This is a recorded presentation from Jo Soard, the Inventory Lady. Soard shares her expertise in documenting your business and personal assets before you experience a disaster.
Here’s the transcript for this video:
Ryan: So now it is time to continue on with our theme for the month of March, which is Disaster Preparedness.
Ryan: And so, I would like to introduce everyone to our speaker today, who is the Inventory Lady, and she is going to talk to us about why it’s important to document all of your business assets.
Ryan: So, everyone, let’s give Jo Soard a hand.
Jo: Thank you, Ryan.
Jo: I want to start out and say I’m going to be talking about a few different things, So what I want to do is let you know I’m not an attorney. I am not an accountant. So, things that I may mention here.
Jo: If you have questions about, uhm, go to your professional advisors because I am just not, I can give you an answer, but guaranteed I know enough to be dangerous so we won’t even go there.
Jo: But what I’m doing is giving you some information to help you think, because whether it’s a home or business, and if you have an in-home business, that’s a consideration as well, but you need to know what you own, because at some point it’s not going to be there.
Jo: My little tagline is Mother Nature and thieves do not make appointments.
Jo: So we are, we’re in Indiana. We know how this goes, as far as the tornadoes to come, so, we don’t have the fires, well, we do have fires. Look at what happened with Amazon, but that was, that was a terrible business situation, so you know we never know what’s going to happen, but you need to be prepared.
Jo: I don’t care what industry you’re in, what you do, be prepared.
Jo: And my whole goal is to give people peace of mind. So, if we have done an inventory for you, I walk away, I have all of what I call raw material and something happens to your stuff. Whether it be in your home, your business, your storage unit, you’re covered because I have the information.
Jo: Now I’m going to go through some notes here that is going in my PowerPoint. So, as I go through this, I hope that it makes sense because it’ll have little drawings, but anyway.
Jo: There’s two, there’s a proactive inventory, and that’s what you want to be. Maybe that’s what you want to have. That’s what you want to do.
Jo: You don’t want to do be doing a loss inventory. There is so many things in a loss inventory that you’ll be shaking your head forever, wondering why didn’t I do it first?
Jo: Do the, my proactive inventory and that’s the thing people always think, not going to happen to me.
Jo: I mean your neighbor’s house next door may burn. Amazon burned. How many after that?
Jo: How many people thought about? Oh my goodness, am I covered? They’re thinking, oh, that’s a big business. They have insurance and that’s what people do. They think they have insurance.
Jo: Well, they do have insurance, I’m sure, but they think that insurance is going to cover all their losses. What they don’t realize is when you have a situation and you have to call your agent and say just had a fire or theft, water loss or whatever, they’re going to connect you with.
Jo: I’ve just lost my train of thought, anyway anyway.
Jo: They’ll connect you with the adjuster and what is the adjuster going to do?
Jo: He’s going to hand you a piece of paper or several and say, What did you lose?
Jo: And you’re going to sit there and say, Oh my gosh, now it’s your turn. You have to remember everything. Not only do you have to remember everything, you need to write it down, you didn’t have an idea of when did you purchase it up.
Jo: So many things you need to know and if it’s a business where you have employees and families involved then you’ve got more things to think about, so that’s one reason you really want to know what you own and another reason you may want to know what you own.
Jo: You may want to buy a business. Sell your business. And, the question is going to be, what’s your assets? What’s your business worth? What do you have?
Jo: So, there’s another thing. So, these are things all in a succession plan. You also will need to have all of this information as well for the attorney to put together this action plan for your business.
Jo: So, let’s just talk about a few things here. What we need to know is what are all of your assets, whether it’s a fixed asset, whether it’s personal property, depending upon your business, you’re going to have different kinds of assets, but let’s look at it like this.
Jo: Let’s take the top off of your business. You’ve got a brick-and-mortar place over here. Let’s take the top off, turn it upside down and what’s falling out unless it’s big enough or it has to be, you know, bolted down to the floor.
Jo: This is all of your assets and business assets that you need to have a list of. You need to do this at the beginning of your business because that way you should go through, you’ll have a better idea of what you have and it won’t be so hard to sit down and do when you really do need to do it.
Jo: So why? Why is? Why do we track our assets? There’s a lot of reasons.
Jo: Not only do we want to know what we spend on our assets and how much they cost is; we want to know where they are at one time everybody was in a building.
Jo: All of the employees were in a building, maybe on one floor, maybe on different floors, different rooms, but you weren’t all together so therefore our business owner needs to know how many PCs.
Jo: Further, how many have, how many laptops are there? How many of my employees have cell phones and where are the laptops and the cell phones at any given time?
Jo: If something happens and your one of your employees houses burn and their stuff is there, they take home there.
Jo: Of course, usually you have your, both of your phones like Kim does.
Jo: One and one in each hand, you have your cell phones with you, but if you take your laptop home, the employer needs to know what is the model number, what is the serial number, that type of thing?
Jo: So, this is an important thing you need to know where everything is. So, this, in that today’s day, especially when COVID get, How many companies there were smart companies working from home than there was in an office?
Jo: So, that makes. It’s a little more difficult for a company to know where their stuff is, especially if they haven’t gotten all the information off of it in the beginning.
Jo: Another reason you want to know where your stuff is unnecessary purchases. You can’t find something you’ve misplaced.
Jo: I don’t know a cord, a wire, a headset. Whatever, you don’t know where it is.
Jo: So, what do you do? You run out and buy it, because you can’t find what you have, and then later you find it, then you have two, well you, did you record it? You need to know where all of your assets are for unnecessary purchases.
Jo: You need to know where your assets are in case you have storage units, if you have things in storage, you definitely need a storage list because many times you forget, out of sight out of mind.
Jo: If you don’t use something all of the time and you just put it in storage because your, your building is too small, your Home Office is too small. My garage is full. What am I going to do with it?
Jo: But in a storage unit, you need to know what is there, because, something happens to it, even though, now I just rented a storage unit I had to pay for insurance for that storage unit, in case something happens, but it’s my responsibility to know what’s in there in case something happens, till I can recover it or recover the cost.
Jo: We talked about the buy, sell, and the mergers. If you need a line of credit, banker is going to say, what’s your assets?
Jo: Well, you need to have that inventory list so you can look at it and you know that you’ve got this much value in your property, your business property and you can prove it, that’s the main thing is to prove it.
Jo: Uhm, you have to do accurate tax returns. Some people undervalue or overvalue on taxes, so you need to be able to do a tax return that’s accurate.
Jo: Talk to your CPA, especially on your business insurance.
Jo: Find out what he needs or she needs to know from you to have all of this listed. And it also depends upon if you depreciate, how you do it?
Jo: Not getting into it, but you really need to know what, what your accountant is doing for you on all of that, you need to know about tax deductions for uninsured losses, because if you don’t have something insured, you bought it, you thought, oh, I’m going to call the insurance agent, have it added.
Jo: You don’t do it, it’s lost. Then you know there’s another form there. You have to take care of for your uninsured losses. People don’t think about that. People don’t think about that on their homeowner’s insurance, and that’s something they’re going to deal with. Probably more than business.
Jo: But still, you still need to think about all of this. Uhm, many times your insurance coverage is not going to cover what you lose, so, you do need you do need to be good friends with your, your CPA or bookkeeper or whoever you work with.
Jo: Now in, uhm, I don’t like that because, like it’s too, time we get technical on you, I just want to make you think.
Jo: The written documentation is very, very, very important. Pictures are good, but you also need a written documentation, so if you are doing this on your own, if you take a picture or something, make sure you write everything down about it.
Jo: A good description, because that’s going to be very important. Insurance companies have a, have software, and they’re going to plug in whatever you’ve lost. For example, you might tell them that you lost a, I don’t know what the biggest size TV is now. Let’s go with the 70-inch new smart TV and you might tell them that you have that, but you can’t prove it and you’ve had it.
Jo: You had it when it came out, but it’s been out too long they want it, if you have your serial numbers and your model numbers because that thing is just melted down into a puddle. This is why you need documentation.
Jo: If you can’t prove it, they’re going to turn around and look in their software and see this. OK, this is this is this and this is this. Well, this should be worth this much money and you said no, but I think this much money for it.
Jo: You need written documentation. Save those receipts and there again, that’s good for business and person. You need to keep a spreadsheet of all of this information so you’ll have it when you need it.
Jo: There are many software programs that you can use out there.
Jo: There used to be, insurance companies used to have and they don’t any longer; Erie is the only one I know that has anything but it’s not an app, where you can actually go and take pictures and document everything as you go. You can do this for personal and business as well.
Jo: Your adjuster doesn’t really care how you give it to him, as long as all of that information is there, and that is what something that, people they just don’t think about.
Jo: Another thing that has to be, you need to do, and you need to be sure you have, is pictures of the exterior of your building.
Jo: And if you have storage units taking a picture of the front of that as well interior as well, you need the interior. You need the walls, the ceilings, the light fixtures, the floor you need, pictures of all of these, because in any kind of a loss.
Jo: If you tell them, you know that you have this one kind of flooring, you know if you have a picture of it, they’re not going to question anything, so you want to do all of that, and when you go through, if it’s a Home Office, make sure you have pictures of the closet.
Jo: Now, many times, if you stuck something in your, say you have a bedroom that you’re using, it’s got this really nice closet. You’ve got a beautiful office setup, but if you don’t need it you goes; tuck it back in the closet. Well, you know, out of sight, out of mind again, so make sure you take all the pictures of all of that.
Jo: And you need to have all of that at the ready. One thing you don’t want to do after you get all your documentation is to keep the information in your drawer. Please put it in a lock box or in the cloud.
Jo: That’s one thing that people think, well, you know, I take pictures and my neighbor, when I started doing inventory, we went to lunch. I told her what I did. She said I’ve done that, I say. And great, where’s your pictures? Where’s your, all that? And I guess Troy said no.
Jo: What happens your house burns down? Oh well, I’ll give it to my brother, where’s your brother? In California, OK, what’s he gonna do with it? He can put it in his office, no, gotta put it in lock box. Get it off your property, people, people just don’t think they just don’t think about it.
Jo: Now there’s different types of inventory, of course. We, you know about the business, there’s also specialty inventories of an, each store, this is a little bit different type, but it’s still the same.
Jo: You still have to get all of the information, a small clothing and a boutique, boutique store may think they don’t need an inventory, but thinking about everything that’s in there, so everybody needs to have an inventory, whether it’s big one or a small one, but mainly for your peace of mind, because if something happens there again, then you want to make sure that you’ve got the documentation that you can prove it and that you are going to be reimbursed in the end for the value of what you’ve lost, and that’s what it boils down to.
Jo: You have to be sure you’re covered.
Jo: Now another thing people don’t think about in a business, inventory. If you have a business, or you’re a tradesperson. You’re a painter. You’re a contractor, Air condition, HV AC, what’s another good one? Electricians, all of these companies usually have vans, and they’re full of stuff.
Jo: These all should be documented as well.
Jo: And for the same reason and just as detailed, it’s many times, and you’ve probably seen it too, if you’re on Facebook or next door, where there will be a picture with a truck and a trailer. And it’ll say if you see this, please notify us. It was just stolen from our driveway. This is our income and it was full of everything that they needed to be a painter or an electrician or whatever.
Jo: This is very important to get all of this documentation and again, it’s very important to make sure your insurance knows what is in that to make sure that you are properly covered for that as well.
Jo: And in the end, it’s all about just the peace of mind.
Jo: Now if you, there, I think I mentioned, if you have a business in your home. If you lose your home and business both in the fire then you’ve got double there. You’ve got to take care of your business clients and you’ve got to take care of your family.
Jo: If you have a building and your employees come to you and their livelihood is gone, you need to make sure they’re taken care of. Well, if you have your inventory, all you do is just take that, give the information to the adjuster and then you know that you’re covered.
Jo: They’re going to go back and have a lot of questions, but it’s just important to take those pictures and document everything. It doesn’t take that long, it shouldn’t take that long, but you can do just a quick photograph of everything and have it and go back to it.
Jo: Well, get all your model numbers and serial numbers.
Jo: If there is any, identifying marks write them, but then tuck it away and then if you have to go back later and actually use it, may be that you’ll have pictures of your desk.
Jo: Open up your desk doors, take pictures of what’s in there because if you have to replace it and you had to buy it, so it did cost money, know how many reams of paper.
Jo: Granted, if you lose it, you may not have a full box of paper. You may only have one or two, but that you did have it full the day of, you know that you did get all that information, but it’s just important to be aware and have all that information if you have to go through a loss.
Jo: Uhm wow. If I’ve done your inventory, I’ve taken care of everything for you. I have that information to work with the adjuster.
Jo: If not, there is so much paperwork you have to do. There’s like I have a list of eight different things usually that you have to take care of, and going back to taking care of your family. Taking care of employee families and taking care of, you know, all of the other stuff that you think about that you’d have to do on a day-to-day basis.
Jo: If you have to sit there and remember what you’ve lost. And then do all of the other it. It can just be well, it’s a lot. It really is. It’s very stressful. I went through it. I had somebody break into my chocolate shop in Virginia. And once you get that check from on a settlement, you’re done, so that’s why you have to take so many, so much time to make sure you’ve listed everything.
Jo: I had everything done, turned it in, had my check, check was in the bank, opened up a door, I went to get my camera to photograph some more chocolates, opened up, the camera was gone. I never went and opened that door and looked in that closet for that camera at the time, so therefore, I was out of camera and you know the insurance was not going to come back and say, oh that’s OK, you know, just let me know how much it was, write you a check, they don’t do that.
Jo: And depending upon your adjuster, it could go well and it can go bad, so it’s just in there again. More stress. So, what I like to stress to everyone, make sure you get those documents written up.
Jo: Get those pictures, get them out of your house. Be prepared because at some point something will happen. It’s not an if situation. Could be something very minor, to be a total loss, and it just I just want to make sure everyone is prepared.
Jo: I feel like I do a lot of educating to people because people don’t think about a lot of this so, are there any questions?
Jo: If you have questions you can always, we can always sit down and have a one to one. I enjoy having a cup of coffee and learning more about you and your business, and I know some of you. Some of you, I don’t know.
Jo: I see three new faces here today, so, but I know Bill. I know Ryan, and Kim and I are buds, so it’s that.
Jo: But I’d like to get to know you know about your business. That’s how we work in this networking industry. We learn about each other so we can go out and you know, mention you to our friends and family, when we hear that they’re looking or have an issue in your area.
Jo: So, thank you Ryan for the opportunity.
Jo: This is all going to be laid out in a in probably a little bit different form, but in my PowerPoint that I’ll just be able to send out to people when they have questions and need to learn more.
Jo: Let’s see.
Ryan: Hey Jo, how often should a business revisit their inventory?
Jo: A business should at least twice a year. Some businesses, now I say that twice a year, I’m going to say it depends on your business. I do inventory for Planet Fitness monthly. I do inventory for another company that’s a consulting business, so it’s just office stuff. That’s a yearly thing.
Jo: If a business, those out, if you’re an in-home business or a brick-and-mortar office business and you go out and you buy a new computer, new printer, let me know. I’ll run by, get a picture and get the documentation. Will add it to it, but if you are you just kind of go and nothing is, nothing happens, we don’t have to do anything.
Jo: But we want to keep everything current, so it could be from, you know, monthly to just once a year, the twice a year is what I recommend. Because people forget they buy stuff and they forget to let me know.
Jo: Jo, later just put it in the drawer.
Jo: You know what they could, should do is come home, get the receipt, scan it to me, and then we’ll get the picture and add it later, because then, then half the work is done. But since I do third party, I really don’t care. You know when I go into businesses, will say, well, this is pretty messy back here.
Jo: I really don’t care. I don’t care what you have. I don’t know what your business is or what you do. I just am there to document and make sure that we have what we need when we need it.
Ryan: So that, Jo, follow up question to that. As far as making sure that if you suffer a loss and you’re dealing with your insurance, what is the most ironclad documentation type that we would have compiled so that the insurance company goes, OK, you’re right, here you go.
Jo: Something done by a third-party person. Because it’s yeah, I’m, I’m third party. I don’t care, so I, I put it down, the facts. Somebody that’s in a panic and this happened to a friend of mine in Georgia. There was a big fire, and this woman calls, uhm, Hannah and said, can I come by and bring you a list of stuff here because you know we just had this. We had this loss and I have to turn it into insurance and I need you, know you, to you know put this all in the right order.
Jo: So, Hannah meets the woman, and this came out of a building that was a total loss, right? Completely clean white sheets of paper. No discoloration, no ash, no, you know, burnt around the edge.
Jo: Nothing Hannah would, Hannah wouldn’t take it because she knew that somebody had just thrown something together to give to the insurance company because they had nothing. They couldn’t prove anything, so they thought, well, let’s do this real quick.
Jo: The best thing, if, that you know, if you don’t have anything, is to have somebody come in and do a loss inventory and they’ll go through with you everything, every room, every file cabinet and recover everything that can be recovered and there again you’re not doing it. You’ve got somebody else there that doesn’t care. They’re just doing their job.
Jo: So that is, that’s the best way to do it. But to have that information already and to hand over to the adjuster you know with dates and numbers and all of that facts and figures, the adjuster will be smiling.
Ryan: Yes, Kim.
Kim: Fine, notice my hands really big when I do that.
Kim: She ain’t kidding around when she says that. You know, the adjuster will give you a sheet of paper and you have to remember, uhm, because my, I was, my daughter and son in law were in the mountains of Tennessee when their house was burning. And uhm, I was there as they were putting it out. And I lived through that with her, that devastation when your entire home and it happened to be a double, so she was responsible for the people who were renting the double from her.
Kim: When all of their belongings were gone, there was basically nothing that was salvageable in that fire. And I remember going through the lists of the lists of the lists of the lists. And, and it was devastating.
Kim: So you’re not in a frame of mind number one and #2 you’re, you’re not going to remember, you’re just you’re not going to remember all the things that you had and it would have been so much simpler had they had an inventory and it is, it’s something you just think it’ll never happen to me, but I don’t say that anymore because my daughters home burned to the ground.
Kim: So, I don’t ever say that anymore. I think of the things that could happen. I’ve been around restoration people enough to know I don’t leave my home with my dryer going any longer. I don’t leave my home with my washer going any longer. I don’t use a plug in, plug in air fresheners. That was one of the things that caused my daughters fire up.
Kim: So yeah, I mean, what you do is important, Jo and I appreciate that you provide that service.
Jo: One thing I will mention, this can be on business as well as personal inventory. If something happens and this is what we were talking to, people at Richmond Hills when, after the explosion and so many people lost their homes and so many people couldn’t even go back in, is you, you go and you contact everybody that’s ever been in your house or business in the last year.
Jo: Then asked them for all of the pictures they ever took at a party. You know when you get together with family events over the holidays, people take pictures. You ask for every picture from everybody that you can find and get, because many times that picture is going to jog your memory.
Jo: And this was, I mean, this happens in a in a business too. You might have something valuable on top of the file cabinet that you don’t think about. You know I don’t know what it might be. Maybe a 24 karat award. I don’t know, but you it’s been there so long you you’re not going to think about it and that’s the same way in your home.
Jo: There was a fire. I was scheduled to go to Martinsville one day and I called the gal that morning because we had bad weather. And to make sure that her roads were clear, and she lived in a long gravel driveway to make sure the driveway was cleared so I could get up to their house and she said, oh, I’ve been meaning to call you.
Jo: Her house caught on fire and they didn’t lose the whole house, but the house was smoke damaged, but the two rooms they lost. That’s what I told her. I said, well, no, you don’t, you don’t need me. If it was just, you know, until we’re ready to put it back together. And then we photographed and everything to, you know, every, when things were replaced.
Jo: But I told her, everybody that’s been in there the last year, get those pictures and she was grateful I did because there were some things that were just on a little entertainment center around the TV. There was some little tchotchkes and things that she totally forgot and had been sitting there forever and they, they did have some value.
Jo: And so that way she was able to have a picture and prove to the adjuster that, yeah, that was in the house and, and your pictures are usually dated and if not, you can timestamp them. You know, get the timestamp through, you know the pictures on your phone.
Jo: So those are just little things that people just don’t think about, you know. And but that’s just a little way to help you remember what was there.
Ryan: It looks like Catherine has a question.
Catherine: Yes, I just wanted to make sure I understood correctly that basically if it was a summary of what you said, what’s important to have, are pictures, updates, location of where we place the documentation, and of your inventory. So, I just wanted to make sure, is that correct or?
Jo: Yes, in receiving receipts.
Catherine: Correct me if I’m wrong.
Jo: If you have them, when you, when you’re purchasing something, keep those receipts, scan them in and keep them with all of your documentation. I mean, after a while you know the receipts going to fade away, or you’re going to lose the papers. So, scan it in and have all that information together in one file.
Catherine: Thank you very much. I just wanted to make sure I understood you correctly too. You said that it’s very important where we place the information so that it’s always available, clear and accessible.
Jo: Yes, a lock box is the best place to have it, but you’re going to have it all on your computer as well, most, most people will, and that way you know, you can get it from, keep it in the cloud as well, but you don’t want your only documentation, your only file in a desk drawer where you could lose it.
Catherine: Thank you, makes sense really appreciate it, thank you.
Jo: Thank you.
Ryan: Does anyone else have questions for Jo?
Ruth : Not a question, but a comment. I just wanted to say this was very valuable information, Jo. I mean, unless you’ve been through something like this, I think it’s like, well, you don’t really want to think about it, but you really, really made me think like, yeah, this is important and I need to get on this right away, so thank you so much for sharing this presentation with us today.
Jo: Thank you for your comment.
Ryan: Any other questions for Jo?
Ryan: All right, Jo, how can folks get ahold of you if they’re ready to have you come and take their inventory?
Jo: Let me put my info in the chat. How is that, Ryan?
Ryan: That would be great.
Ryan: All right, everyone, let’s give Jo a hand for her presentation today.
