The acquisition of land in West Des Moines for the United States headquarters of London-based Aviva was finalized recently. Aviva is the fifth-largest insurance group in the world based on gross worldwide premiums as of 12/31/06.
Aviva US is ranked #1 in sales of "indexed life insurance," which appears to be one of the new code words for whole life policies.
The new facility will house Aviva's 360,000 square foot office building and corporate campus. It will be located on the southwest corner of the intersection of Jordan Creek Parkway and Mills Civic Parkway. That makes the new facility situated about 2.5 miles west of my company's headquarters lavish headquarters, which are slightly smaller than Aviva's proposed construction.
Des Moines continues to be a major headquarters for the insurance industry, and this is further evidence.
Wonder if there was a Section 1031 exchange involved in acquiring the land? I'm pretty sure there was one involved for the seller of the land...
Ken Tharp
Providing Qualified Intermediary services for Section 1031 tax deferred exchanges all over the United States. Headquartered in Iowa, our services are available in Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, and all other states.
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Ken, Can we afford your services if you have LAVISH headquarters? Just kidding.
Why is Iowa so attractive to insurance companies?
Bill Roberts
Hey Bill - I wondered whether anyone would read that blog entry to the point of noticing the word "lavish." I was kidding, too. We're pretty austere here. And you can definitely afford our services - we're downright reasonable.
The answer as to why Iowa is so attractive to insurance companies goes back further than I do. I don't really know how it all started. I did a little internet research to try to answer that question and satisfy my own curiosity to no avail. I found an article by the State Archaeologist (who knew we had one!) saying that Des Moines "quickly became a center for the insurance industry" shortly after the state moved the capitol from Iowa City to Des Moines in 1857. Some people call us "the Hartford of the Midwest," although we prefer to call Hartford "the Des Moines of the Northeast."
Okay, enough about that!!! Thanks for your comments!
- Ken
You couldn't find anybody "more" affordable than Ken with everything he brings to the table! I never thought about it Ken but I don't know the answer to that either. I've always heard DM being referred to as the "Insurance Capital" and knew there were quite a few companies there. Maybe its just one of those birds of a feather flock together deals?
Jason - Thanks for the plug!
I'm truly clueless about how the insurance thing got started here. My first thought had to do with crop insurance, but that's a relatively recent development, isn't it?
- Ken