agency ownership

Hello all (new to the forum),

I am 27 years old and I currently work 6 months out of the year as a defense contractor making around 130,000 (this will applicable to my question). My goal is to find new work in the states equally or more lucrative than what I do now. I want some personal freedoms and being my own boss is appealing to me. I have no Insurance experience and would have to get licensed as well. I have recently been talking to a district manager about possibly purchasing an existing book of business as a captive branch owner. After reading all of these horror stories I am still trying to figure out if I should move forward with the process. Do these horror stories apply to this situation? ANY information provided would be greatly appreciated. Teach me like I am 12 years old and I will take no offense. I do not want to take a wrong turn at this point in my life and want my successes to continue an upward trajectory. I do not need to immediately replace the previously mentioned income but I want to be making a good living.

Thank you in advance!

I just happened across this site and your post. I was a Farmers agency owner for 7 years. I sold it and went independent in 2012. Farmers can be a great place to learn the ropes of being an insurance agent and business owner. Farmers is good at the insurance training part, the business ownership is dependent on the DM. I would ask to see how many new agents are in that district, talk to several and see what their experience is. See what the DM is offering in the way of training. Being a good agent is not the same as being a good business owner.

When I left Farmers it was for a reason that a lot of captives leave, rates were going up, I was losing clients because I had one tool in my toolbox.Farmers will tell you to sell value, not price but, price is always a factor. You will need to be able to ride the waves of rates that go up, then a new product is launched that is underpriced, then rates go up again. This is the insurance game.

Being independent helps because all carriers are not on the same schedule so, now I always have a place to move my clients when necessary. My agency is 4 times what it was with Farmers in less time. But, training on the indy side is almost completely unavailable.

I hope some of this helps.
Dave