost. They usually want to be protected. And years of experience has helped me identify different things that other people may overlook. Yeah. And thinking about when you say, you know, you overprotected, I think that's one thing that is a major red flag inside that industry is that, hey, we can get your premium low, but we're going to obviously undercut your. Your structure. Or if it's a, you know, an entire brick house that, you know, has a policy, a homeowner's policy on a entire brick house. To rebuild an entire brick house is most likely not the cost of your policy. And I see that all the time. Is that true? Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, people will insure a, you know, brick house that maybe because we use replacement cost calculators and each company has their own thing, but I'll see$600,000 replacement cost things insured for 200 grand. I'm like, that is how much, you know, your loans were, you know, about, but depends what you want to protect the structure for. And a lot of people I talk to just don't know what they're insured for at all. And when you look at like a, say, a mortgage company that's servicing the loan, you're required to carry, you know, proper insurance. Correct. So how, how are they able to, you know, underinsure a. A structure that is obviously backed by a mortgage company? Yeah. So in that case, like, say it's a $200,000 loan. The mortgage company just mainly cares that their loan's covered. And sometimes they say, hey, can you write on there it's replacement costs? Can you this, can you this, can you this? But usually they don't dig in too much once they've seen their loan number is covered and they get the, you know, they get the check written out to them. So it's their money first. So they don't care so much about whether the client's taken care of. As long as they're taken care of is the main thing. Yeah, that's a scary, that's a scary part right there. Especially the fact of if you, how you just said that, like, hey, the big company is going to take care of themselves, but they might not take care of you, the customer. And that's, that's definitely eye opening. And I think everybody should probably go back and open their homeowners insurance policy and make sure that they are protected in terms of, you know, if something were to happen that the, you know, the replacement cost is actually going to get you where you're actually living in. So I think that's, that's a big, big issue. Yeah. I'll give you a quick replacement cost story. I was working with a guy, he owns a fairly large construction company. They build subdivisions and they also built some custom houses. So he's kind of an expert on construction. I had asked him, I said, hey, how much would it cost to tear the house down or how much would it cost to rebuild this house? And he goes, oh, that'll be 500,000. Okay, this is. And it's about that price if I were to sell it. In reality, he sold it a year later, back when things weren't like what they were. Appreciation wasn't crazy back then. Year later, he sold it for 600,000. But as I was insuring it, I did my replacement cost calculator. It came up to$896,000. He's a builder, he's an expert on costs. 500,000 is his off the top of his head number. So I got almost a$400,000 delta. I'm like, this is not good. How do I bridge the gap? And so I said, hey, here's the replacement cost number. I know you're gonna think this is crazy since it's so far different. Can I ask you a couple questions? He says, yeah. He goes, that's wrong. I said, I'm not gonna argue and say it's right, but can I ask you a few more questions? He goes, yeah, go ahead. And I hey, did you think about taking out the foundation? Did you think about removal cost? Did you think about custom construction since you're not building a sub? We walked all the way through it. And he goes, Man, that's 350, 000 extra dollars that I hadn't. You know, you put me on the spot. And I go, I didn't put you on the spot. I was just asking you what you thought. He goes, well, 500 is what it would cost if it was. You know how I normally build houses, okay? He goes. I go, so which is right, 500 or 896? He goes, 896 is still wrong. But 850, we're close enough to. I'll give it to the reconstruction calculator. And so when I talk to people, sometimes people say, well, I just built the house, so it's, I know how much the construction costs are, but they have no idea about tearing it down and rebuilding it. So the reconstruction cost is the big number. So like the brick that you referenced earlier, that's one of, one of the, you know, big differences. People all the time say, I bought it for this, why should I insure it for that? Then that's why, if you want to rebuild the house and have it back, that's what it's going to cost. Yeah, that, that's the whole, the thing about the, the reconstruction. A lot of homes in St. Louis, as we know, and we're both from St. Louis, there's a lot of brick around here. And I feel like as homeowners, we should probably all do our due diligence, open up our homeowners insurance policy and just see what, see what you're covered for and what you're paying. And if you have any questions, obviously you'd call Dan. So we'll continue on. Tell us a little bit. You know, everyone probably in this industry has, has a bunch of crazy claim stories, but give us something that maybe is new in regards to maybe the new deductible. I know there's a whole new process with that, how that works. Is there, is there a crazy claim that in the recent times or maybe even, you know, a decade ago is fine as well? Give us something that, you know, would stick with us? Yeah. One that sticks out to me was when I was kind of a brand new agent. There was a guy, he was a US citizen, but he also resided in Mexico in the off season. But he did not shut his house down for the winter. He didn't winterize it. He thought he had had the utility company turn the water off. So he calls and says, hey, we got a big problem. Water everywhere. And I said, oh, have you talked to the claims adjuster? I did. And they, they denied the claim. I said, they did. How come? And he says, I go, well, first, how high was the water in your basement? He goes, yeah, the pipe froze. It was only below 32 degrees for 3, 3 days. One winter, three days. It was nuts. I said, how high was the water? He goes, I'm not sure how tall the ceiling is in the basement. A neighbor had seen water pouring out of the basement window. Turns out it was the upstairs bathroom in a second story home. I said, why did they deny your claim? He goes, well, I've been in Mexico for the last three months. I said, was anybody living at your house, your kids or. He goes, no, no, no. I left. We all left. I said, she had a vacant house for three months. Nobody around. I'm like, there's nothing I can do to help you. He had a standard homeowner's policy and didn't tell us that he vacated it and his claim got denied. I'm shocked. I know where the house is and it's still standing. I have no idea how because it's $200,000 of damages. So those products, if you do have that, that vacation home and your primary residence, what, what type of insurance should we have? So in that situation, just let your agent know, hey, this is what I'm doing. We ensure some people that, you know, live here and live in Florida. It's like, you know, help us understand what you're doing. You know, One of the guys goes, well, it depends how long the baseball Cardinals are in the playoffs of which one's my primary house? So that's kind of true. That's kind of true. Tough one. But a lot of it has to do with having somebody maybe around your house to take care of it, or maybe having somebody, you know, stay there for a while just to keep up with it. So had a client get married and on their honeymoon, they're in Hawaii and their pipes froze also. And they had house guests and everything. So the house guests took care of it pretty quickly and minimized the damage. But they were going to be gone for seven more days. And I'm like, oh, my gosh. But, you know, that was$67,000 and that was taken care of quickly. I can only imagine if that would have kept going for seven more days before they found out about it. Yeah. So I think the moral of the story is maybe it's not necessarily the product. It's just, hey, having somebody that's going to check up on the house, like you're saying some type of that somebody that steps in there and runs the water every now and again and just make sure that everything's going well while you're gone. Yeah. I had a call just before we jumped on and it was a real estate agent. Real estate agent says, hey, I got a client. Person who owns the house passed away, brother let the insurance policy lapse. We called Big Red and Big Red said they could get it back on and, you know, but there might be a roof inspection. I said, it doesn't matter. There's nobody that lives in that house. Would you put a homeowner's policy back on it? I'm sorry. Big Red said they would take care of you. They don't insure vacant houses. Well, it's going to be 130 bucks a month. It doesn't matter what it costs per month. Mike, how long is this house going to be? Around six. Six weeks. I'm like, let's put a vacant policy on it. Cost whatever cost, 450 bucks, one time fee. Why are we comparing the store Ongoing? And she's somebody I knew pretty well. I'm like, FYI, these conversations happen all the time. And it is so difficult to get somebody to switch from their monthly payment thinking to a one time cost thinking, like, until you sell the house, that's how long you pay for the vacant insurance. And then you're not paying for it anymore. You don't own the house. So I get a little fired up about that one because it's so hard to get somebody to understand. On one hand, this Isn't ensuring anything. So let's just do it the right way once and, you know, protect you just in case the fire happens or the tornado happens. Yeah, exactly. That's right. You rather be safe than sorry. So what. What would you say if you could. If you could review every listener's insurance policy right now? What's like, the first thing you would check right now in the current timing of things? You had mentioned earlier about deductibles, I'd look at their deductibles and see what they are. So a lot of times people do have the right replacement cost or within reason on their house, but the deductibles just recently changed. So years ago, Oklahoma is known for having tornadoes, A lot of wind, tornadoes, a lot of damage. And so they've had a separate deductible for wind and hail for years. Maybe two years ago, all the realtors in town were saying there's a rumor that you couldn't buy new house insurance if you had a roof older than 10 years. It wasn't exactly true, but there were quite a few companies not insuring houses with roofs older than 10 years. And one of the reasons they couldn't was because they had to insure all those roofs at replacement cost, and they didn't want to be buying people roofs in a time where all the insurance companies were losing money, which sounds crazy, but you can go look up the public companies and see for three years, insurance companies lost money. So they kind of took how Oklahoma was doing insurance, and we're now two tornado alleys have converged, and they're hitting St. Louis. So there is a lot more wind, There is a lot more tornadic activity, more hail, everything else. And they switch those deductibles to a percentage deductible most of the time. Usually it's 1% of the replacement cost of the home. Some of these companies are doing 2% and 3%. So do the math. 3% of a $500,000 rebuild house, that's $15,000, which might be about how much it costs to replace that roof. Dan, I got a 3% deductible. It's wonderful. Yeah. Why is that wonderful? Because if I got a$15,000 problem, I just pay 3% of the 15,000. So you're doing the math right, except for with the wrong inputs. So I had a client, she ran a bank, and she really thought a 3. Her. In her case, it was a 2% deductible. She thought it was great. And then we walked through it. She goes, oh my gosh, can you fix this for me right away? And we were able to and able to take care of her, but people that are smart people sometimes understand things poorly. She's like, why did that other insurance person tell me wrong? And I'm like, well, tell me what they said. And as it came out, they just said, hey, you got a 2% wind hail deductible. And then she did her own math and figured out her own answer. She just did it wrong. That so why. It was all because of, they changed that policy because of people, the, the insurance companies just losing so much money. Right? That was. Yeah. So as you know, homeowners, we want to pay as low as we can on homeowners insurance. But for the most part, everybody I talk to says I want to make sure fires, tornado, you know, the big stuff happens, I want to be taken care of. So I don't want to skimp there, but I also want to pay a low price. Cool. With the insurance companies, they were having to buy 20, 30, 40,000, $60,000 roofs and siding and everything else. And finally they got fed up with it. They were losing money on house insurance forever. And we don't want to be spending 4 or 500,000 or 4 or $5,000 year for regular, regular houses, Regular house insurance, I get it. On the million, two million, three million dollar houses, those should cost more. But on, you know, regular three, four, five hundred thousand dollar houses, we don't want to spend four or five grand. And for the insurance companies to make that work, they had to raise the wind and hail deductibles, basically the roof and siding deductibles higher so that as the insurance or the roofing companies were doing for the longest time, hey, we'll take care of your deductible, you'll get a free roof. Just let us come out and free roof for you. And you know when every 10 years you're putting a new roof on for in with the insurance company's dollar and, and roofs skyrocketed in price recently. So. I know. And so when you look at like the difference of some of like when people are getting, I feel like people are getting roofs and with all the other damage or the exterior damage, people weren't basically paying anything because they'd find, you know, the, the gutters or the certain stuff that had dings that technically didn't need to be replaced. Right. And then that would up, you know, make up for the deductible. Is that still like a thing? I don't know, I'm confused on how that process really works, but I. All the time that's what these roofers do. I mean, is that fraud? Is that like. Yeah, yeah. So they, in theory they should be super careful about how they do that. But what, what can work is they call it the cash value. So like let's say the gutters. Say the gutters cost$1,500 to take care of. There's an actual cash value. So not replacement cost. Replacement cost is 1500. Maybe the cash value price is say a thousand. So there's a $500 difference. So if the person never replaces the gutters, they don't get the $500. They do get to have the thousand. And then that's how they were taking care of deductibles or should have been taking care of deductibles. What they shouldn't have been doing is saying, hey, we put new gutters on this one and taking all the money. Okay. So that's. Okay. That's interesting how that, how that all works because I was, you know, it's, you're, you're hearing like, oh, you. I mean they advertise it sometimes. Like. Yeah, they still advertise it, which I think is crazy. So you're telling me I've got my seven or fifteen thousand dollar deductible and you're just going to get me a free roof. I don't know how they're going to make up that difference or if they just. Hey, not on your policy. Yeah. With that much collateral damage, I guess is what they're hoping for. I'm guessing that I think it's just so new and they haven't changed their marketing plan. You know, if you got one plan, the market conditions change. Until they come up with a new plan, I guess they're going to keep running the same old play. Yeah, that is true. Well, well, that's a good thing. So everyone go check your deductible and kind of see what, see what's going on there. So next little quick thing, obviously what life event should immediately trigger an insurance review. Kids, you know, obviously a house. But what life event would it be? Kids, Marriage. Yeah, so all those type different things. Yeah. Just when really anything changes in a big way in your life, you know, finish a basement would be one that a lot of people don't think to call their insurance agent. You know, separately when you have kids or maybe you take on extra debt or you know, whatever it is, you might consider having life insurance. One thing I Tell people that are younger and healthy is, you know, typically you're going to get older and you're going to get less healthy. Most people usually don't figure it out and get healthier over time. And life insurance can be super inexpensive. I've had, unfortunately, a few clients that had unfortunate things happen to them or their family members. And it's nice when there is a backstop there to take care of things and, and give some financial cushion to the situation. Yeah, I think that's just, you know, some of the stuff that, you know, comes out of the. Out of the blue and stuff that you can't control. This is just here to, to help you and, and help you make that, you know, next. Next decision or get over a tough, tough outcome in life. And, and I think that's why insurance is there. And people, you know, there's a lot of times too people, I hear, they're. They're like, I don't want to use my insurance. And I'm like, well, why do you have insurance then? That's another. Another thing. It's like, if you have insurance and you need to use it, use it, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's different. I get a funny phone call one time from a guy similar to you, and he's frantic on the phone, and I'm like, oh, something really bad happened. He says, hey, I was cutting my grass and I just threw a rock through my window. And he, ah. I said, oh, man, no way. Like, which window? He's like, my dining room window? I said, yeah, what else happened? This is. No, that was it, man. Like it. It busted it. Like it's bad. And I said, okay, what do you want to do? He says, man, I got to get an insurance claim in right away. And I said, cool, let's do it. Can I ask you a different question? He's like, yeah, what is it? How much does a dining room window cost, do you think? Just guess. He says, I don't know, about 400 bucks. I pause, and he just starts laughing. This is. Why did I call you? Because it was traumatic. Like, that was a huge deal. Like, when does somebody's dining room window just blow up? He's just rolling, laughing. He's like, man, I'm so glad that you helped me think through this before I tarnished my record and had a claim on there and then go through a whole process to find out I'm not getting any money. And, you know, claims adjuster pointing out math to me that $400 is different than a $1,500 deductible. Yeah, right. Yeah, there's quite a. Yeah, get a. Get a mark on your. On your insurance and. Yeah. Pay more out of pocket. That doesn't make sense, right? Yeah, yeah, I like that. But it's true. I mean, it is like, you know, if there's been times where I'm like, oh, my gosh, I call my insurance agent. You're like, oh, my gosh, like, let's call the insurance guy. Like, you're like, it's just like a realtor, like, you know, it's just the other day somebody, you know, called me because they're asking about homeowners insurance, like, if they needed to pay at the end of the year if it came out of their mortgage. And it's just interesting, like, two years. I'm glad you get those calls, too. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. I'm like, yeah. I'm like, actually, I'm like, like, so you're paying homeowners insurance and it's in your mortgage. I'm like, so it sounds like you're paying twice. I go, you better. And I'm like, this is. You better actually call your insurance agent for that one, because that's over me. So you're calling me to ask about your mortgage account. Yeah, exactly. You're asking basically your escrow account. Yeah, yeah. But, yeah, you know, I'm like, is it, you know, sometimes you think, well, I guess it's somewhat of a compliment that they call you. Right? Yeah. Yeah. I don't take any offense to it. I'm like, I get it. I'm. I'm more comfortable to talk to and easier to reach. So. All right, so one of the last things let's just kind of get with, obviously, inflation rising, home values, etc, are there more in cars, like, are there more people out there on the road than ever before or that are uninsured? It sure seems like it in Missouri. Last I heard, it was one out of three. Have no insurance at all or have just the state minimum of 25,000 for people and $10,000 for property damage. So Missouri still has a $10,000 minimum for property damage. So occasionally I'll be talking to somebody like, oh, yeah, I got. Got, you know, Missouri insurance and everything that Missouri requires. And I'm like, oh, my goodness. I'm pretty certain they've got 25,000 for medical injuries and$10,000 for, you know, run into a car. You know, I don't know. Last time you've looked at new car prices or used car prices, New cars hanging around, fifty thousand dollar average price. And a used car seems like you can't get one for a 16 year old kid less than 10 grand. That's true. So yes, inflation has gone crazy when it comes to cars in homes and. But that what it leads me to say is like, hey, you know, you have a, a part like you can get in your product, in your policy that like can prevent or protect you from the uninsured. Correct? Yeah, you can get underinsured and uninsured coverage. You can get comprehensive and collision coverage. So if you do get smacked by somebody that doesn't have insurance or only has maybe the state minimum, maybe they put you in the hospital. You know, you can get up to$250,000 per person, even up to 500,000 or a million or more, you know, if you care about the medical injury side of things. And then your comprehensive and collision will take care of your own car depending on what happens to it, you know, hit, run or hail damage or even theft. Yeah, that's one thing that kind of sparks my, my mind about the deductible. I keep my collision, my acts of God, as I say, deductible down to 100 because if I get a rock in my windshield, I'm not, I don't want to pay anything more than 100. So that's, yes, you may be able to get separate coverage called glass coverage. So if the windshield's the thing that you care about, you might raise your deductible to five hundred or a thousand for the acts of God stuff if you're okay with hail dam, you know, whatever. But you can buy usually glass coverage. That counts as a lesser claim. It's just a glass claim. It's not a comprehensive claim. It doesn't cost much money at all. You might be able to save money. And also when you do file the glass claim, being a realtor, you drive a lot and are on all kinds of roads and highways and everything else. So anyway, it could be a real beneficial way to have zero deductible or $50 deductible on that since that's the big concern. Yeah, I think, I'd say that's a great point. I think that is, you know, I learn something new every day and I just learned that right there like that. That's impressive that I didn't even know that there was some type of a glass insurance, you know, out there about that. So hey, I'm sure as a lot of us, we keep our collision most of the time a lot of it is, you know, our, in our windshields, like they get cracked quite often with things flying off trucks. And if you drive on the highway, I mean, it's just, it's almost inevitable. It's like termites. It's, it's not winning or it's not if, it's when. So. Right, right, absolutely. Seems to be. So I appreciate you coming on here. Any, any final things you want to give us about the insurance industry or where we can find you or if anybody wants to kind of dive into their policy, what, what should they do? Yeah, so real quick, for the last three or so years, I've been publicly talking at various events and to various groups and they've had questions about deductible, you know, what's the future look like. And for years I've had not a great future outlook. Like I've had to give negative consumer news, hey, it's going to get worse. Deductibles are going to get higher, prices are going to get higher. And last year, the good news is, and this sounds funny, the insurance companies made money. That's terrible. I don't want them to make money. No, no, no, they made money. So what that means is they don't have to keep penalizing us, they don't have to keep raising the prices, keep changing the deductibles. Like they've kind of figured the formula. And as long as things stay similar to what they are now, kind of, we're back to having things figured out and companies can be competitive again. So for the longest time they weren't trying to be competitive, so prices were going through the roof since nobody was trying to get new customers. So nowadays there are some potential options out there where companies are being aggressive and trying to find new customers. So anyway, good news, now we might see our car insurance prices come down and house insurance prices are stabilizing. So there's some good news. And then, yeah, if anybody wants to do a review, ask, ask some questions, you know, one off or just wants to do a full review, I'd be glad to connect with you. My last name's easy to find. L U I G as in George, S as in Sam. So you can just do a search, find me. You'll get my direct number, which is 314-503-0964. And yeah, hit me up on Facebook or direct through my cell phone. Yeah, glad to talk to whoever and answer any questions you have. Yeah. And I have noticed that actually they were talking about how the prices of car insurance has Actually started to come down again. I did read that. So that's, that's a great, great thing for us. Right? Yep. Just like your real estate. In the national news. They say things may or may not actually be true here in St. Louis, but yeah, that, that national headline about car insurance getting reduced is true. I've seen, I've seen that since about February. Things have been coming down. Yeah, that's good. And realistically, you know, I think, I think we give. We. During the, the COVID and all that during, when they were losing money, like, oh my gosh, our insurance is skyrocketing. I don't think mine really went up more than 20, $30 a month. Like at like, that's a lot maybe for some people, but it's really not at the end of the day for what we're actually getting and ensuring and protecting. It's really not a backbreaker when you look at everything else. It's actually quite nice compared to some of these other bills that, you know, you got to pay and you don't get a lot of protection anyway from it. So. Yeah, when it was like traditionally a 3% cost increase every year, give or take, and then people were getting hit with 20 and even 40% or higher increases like that felt like a huge deal. But most people, you know, saw the headlines or were quick to understand, hey, you know, there has been a lot of, a lot of weird stuff happening, like people driving a hundred still, they got comfortable driving 100 on the highway during COVID when there was nobody on the road. Unfortunately, those driving habits stuck around after Covid was over. So there's been a lot of high speed accidents, more than traditional on the highway. So there's been a lot, lot bigger. Yeah, yeah. You know, loss. Yeah. Not, not a great, not a great idea to go that fast. And it's certainly not a great idea to put yourself on camera showing yourself going. It's one of the, the dumbest things I think you can ever do is show yourself going 108 miles an hour on video in a 45 mile an hour zone. Zone. So that's. Don't do that. Yeah. You know, with our phones now working so good with video and communications and everything, that has also tremendously increased the number of accidents out there and the speed at which these things happen. Yeah, no, I, I appreciate it. So if you want to get. When you don't put your foot on the brake. Yes. You looking. That's right. That's. That's another. Yeah. Distracted driving. All time. All time. Well, I appreciate you coming on here and kind of sharing some stories, telling us kind of something we should do, you know, dive into some, you know, thing to kind of refresh your, your insurance policy and kind of know what you're paying for, you know, your deductibles, know your homeowner's insurance and kind of what all is inside that lovely package of insurance stuff. So I appreciate you coming on here. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And if for some reason somebody wants to look at anything life insurance wise, glad to review that stuff takes just a couple of minutes. So sometimes it can be overly complex when it's really a simple, easy, easy product. So a lot of younger people get caught up in some things that are complex where it doesn't need to be and just a short conversation and get things figured out for you. Absolutely. And I think that's, you know, comes down to, you know, it's not always really about policies. It's about protecting your family. It's about protecting your business, your assets, and of course, the life that you've worked so hard to build. And I think the best time to find out what's covered isn't obviously after something happens. Right. It's before. And if today's conversation gets even one person to review their coverage, maybe ask better questions or make smarter decisions than I think we've done our job. So, Dan, thank you for sharing your knowledge, your experience, and some of the stories that really bring this topic to life and to everyone listening. If you found value in today's episode, share with a friend, family member, business owner, or homeowner who could benefit from hearing it. Those shares are what help us continue to grow and bring on amazing guests. Until next time, keep learning, keep growing, and keep elevating. This is Elevate with Aler and we'll see you on the next episode. One love. Thanks so much for tuning into this episode. We sure do appreciate it. 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