Pretty vacant: Cashing in a development trend

Although I’ve been in the business for the past 18 years–starting out as a captive agent with Nationwide Insurance, then five years later off on my own–I’d never planned to specialize in the vacant building market. It was just something that evolved, in part because of our location in the heart of urban Baltimore.

Today, American Insurance has two offices – one in suburban Maryland, and the other in Baltimore –gross revenues of about $1.5 million, and a 60/40 split between personal and commercial business, with specialization in larger used car dealers, contractors and Main Street commercial.

Because of our heavy focus on personal lines, a lot of vacant property business comes our way because of homes and businesses that need coverage. Vacant property makes up about 5 percent of our current book of business. And it’s growing all the time: our vacant building insurance sales have grown as much as 25 percent year over year for the past three years.

This specialty evolved in part because of our location in a gentrifying section of Baltimore, where many people are buying older homes and fixing them up. Our clients run the gamut from developers, individual homeowners, banks and mortgage holders for repossessed properties.