Recently, our team sat down together and talked about different times GSQ really added value to our clients. One of my favorite stories was about an underground fuel tank. It was a big claim where a client of ours was being threatened to be sued out of his retirement. He had sold this building five years earlier, and now, the building sold again. At the second sale, they discovered there were some empty fuel tanks in the ground. Turned out this building used to be a gas station many years earlier. Our client used it as an auto repair shop never knowing that there were tanks underground.
Once this information was discovered, the building owner and new prospective buyer were upset because there was evidence that they had leaked. Our client was told to get his lawyer. The current owner who was now selling was getting his attorney. Lastly, of course, the new buyer still wanted the property, so he had an attorney to represent him as well.
Everyone had drawn a line in the sand and the lawyers had begun to bill for their time… The voice of reason came from Richard Garland who asked, “Why don’t we find out what it’s going to cost to take these tanks out?” What a novel idea. The cost was fifteen thousand dollars to take them out of the ground, haul them away, dispose of them, and fill in the hole. A very manageable situation. On the other hand, I bet within a few hours of consultation with these three attorneys they probably would have burned up fifteen thousand dollars and not been any closer to a settlement.
Our agent added real value to solving the problem and saved everyone involved time and money, especially our client who had been in retirement for five years and was concerned that he could have lost everything. It’s situations and experiences like this that have developed the culture and level of service we bring to the table for each client of Garland-Sturges & Quirk.