I monitor some keywords on twitter via some Hootsuite columns. One of them is “insurance” and I have a geo-tag with it to grab tweets mentioning “insurance” within a 40 mile radius of Corvallis.

Once every week or two I catch someone asking a question or mentioning they’re getting quotes, and I respond. Earlier this week was just such an opportunity.

Ty Hildebrand, a Realtor in Salem, mentioned he was looking for homeowner’s insurance, so of course I responded. Something to the effect of, “If you’d like us to get you a quote, I’d love to help”. Much to my happiness, Ty replied with his cell phone number.

Turns out, Ty has a property that is currently vacant- very difficult to insure, and expensive. I took my time to explain to him the what’s and why’s, but ultimately told him I couldn’t help.

About five minutes after I hung up with him, I thought to myself. What in the world did I do? Here this guy was looking for help, and in the end, I did nothing for him. Lame, if you ask me.

So I quickly called a broker buddy of mine who’s able to do oddball stuff and asked if he could do vacant properties. He said he could, so I asked how much (ballpark), and what options there are for payment. Then I called Ty back.

“Hey Ty, I can’t believe I finished my last call without giving you some actual help. I have a guy I trust that can write your property for you. You can pay for 3, 6 or 9 months of coverage, which will help, because it’s kind of spendy. Expect it to be about 3x the cost of a normal homeowners policy, annualized. My friend is expecting your call. Let me know if I can ever help you with something else. Cheers.”

What impression would Ty have had of me if I hadn’t made that second call?