How Insurance Works for Small Businesses & Self Employed
In Understanding How Insurance Works for small businesses & the self-employed, Eric Geier, founder of Puresurance, joins host William Glass to discuss insurance and business. You’ll learn:
- Understanding Health Insurance for Small Businesses and the self-employed
- Biggest misconceptions around insurance for small businesses
- Relationships are more important than ever in business
- Having a servant mentality and the importance of word of mouth marketing
Our Sponsors
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About Eric Geier
Eric Geier is the CEO of Puresurance, advising business owners and entrepreneurs on the implementation of life insurance as a retirement vehicle and custom-designed health coverage solutions. With over 25 years of experience on Wall Street, Eric is a financial professional with a lifelong goal of helping people with their personal finances and retirement plans.
Learn more about Eric Geier: https://puresurance.com/
Transcription
This transcription is autogenerated and may contain errors.
William Glass: [00:00:00] Are you a small business owner or freelancer and unsure about the health insurance you have, or maybe don’t have any health insurance. If so, then this episode is for you. We’re diving into the misconceptions that small business owners and freelancers have when it comes to health insurance, what you can afford, what’s adequate coverage and something that won’t break the bank, sit down with Eric Geiger from pure Sharon’s, who talks about all the things that you need to know as a small business.
I myself had these misconceptions and it was really eye opening to understand a little bit more about how the industry works and what you can actually access that you won’t see just doing a plain Google search online. In addition, Eric talks about his experience on wall street and how he ended up moving into the insurance business and why relationships are so, so important even in today’s day and age, where you can do everything online and you don’t have to talk to a human.
That gets into word of mouth marketing and how that fuels his growth as a business owner and why it should feel yours as well. I’m William Glass CEO, and co-founder of estrogen, of course, your host of the Silicon alley podcast. If you haven’t already go ahead and pound that subscribe button. So you get notified when it says air every Friday without further ado.
I hope you enjoyed today’s episode of the Silicon alley podcast, featuring the Eric Geiger. Are you interested in growing and scaling your business? Welcome to the Silicon alley podcast, where you’ll hear from entrepreneurs, venture, capitalists, and top performers on what it truly takes to grow and scale a business.
You’ll walk away with actionable insights. You can apply in your own business and life now to William Glass, the CEO and co-founder of ostrich and your host of the Silicon alley podcast. Eric welcome to the Silicon alley podcast. Super excited to have you on today. I
Eric Geier: [00:01:40] am very, very happy to be here. Thank you for inviting me.
William Glass: [00:01:44] Yeah, absolutely. And, um, I’m excited to dive in and talk about a few different things. Cause you’ve had an interesting journey. Having lived overseas, been in the equities business and been in finance. So definitely want to dive deep and now opening up your own, your own business. So really excited to touch on a number of topics.
Eric Geier: [00:02:02] Cool. Yeah, there’s a lot of history there. I’m a little older than I, uh, than I wish I was at this point in my life. But with age comes history and wisdom. So yeah, let’s do it, man. Absolutely.
William Glass: [00:02:15] Yeah. So have you, so I’d like to, to kick this off, have you always been interested in food? Cause that’s where you ended up, right, right after
Eric Geier: [00:02:21] school.
Yeah. So I, I pretty much didn’t have a choice. I mean, I was interested at an early age, pretty much right out of the womb. My grandfather and my father would have me looking at the wall street journal with them at a very, very young age. So, um, I don’t think I had a shot at doing anything else, but being in finance.
Gotcha.
William Glass: [00:02:41] Yeah. As a kid. Yeah. Wall street journal at a, at a young age. That’s a, that’s definitely unique. So talk, talk to me about that. So did that, how did that interest kind of grow from, from studying wall street journal and your father and grandfather?
Eric Geier: [00:02:55] So my father passed away when I was, um, 12 years old and.
Big profound impact on my life. So finance to me was a way of carrying on his legacy a little bit. Not that he’d loved finance so much, but it’s what he did. And it brought a connection to him in that way, if that makes any sense. So, you know, I guess when the world is open to you and you can choose anything, you gravitate towards those things that brings some sort of meaning in your life and finance accomplish that for me.
William Glass: [00:03:29] Yeah, that’s really interesting. And, uh, you know, that’s got to have been really tough, losing, losing a parent’s never easy, but especially, especially at that age, how did that, so it made you interested in finance, but how did that impact your journey and
Eric Geier: [00:03:43] career? So life became a lot more serious for me. I would say at that point, I would say my childhood pretty much ended at that time.
You know, I still did mischievous things and, you know, had fun, but I definitely took a more serious track after that. And, you know, school became more important to me. What would go on after school would, would, would happen to have a huge effect on me? I mean, In lieu of taking a couple of classes in my senior year in high school, I was able to get a job at Merrill Lynch, 17, 18 years old, working for a huge broker, which gave me great retail experience.
I didn’t end up on the retail side. I ended up on the wholesale side covering asset managers, but it did give me a, a lot of exposure. To the markets. And, uh, that was right around the time. You’re too young to remember, but black Monday when, uh, the market fell over 508 points, and that was the biggest single day drop, uh, up to that point, not including the great depression, of course, you know, to be a part of that.
And to see what kind of impact that had on people was, was, was extremely profound. So, you know, from there. I, I was kind of all in on the finance side. I, I studied it in school and went right from college to, to a brokerage company named Instinet who basically invented electronic trading. So it was really exciting to be a part of that company, uh, during the advent of electronic trading.
So the fact that when you look the New York stock exchange, you don’t see any brokers or anything on the floor. Uh, you have Instinet to a thing for that. Yeah, I know.
William Glass: [00:05:28] That’s yeah. That’s, that’s really interesting. It’s actually. And what was that black Monday? Was that 87 or was that 89? What’s 7 87, right?
Yeah. So context, my, my dad had just gotten licensed as a, as a broker and six months later, six months later that yeah, black Monday happened. And that was, that was the end of his, his career in finance. But. Yeah. Yeah. So you also didn’t have the chops for cold calling. He was on the retail side trying to, you know, here’s the phone book go, go
Eric Geier: [00:05:58] dial.
Yeah. And it literally was a phone book back in those days.
William Glass: [00:06:02] Yeah. So that’s, that’s really interesting. So you were at the very kind of forefront of the internet, really taking over trading. And now when you look at it today, it’s just, it’s a whole, whole nother world. As you said, no traders on the floor.
It’s mostly algorithms that are doing a lot of the heavy lifting. This
Eric Geier: [00:06:17] was actually presented. This was, they called them idiot boxes. These were these screens that we would put on people’s desks and it would give them access to trading activity that was happening off the exchanges. And eventually we, we achieved the critical mass and all of these.
Brokers and specialists who would refuse to do business with us, we’re forced to be cost that’s where the liquidity was. So it became a snowball effect. And, you know, as you know, you could just see what’s going on right now that it was a successful, uh, endeavor. So yeah, even before the internet, we were using Lotus Lotus notes to communicate with each other.
So yeah,
William Glass: [00:07:01] those, those were the days. Yeah. That’s really, really interesting. Take it, taking it back in terms of how technology is changed, the finance industry in general, could you just quickly to make sure that we don’t lose anyone? Could you break down when you mentioned you started out on the retail side and then move to the wholesale side, could you break down what that is in case someone’s listening and is like, what the heck are these finance terms are being thrown around.
Eric Geier: [00:07:27] Sure. So retail side is just, you know, like a stockbroker talks to an individual investor that’s retail. When you go and you talk to your stockbroker, your financial advisor, whomever it is who manages your money for you. That is a retail relationship. When you’re talking about representing the asset managers who ultimately invest the money that you have, that’s the wholesale side.
I worked on a trading desk for the better part of 25 years. And my clients were the largest asset managers and pension funds in the world. And I helped them invest in the equity markets around the world. So that was my. John, that was that’s the wholesale side. Uh, and, uh, yeah, I mean, it was great. I got to, um, work obviously in New York, that’s where I’m from and spent most of my career there, but also, uh, in Hong Kong where I lived for a while, I’m helping Instinet grow that Asian equity business and all know.
Pretty much traveled around Asia. Uh, we had an office in Japan, you know, in, in Europe we had several offices and I would, I would be there as well. So, but yeah, it was, it was a real exciting time because international equities were just kind of becoming a thing. Asset managers, portfolio managers, we’re looking for exposure outside of the United States.
And there were emerging markets at that time that were very attractive Brazil being one of them, bunch of Latin American countries, as well as a Southeast Asian country. So, you know, there was a lot of value out there that managers hadn’t gone to before that. And now, you know, the world was just becoming a much smaller place.
William Glass: [00:09:07] Yeah, no, absolutely. It’s really interesting seeing that exposure. What did you learn during that time? Right. 25 years on a trading desk, what are, what are some of the kind of key things that you learned during that time?
Eric Geier: [00:09:20] That nothing stays static. Everything moves very, very quickly and being outside of it for a month, even can have you way behind the curve.
So it was just really, really. Important to always stay ahead of what was going on, because everything was just always in your rear view mirror. So, you know, it forces a focus and a sharpness that other professions don’t have. So yeah, it was good. It was, it was really, really exciting. It was an exciting time to be part of the business.
Certainly things were changing at record. Yeah. At record pace market makers became less and less necessary, more and more things moved over to the electronic side and for good and for bad things and move forward. So one of the disadvantages, as I think electronic trading has taken the relationship out of the business a little bit, but there’s a price to be paid for everything.
So in my opinion, the advantages, um, unquestionably outweighed the, um, the disadvantage.
William Glass: [00:10:23] Yeah, no, that’s, that’s really interesting that you, that you bring up the relationship side of it, because I think at least, you know, I’m coming from a millennial lens as long as if it depends on if you’re working with a fiduciary or if you’re just working with a broker.
And, but that relationship hasn’t really seemed that important. Um, at least to, you know, at least to me, Maybe I’m, maybe I’m not speaking for millennials here, but at least from my, you know, my experience, could you talk about what we’re losing in terms of relationships and what you’re talking about?
Because you know, at least to my mind goes to, well, you know, I can go make decisions myself now, so that’s. That’s better. So what do you think we’ve lost?
Eric Geier: [00:11:02] So that was actually one of the things that made me leave wall street and kind of make an impact on, on a one-to-one level is I’m an old school guy. I think.
Yeah. Technology is great and it should be leveraged, but I don’t think it should be hidden behind and everything done there. I think the human relationship is incredibly efficient. And when, you know, when I started seeing it go away a lot, uh, you know, it made me kind of want to go back to that. And, you know, it made sense for me to choose a different path altogether to get back to that.
So I don’t like the fact that people just sit behind computers all day and I guess. Are in their own little world trying to solve their problems when the, the, the biggest, uh, accomplishments happen between a meeting of the minds. And you just can’t get that behind us. Yeah,
William Glass: [00:12:00] no, that’s really, that’s really insightful thinking about how we do accomplish things together more.
Are you, when you, when you say that, Eric, are you thinking about it from an individual perspective of, you know, setting someone’s personally up for success or are you thinking even at a, at a larger level, um, in terms of the importance of bringing people in.
Eric Geier: [00:12:21] I think people being brought together on a larger level from a philosophical discussion is, is, is something worth having, but I’m just kind of talking about the relationship on a one-to-one basis when you’re doing business with people.
One of the things that I think my clients appreciate so much about me is that. I don’t send them to talk to other people to solve their problems. I am the liaison between them. And in this case, health insurance products. They can reach me at any time. We can talk through different scenarios at any time and I am completely accessible.
And I think that in itself is a differential advantage. And that’s what I got from working on wall street at a time when relationships were still very, very active.
William Glass: [00:13:12] Yeah, no, that makes, that makes sense, Eric. And so you’ve, you’ve kind of touched on it, but can you talk about, and it sounds like it had to do a lot with the relationships, but what led you to start the insurance business?
Eric Geier: [00:13:22] Yeah, so a couple of things. Number one, I wanted to make an impact on an individual. Which I’m doing right now. And the other thing was I wanted to do something myself. Like I was ready. I had worked for these huge mammoth organizations, the last one of which was a 50,000 person bank. And, you know, I wanted to cut the cord.
I wanted to have my own thing and I wanted. Also to find something that was very inefficient market and make it more efficient like we did in trading. Right. So what is the biggest inefficiency in our economy today? Health insurance. So this was an opportunity to bring transparency to something that traditionally has been very opaque.
And those who had the biggest problem with health insurance are the small business owners, the aspiring entrepreneurs, the independent agents, the, you know, the freelancers. Because if they’re not lucky enough to have a spouse, who’s on a group plan that they can leverage, they’re basically on their own to find out, you know, what it is that they can, that they can do.
And insurance is so incredibly important. It’s out of reach for a lot of people. If they don’t know. The right places to look. So, you know, my specialization has always been to uncover that which was previously hidden and make it available to the masses. And I’m doing that with small businesses and health insurance.
William Glass: [00:15:01] Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense. And I can definitely relate since starting, uh, since starting our company right now, we, you know, we’re, we’re individually insuring ourselves. And I essentially joke that I’ve got the, you know, I’m, if, if I don’t get hit by a bus, then my insurance doesn’t cover anything.
Like, you know, that’s the plan that I’ve got. Right? I’ve got that large of a deductible deductible. You know, and, you know, we’ve looked at, as we, as we’re growing the business, looked at different kind of, I guess, HR outsource that, that kind of includes some of the health insurance and other benefits or benefits providers.
And it’s really, really difficult to understand and figure out what’s quality versus. So it’s definitely a problem.
Eric Geier: [00:15:44] Yeah, it is. It’s a huge problem. And being that you’re so young, you have more options than you even realize. And right now, if you have a high deductible, you’re basically just have catastrophic coverage, right?
Correct. If you’re paying your premium every month, I’m guessing you’re not even coming close to hitting your deductible. So you’re basically, you’re basically self-insuring you’re, you’re what the business calls functionally uninsured. So, yes, there are options at your disposal that are a fraction of the cost of a comparable ACA plan that you might not know about just because it’s not in your wheel house.
Right. That’s not your specialization. This is kind of what I do. Right. So I’m always. For value, you know, I’m taking in all the information I need and looking where I can construct policies to benefit business owners like yourself. So insurance is not a, an albatross on your shoulders where it’s either going to cost you a tremendous amount of money.
Right, or it’s not going to cost you a lot of money a month and you’re going to get nothing for it. So, you know, those are, those are, those are the options for a lot of people who are not working with someone who they trust really knows the business inside of that. Yeah. No,
William Glass: [00:16:59] that makes a lot of sense. And you, you mentioned a few different types of people, but who, who, so who do you serve?
Right? You mentioned freelancers, you mentioned small business owners, like. Can you, can you elaborate a little bit on like who that ideal customer is that you’re serving and the problem that you’re solving and the health issue? Yeah.
Eric Geier: [00:17:18] So there’s in order in order to kind of do that, we’ll take a step back just a, just a little bit, because what we’re seeing right now in this economy is a lot of people wanting to go out on their own.
If COVID has kind of done anything, it’s really, people want a better way of life. They don’t want to spend nine, 10 hours in an office every day. Right? One of the biggest concerns for an aspiring entrepreneur is especially if they have a family, is what am I going to do about health insurance? When I leave my cushy group.
Right. So I work with a lot of franchise organizations and marketers who deliver people to franchisors, and we start the conversation really early on so they can get over that hurdle of what am I going to do about my coverage? I have a wife and two kids, or a husband and three kids. We have to be insured and we need good insurance.
It’s not a sexy conversation, but it’s a, it’s an incredibly important conversation. So that’s where we start franchisors will bring me in to talk to existing franchisees, right. Because they’re not, they’re all distinct. Businesses. They’re not a big organization where you can get on a group plan. So we need to solve for existing business owners.
We need to solve for aspiring business owners. And back to your question, like, what is the profile of the person who comes to me? The end user’s profile is the following no insurance, because you can’t. High deductible not getting any value, like in your case, premiums are going up, you know, year over year.
And it’s really becoming unaffordable. That’s a huge reason. And underinsured like gone on one of these faith-based ministry health share programs. That’s not real insurance, but looks a lot like insurance. And because of that, they get buy-in on it, but it’s a very dangerous. Kind of thing. If you know, you’re paying money to transfer a risk and there’s no real transfer of risk.
So I’m kind of on top of it. I that’s my niche. I only work with the self-employed and those who can’t buy or you know, who can’t. Yeah. Yeah, I have a corporate plan or leverage a spouse let’s, you know, and it’s a big niche and it’s growing. And if you’re in your mid twenties, for example, or thirties, it’s not going to be expensive at all.
And you’re going to have coverage. Just kind of look, what else is out there. If you have a really good insurance agent, leverage your really good insurance agent and ask them and say, this is my problem. What, what are my options? And it shouldn’t be that. It is unfortunately, but
William Glass: [00:20:03] no, absolutely. Yeah. And that’s, that’s really, really helpful too, like things for, for narrowing down who you really serve and kind of some of the problems.
Cause I think that that, that helps clarify who that target market is. Right. Gets could get value because health insurance is definitely one of those things where, you know, I don’t know what I would do if I had a family right now, or, you know, I’ve I had pre-existing conditions or anything like that. I probably, that would be a huge factor because it’s such a, a financial constrain, additional risk in addition to going out on your own and starting a business.
So it’s an extra layer of risk that you’ve got to, you’ve got to. And
Eric Geier: [00:20:37] pre-existing conditions are a huge problem in this country because they’re very expensive to treat the government is basically forcing private insurers to take on that risk. So what you’re seeing is deductibles going higher and higher, uh, so they can protect themselves to some extent from having to.
Get somebody sign up and in two weeks, you know, they’re going in for their diabetes treatments, you know, it’s, it’s hard. So what I think you’re going to see in this country and president Biden’s spoken about it is a Medicare like option for those who are under 65 years. And that should support the high risk pool of people.
So private insurers could get back to doing what they do better. And look, there’s ensuring somebody with diabetes. Isn’t a problem. If you have fun. People in their thirties who use the doctor once a year. Right. It all balances it out. It’s when you have 20 people with diabetes and no younger people who are going, that’s the problem, because it’s, what’s called a adverse selection.
You have too much of a bad hole and not enough of a good pool to balance it out. So, you know, that’s what you’re seeing right now in this.
William Glass: [00:21:55] Yeah, no, that’s really, really interesting. And I’m, I’m glad you brought that up because I think it’s just one of those things where when you think about, well, why don’t we ensure everyone, like, you know, there’s just so many different components and forcing private companies to take on risk.
W it’s just going to make it really unaffordable. Yeah.
Eric Geier: [00:22:12] You’re, you’re subsidizing that. That’s why your deductible, so.
William Glass: [00:22:15] Yeah, exactly. So it’s really, really interesting. I’m curious to get your take on, and again, it’s probably going to be a little bit of a case by case basis, but when you think about, um, the benefits of a high deductible plan and HSA, you think about FSA, which is flexible spending account, the, um, health savings account.
Can you talk a little bit about those and how they can impact not just the health aspect of insuring yourself, but also thinking about retirement and long-term and some of the benefits of those programs.
Eric Geier: [00:22:45] So I think that the reason, well, the reason HSA is exists is to fix a systemic problem of high deductibles.
I think what you’re going to see is, and, and I’d like to see more, more companies doing this. Or ICH RAs, where firms are setting an amount of money that they’re going to give to each employee every month. And that employee has the option of buying whatever health insurance, or paying for whatever medical expenses they have.
And not everybody is a one size fits all situation. But when you have a group plan, you know, like, like I worked for this 50,000. Yeah. Person company, you can’t have differences for each person when you have 50,000 or, or even a thousand people, right. You’re on one group plan. So I think the better model going forward is to say, okay, I’m going to give you $500 a month.
Pre-tax income and you can use that money, however you want. As long as it’s, you know, a qualified medical expense. And I think that benefits people, um, altogether, now you talk about, about retirement. I kind of keep the two situations distinct. I use life insurance as a retirement vehicle, and I’m happy to talk to about that because I’m extremely enthusiastic about it.
And it often. So much flexibility around not only saving for retirement, but also in providing a slew of living benefits, such as investing in a business, leveraging cash value of your life insurance policies to buy a business, to put a down payment on a property that you want to live in to pay for your kid’s college or your daughter’s wedding or whatever it is.
There’s a lot of flexibility around life insurance on the living side, rather than. Passing of, um, money tax free to beneficiaries that people don’t consider a lot. One of the things, one of the advantages of putting small business owners in health insurance plans that are affordable for them is now they have all this excess money now that they can use that they can now allocate towards retirement.
Through a life insurance policy and, and things like that. So that’s kind of how I work with that. I keep the two, the two are closely linked, but they serve two very distinct functions. Yeah,
William Glass: [00:25:14] I know that, that, that makes a lot of sense, Eric. And I was just thinking about some of the, the benefits that you can do in an HSA, right?
Where it’s, I think it’s the only one where you can continue to contribute pre-tax and the earnings aren’t. Actually taxed when you pull the money out, but you do have to use it for qualified medical, et cetera. So it’s like one, it’s one of those loopholes where if you assume that at some point in the future, you’re going to need it depending on your age and you have the enough cash and you’re able to risk a little bit of the money by putting it in the markets.
You could potentially grow that
Eric Geier: [00:25:45] the danger in relying on something like that for future health costs. Is that right now? Average cost of nursing home is $90,000. Uh, in about 10 years, it’s going to be about 120,000 based on a 3% inflation rate year over year people. If you’re, if you’re married, you have a 5% chance of living to age.
100. Right. So you really need to, and with that, you’re going to have a higher percentage, a higher chance of needing long-term care. Right. So in order to address those medical issues again, that’s what we do in life insurance contracts, right? Yeah. I agree. I’m not a big HSA person. I get why it’s there, it’s there to fix an issue and it’s nice that you have pre-tax money and you can take it out tax for qualified expenses.
And that’s great, but I don’t really get involved. Too much of that in retirement, there’s better retirement vehicles to address those situations. Sure.
William Glass: [00:26:43] Yeah, absolutely. And that makes sense. And yeah, there’s obviously limitations to every product. Right. And every, and every situation is going to be different in terms of, so we’ve talked a lot about life insurance now.
There’s different types of life insurance, right? So there’s there’s term and there’s whole, I’m sure there’s probably a. Hybrids and mixtures, but those are kind of the two, can you talk to me a little bit about the difference between term and whole, because whole has been vilified for the most part, right.
Okay.
Eric Geier: [00:27:11] Yeah. Yeah. So there’s a lot of noise out there around term policies that it’s better to buy a term policy and invest the difference as opposed to buying a permanent life insurance policy. That could be more expensive. And using that as an investment vehicle term is doesn’t have a lot of value. How do I want to say this really nicely terms sucks unless you’re young and it’s your own, the only option and you can’t do anything else.
Right. And the idea that for retirement, that you’re going to buy term and invest the difference is unrealistic because human nature is going to say that you’re not disciplined enough to invest the difference. And if you are. Disciplined enough to invest the difference. You’re not going to achieve the same set of returns that you would if the money was invested on your behalf.
So I think the greatest, um, benefit that term policies provide is the. Health profile that you can grandfather in when you buy permanent life insurance, when you can afford permanent life insurance, right term term policies have no cash value at all. Only about 2% of all term policies ever pay. But if you’re, if you’re 25 and you’re married and you have a child, you have another one on the way it’s going to be cheap to buy a term policy.
And you know, it’s good protection. But if you have the option, I’m always in favor of buying permanent policy and within permanent policies, you have whole life and you have universal life. And the difference really is whole life is, is fixed premiums, uh, throughout the life, uh, with a fixed rate of return, a universal life has more flexibility around paying premiums and you have the chance of better returns because it’s, it’s tied to often an index like indexed universal life.
It’s very popular right now. Yeah, those are the two. They both can accumulate cash value. You can use that cash value. For practically anything. And obviously both have death benefits. The whole life policy is a fixed death benefit. The universal life policy has a, has a death benefit that can be adjusted based on your, your cash needs while living.
So, yeah, but it is. But it’s a better product, right? So I guess the best way to explain a universal policy and the costs around it is assuming that you are a real estate developer and you build a five story building. You have to pay the mortgage on the entire five story building. Right. But the government in the first year is only going to let you take rent from the first one.
Okay, so you have a five story building to pay a mortgage on, and you’re only getting revenue on the first floor, year, two floors, one and two, you can take revenue from, and then year three, you start realizing a little bit of profit and then so on and so forth. And that’s when the cash starts accumulating.
So yeah, you pay into it more than you get out of it in the beginning. But over time that cash value is going to help you bridge the gap between your retirement. Maybe you have an annuity, your social security, whatever that shortfall is that life insurance product could be a great tool to help you bridge that gap between longevity risk in your retirement.
Right? Because nobody wants outlive their money. No fun going, w you know, if you’re 90 years old and you’re. What are you going to do? You can’t go back to work, right?
William Glass: [00:30:45] Yeah, no, exactly. Yeah. Unless you’re famous and can hop up on a, on a TV show and get paid for an appearance, but that’s not
Eric Geier: [00:30:53] me.
William Glass: [00:30:54] Yeah, exactly.
Exactly. So, yeah. Thanks for breaking that down. So it definitely sounds like it’s very, you know, it depends on situation and understanding what your needs are, where you are.
Eric Geier: [00:31:04] There is no one size fits all to everything. There’s no one size fits all to everything, right? I mean, and at your age, you, you might want to, uh, health insurance policy with pregnancy coverage, right.
But a 55 year old, couple. They’re in a one size, all fits, you know, one size fits all approach. They might have to pay for pregnancy coverage and their policy, but they certainly don’t need it. So, you know, there should be a reevaluation of needs quite frequently, as much as you reevaluate your retirement plan.
It’s, you know, they’re, they’re both very, very important financial considerations. Yeah,
William Glass: [00:31:42] absolutely. That makes make sense, Eric. So Eric, thanks for breaking that down. And there’s obviously, you know, as you said, one w no one size fits all, what would you say some of the biggest misconceptions or just things that you have to correct?
When people start looking at health insurance for their.
Eric Geier: [00:32:01] Yeah, that you need to have an ACA plan, a marketplace plan, or you’re going to be assessed a penalty penalties went away on January 1st, 2019. There’s only a one size fits all approach to insurance. There’s no way to build policies that are specific to your needs.
That’s a huge misconception. And another misconception is that. Deductibles need to be satisfied before you can get care. And there are policies out there that don’t have any deductible for 99% of the things that you’ll meet. So it really makes a lot of sense to not even hire. I don’t hire is the wrong word, but you enlist a professional who knows what they’re doing and who knows all of the choices out there and who doesn’t.
Concentrate on one thing in a vacuum, but is actually there to, to provide you, uh, that, which is the most suitable for your situation.
William Glass: [00:33:07] Gotcha. No, that makes a lot of sense. And that goes back to what you talked about earlier, right? The relationships, and being able to have that person that understands your situation and not just you and experience, not your area of expertise going and finding something online and purchase.
Eric Geier: [00:33:21] Yeah. And you know, here’s the thing. And this is like with any business, right? Any business grows the best through word of mouth, right. If you’re doing right by people and you’re actually taking a servant’s mentality and you’re not just in it for yourself, but you’re true. Purpose, your true why is to serve those who and trust them their, their lives to you, then it comes back tenfold.
So, yeah, that’s just kind of the way that I’ve always conducted my, my life and the more that you do right by people, the more you grow as a business. And there are things that, you know, I envisioned for this business that I hope to make an impact on a much bigger level. In people’s lives. So, so far so good.
William Glass: [00:34:08] Yeah. No, absolutely. So yeah. Tell me a little bit about what the process has been like starting pure assurance and how, how that’s been going out on your. Yeah,
Eric Geier: [00:34:20] I left a 50 hour week job making mid six figures to working a hundred hours a week and making, you know, in, in the beginning, at least mid five figures.
So it’s a big, uh, you know, anybody who wants to go into business for themselves, so they won’t have to work as hard. I would urge you to readjust those expectations, but if there is a rewarding aspect of it, then. Don’t have when you work for somebody else and you know, the journey has been, um, it’s been difficult.
I’m not going to sugar coat it, but the victories. Are that much sweeter when you have to, you know, when you have to travel and I’ll use the, the metaphor, you remember Shawshank, right? The Shawshank redemption, when Andy deferring had to crawl through whatever of sewage to get to the other side and you get, when you get to the other side, it’s that much sweeter when you have to crawl through that sewage by yourself.
And, uh, you know, any business is going to have that, right. You’re going to fail miserably. You’re going to pick yourself up. You’re going to, sir, you’re going to show. Yourself, what metal you really have. It is a lesson in character building, nothing that I’ve ever done has built as much character has made me grow as a person.
Then the work I’ve done to build this business.
William Glass: [00:35:42] I think that’s, I think you’re spot on there. Uh, Eric, and I’m curious in terms of, uh, any examples, do you have any examples of, you know, some of those challenges that you’ve had to overcome so far and you know, how you’ve, how you’ve approached that in your.
Sleeping
Eric Geier: [00:35:57] pills.
Yeah. When you’re, uh, when you’re laying in bed at two in the morning, and this was more early on, this hasn’t been, or things have actually been going really well recently, but early on when you’ve tried everything that you thought would have worked. Right. When you’ve spent the marketing dollars, when you’ve really put yourself out there.
And we’re absolutely convinced that this was going to make a difference and move the needle. And it hasn’t that really tests your metal. And there’s been a lot of sleepless nights and waking up in the middle of the nights, drenched and. Wondering when it’s going to click and you just got to show up every day and just keep on punching because it’s going to happen at eventually if you’re teachable and if you can pivot quickly enough, then, then it’ll happen.
But you always have to, if you start a business, you really have to start it for the right reasons. And not because you think it’s going to be cool or you think you’re going to be admired because of it. But there really has to be a while. There, there has to be a purpose because in those dark hours, that’s the only thing you have to cling on.
That’s going to remind you why you did it in the first place and why it’s the only shot you have. That’s going to keep you going.
William Glass: [00:37:17] No. I love that. Yeah. Focusing on that, why, and really, really knowing what that is to get you through the tough times, because there’s a lot of, a lot of highs, but a lot of lows.
Eric Geier: [00:37:26] Yes. Yes. It’s uh, everybody loves the story of the, of the guy that sold this company for a billion dollars or whatever it was. But nobody wants to hear about that. 20 years of, of anxiety and, and sleepless nights and divorces and relationships that have gone south and all that other stuff that had to happen to get to that place.
So everybody has a hero’s journey and it’s never goes from, from a low point a to a high point B it’s. It is definitely a rollercoaster, but I wouldn’t have it any other way because I’m smarter now than I’d ever been. And I’m just a much. I’m a better person now than I’ve ever been. And had I not gone through each and every one of these experiences, there was absolutely no shot I would be here.
So it, it builds a lot of character. Absolutely does. So
William Glass: [00:38:20] along those lines, Eric, how do you define success? Like what does success look like
Eric Geier: [00:38:25] to you today? Yeah. So when I can actually go out on my balcony at six o’clock and open up a beer and just lay there with my eyes closed and not worry about anything and just kind of enjoy the breeze and the sounds of Florida and, and just kind of be present, uh, that’s that’s success for me when you’re not worrying about.
I, I look, I don’t even have to be rich. I honestly don’t have any aspiration of being rich. I just want to be comfortable enough to pay my bills and make an impact in people’s lives. And, you know, that’s where I am. No,
William Glass: [00:39:00] I love that. I love that. And so we’ve covered a lot of ground today and I always like to wrap up with a little bit about personal finance.
And I’m curious to hear your thoughts on this, especially with your experience and kind of what you just aligned to there in terms of not trying to be rich, right. That’s not the goal. So could you describe your relationship with money? Yeah.
Eric Geier: [00:39:22] Yes, I can. It’s evolved over time and I have a respect for it now that I never had in the past, when you are committing your own capital to something, you do not want to see it go when you work for somebody, it’s almost like the money is not real.
It goes into your checking account, direct deposit, and then you pay your credit cards and you do whatever living under your means. Is the greatest freedom in the world because you’re not going to worry about things. And if anything needs to change, you have a reserve there to do that with. But if I was to give anybody any recommendations at all, it would be to consciously try, make it a game if you have to, but live under your means.
And don’t be afraid to take risks that are smart. Don’t spend money because you’ll think it’ll impress other people, or it’s going to give you a temporary high. There’s a lot of investments out there. There’s a lot of opportunity out there that you can take if you have the right relationship with it. I
William Glass: [00:40:32] think that’s great.
Great advice, right? It’s just, it’s so simple, but really powerful when you can live below your means and not, not try to impress everyone with new fancy car watch or clothes or shoes or whatever it is personally.
Eric Geier: [00:40:47] And I’ve got an incredible wealth manager. Who’s coached me on this as well. Not only has she proven to be a skilled at actually managing assets, but she’s written books on relationships with money, and she’s just really helped me to change my.
Perspective. And that’s another thing I just kind of like to say that I’m a big fan of surrounding yourself with experts in every single area of your life that you want to see change. If you want to a six pack stomach, hire a trainer, or at least model yourself after, you know, somebody like David Goggins or someone, if you want to grow your assets.
Get a good financial, whatever it is that you want to do, there’s somebody out there whose specialization is that don’t try to figure it out by yourself, enlist that mentor. Uh, and there are tons of people out there and it doesn’t have to cost a lot of money or any money at all. And you could really learn a lot from people.
Well, yeah,
William Glass: [00:41:49] that’s great advice. What would you say Eric is the best investment that you’ve made?
Eric Geier: [00:41:55] In myself. My best investment is as has been in myself, in my education, in my, in my journey from wall street to health insurance. I’ve made good paper investments that have done well, but I don’t think that it holds a candle to the successful investments.
I made it myself.
William Glass: [00:42:13] Yeah, it makes sense. I like that a lot. What would you say on the other side of the coin? Right? We don’t always make great decisions. Is the dumbest money mistake that you’ve made
Eric Geier: [00:42:25] squandering an inheritance that was given to me at 18 years old after my father passed away. It wasn’t total squander.
I mean, I paid for college and I traveled the world, but you know, I didn’t need the BMWs and stuff like that. That could have, uh, waited. That makes
William Glass: [00:42:41] sense. Yeah, that goes back to the, uh, the other question about relationship with money, right? Not spending money on things to impress other
Eric Geier: [00:42:49] people. And that’s right.
If there’s anybody listening to this and you want to leave money to your kids, don’t leave it to them. At 18 years old, do not give a kid a pile full of money at 18 years old.
William Glass: [00:43:01] Well, this has been a lot of fun. I really appreciate you sitting down and dive in deep into finance and health insurance and a number of topics.
Um, I want to leave you with the last word. So anything you want to leave the audience with, and then also please let everyone know how they can connect with you outside of this podcast. Sure.
Eric Geier: [00:43:18] So first thank you so much for having me on this has been an absolute pleasure. I love the fact that I can look at different buildings in New York that I know of right behind you.
Um, and I’m going to, I, you know, my message to your audience around health insurance is just. Enlist somebody who you trust. If you don’t have one and you’d like to run something by me, you know, feel free to reach out to me. You can go to pure Sheeran’s dot com or you could just download my digital business card by texting the word cover.
Two 21,000 and I’m happy to answer any questions. I’m happy to look over your current policies and make some recommendations. Won’t cost you anything. You know, I just wish luck and health for everybody from here on in, hopefully the rest of 2021 into 2022 will be one of more life and not such, you know, demise as we’ve seen over the past 12 months.
William Glass: [00:44:17] Exactly. Exactly. Well, thanks again for sitting down. This was a lot of fun.
Eric Geier: [00:44:22] Thank you so much
William Glass: [00:44:24] on your way out. Yeah. Please share the podcast with others. It’s the only way that the community grows and others hear these incredible stories from entrepreneurs and top performers. And of course, pound that subscribe button.
So you’re notified when new episodes drop every Friday, I’m William Glass, CEO and co-founder of ostrich. And of course you are the host of the Silicon alley podcast have a very profitable.
Eric Geier: [00:44:45] You got no time to waste, but still you, as it say, gone in a circle say, and I’ll now leave this place
somewhere else. Go to such a bright side over and over.
End of Transcription
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