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| Pictured is Matt Strydhorst, owner of Shine Services and ProAct Inventories. He has been in business since Oct. 2009 and last year, he won the Rising Star award from the Chamber of Commerce. |
Spotlight on Business: ProAct Inventories - What if you came home from work one day to find that your house had been replaced with a smoldering pile of rubble? All of your worldly possessions are gone, and on top of dealing with losing everything, you have a mountain of insurance paperwork to do. Matt Strydhorst of ProAct Inventories offers a service that can shave months off of the insurance process in the event of total loss and make sure that you will be reimbursed for everything you’ve lost.
According to Strydhorst, most people with insurance policies are underinsured. For example, if your house burns down, your insurance company will ask for an itemized list of all of your possessions and what was in the house. Strydhorst says that most people can only remember around 75% of the items in their houses and the remaining 25% remains uncovered by insurance. With Strydhorst’s new business ProAct Inventories, which is a joint venture with Jake Gour from Fairview, he will come into your home and make an itemized list of every possession in your home, complete with photos to show the current condition of the item, the current value and the replacement value of an item.
According to one insurance company, only 2% of their clients are pro-active with getting an inventory done for their homes, but it could save a lot of time and struggle for homeowners if something bad did happen. “I talked to one woman who had lost her house in a fire, and six months later she was still battling with insurance companies. “I asked her how much faster it would have gone with if she’d had a list of the things in her house, and she said that she probably would have had [the insurance process] done in two months,” says Strydhorst.
He says that most people underestimate the value of their possessions. He claims that in a regular home, there is about $10,000 - $15,000 worth of stuff in one bedroom alone. When an insurance company reimburses you for your loss, they cut you two cheques: one for the current value of your possession, factoring in depreciation, and another cheque for the difference between the current cost and the cost to replace it. If you have an itemized list of all your possessions with the replacement and current values, it will save lots of time for you in the long run. It can also protect insurance providers against insurance fraud.
According to Strydhorst, he’s always been the kind of person who would champion causes for people, and try and find solutions to problems that people didn’t even know they had. He grew up in the hamlet of La Glace and moved to Fairview to work at Fairview College in 2000. He worked there for nine years teaching the Trans Vocational program before leaving in June of 2009.
In October of that same year, he came across a great opportunity, and bought his first business, Shine Services, from its previous owner. It started off as just a window cleaning business but he has since expanded to asphalt sealcoating and crack repair, gutter cleaning, pressure washing, tree trimming and he’s even trying his hand at property management. ProAct Inventories was also a way of keeping busy in the winter.
Since sealcoating can only be done on a sunny day, and most of the other things Shine Services offers definitely cannot be done in the winter, Strydhorst needed to find something to do while there was snow on the ground. “I want to try and offer services that no one else does in the area,” says Strydhorst. It looks like Strydhorst has already filled a niche in the Peace country, as ProAct Inventories is the only company in the area who offers the service of creating an inventory of your house.
There are three different packages that he offers ranging in prices from $230 - $2000 depending on what you want done, including a videotape of all assets, cataloguing and photographing all assets over $500 or a full itemized list including photographs and serial numbers and purchase receipts of everything in your house. He can also help with estates.
According to Strydhorst, most people with insurance policies are underinsured. For example, if your house burns down, your insurance company will ask for an itemized list of all of your possessions and what was in the house. Strydhorst says that most people can only remember around 75% of the items in their houses and the remaining 25% remains uncovered by insurance. With Strydhorst’s new business ProAct Inventories, which is a joint venture with Jake Gour from Fairview, he will come into your home and make an itemized list of every possession in your home, complete with photos to show the current condition of the item, the current value and the replacement value of an item.
According to one insurance company, only 2% of their clients are pro-active with getting an inventory done for their homes, but it could save a lot of time and struggle for homeowners if something bad did happen. “I talked to one woman who had lost her house in a fire, and six months later she was still battling with insurance companies. “I asked her how much faster it would have gone with if she’d had a list of the things in her house, and she said that she probably would have had [the insurance process] done in two months,” says Strydhorst.
He says that most people underestimate the value of their possessions. He claims that in a regular home, there is about $10,000 - $15,000 worth of stuff in one bedroom alone. When an insurance company reimburses you for your loss, they cut you two cheques: one for the current value of your possession, factoring in depreciation, and another cheque for the difference between the current cost and the cost to replace it. If you have an itemized list of all your possessions with the replacement and current values, it will save lots of time for you in the long run. It can also protect insurance providers against insurance fraud.
According to Strydhorst, he’s always been the kind of person who would champion causes for people, and try and find solutions to problems that people didn’t even know they had. He grew up in the hamlet of La Glace and moved to Fairview to work at Fairview College in 2000. He worked there for nine years teaching the Trans Vocational program before leaving in June of 2009.
In October of that same year, he came across a great opportunity, and bought his first business, Shine Services, from its previous owner. It started off as just a window cleaning business but he has since expanded to asphalt sealcoating and crack repair, gutter cleaning, pressure washing, tree trimming and he’s even trying his hand at property management. ProAct Inventories was also a way of keeping busy in the winter.
Since sealcoating can only be done on a sunny day, and most of the other things Shine Services offers definitely cannot be done in the winter, Strydhorst needed to find something to do while there was snow on the ground. “I want to try and offer services that no one else does in the area,” says Strydhorst. It looks like Strydhorst has already filled a niche in the Peace country, as ProAct Inventories is the only company in the area who offers the service of creating an inventory of your house.
There are three different packages that he offers ranging in prices from $230 - $2000 depending on what you want done, including a videotape of all assets, cataloguing and photographing all assets over $500 or a full itemized list including photographs and serial numbers and purchase receipts of everything in your house. He can also help with estates.
Now, if the idea of someone coming into your house and going through your things unnerves you, think about this: “I’m working hard to maintain a sense of privacy and security. It’s really important to me that my clients trust me. “I feel more weirded out than my customers sometimes, especially when it comes to more private items,” Strydhorst laughs, “But my clients don’t hide anything from me.” Besides, Strydhorst says he is not in the business of storing information. With the help of his business partner and IT guy Jake Gour, they will give you your inventory on a flash drive and 21 days after they send an invoice, they will delete the information so that hackers and thieves won’t get a hold of it.
All in all, it seems that getting an inventory done of your possessions is a good thing. Not only will it help you bring back the lifestyle that you’ve lost in the event of a loss, but it doesn’t even take that long to do. For a medium-sized house, Strydhorst says it takes him about 32 hours. “I’ve always had a dream of being an entrepreneur,” he says, “But it’s much more guts than glory.” He says it is much different than getting a paycheque every two weeks, because every sale is his own, and that’s satisfying. “The biggest reward is talking to people, and meeting people. I’ve always been a people person, but this job gives me the opportunity to meet so many great folks.”
All in all, it seems that getting an inventory done of your possessions is a good thing. Not only will it help you bring back the lifestyle that you’ve lost in the event of a loss, but it doesn’t even take that long to do. For a medium-sized house, Strydhorst says it takes him about 32 hours. “I’ve always had a dream of being an entrepreneur,” he says, “But it’s much more guts than glory.” He says it is much different than getting a paycheque every two weeks, because every sale is his own, and that’s satisfying. “The biggest reward is talking to people, and meeting people. I’ve always been a people person, but this job gives me the opportunity to meet so many great folks.”
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