Thirteen years built one relationship at a time.
Yoshizumi Insurance Agency was founded in 2013 in the Badger Building on La Granada — two blocks from the Inn at Rancho Santa Fe. The model hasn't changed in thirteen years: every policy hand-built, every renewal shopped, every claim handled by Kiyoma personally.
The agency built for California's hardest insurance market.
Yoshizumi Insurance Agency is a boutique, client-first independent agency that combines personalized service with professional expertise — protecting what matters most to families and businesses across San Diego County. Founded in 2013 by Kiyoma Yoshizumi, the agency has become the firm local realtors and homeowners call when the California insurance market gets complicated. From fire-mapped Rancho Santa Fe estates to commercial portfolios in downtown San Diego, every quote is shopped across carriers, every policy is hand-built, and every client gets the personal cell line — not an 800 number.
From the start, the model was different from how most insurance agencies operate. No call centers. No tiered service. No policy that exists only because it was the carrier the agent gets paid to sell. Every quote shopped across 30+ carriers. Every renewal re-shopped. Every claim handled by Kiyoma personally — from the first phone call through the final check. The boutique-agency model, in other words, scaled for the moment California finds itself in.
About Kiyoma Yoshizumi.
Kiyoma has spent over a decade as a licensed California insurance broker, building Yoshizumi Insurance Agency from a single office in Rancho Santa Fe into the trusted name North County homeowners and realtors call when escrow timing depends on getting coverage right the first time. When CBS 8 needed an expert to explain California's insurance crisis to San Diego viewers, they called Kiyoma.
Kiyoma Yoshizumi has been a licensed California insurance agent for 13+ years, with credentials including Licensed CA Insurance Agent, Independent Broker, American National Authorized Agent. He's the owner of Yoshizumi Insurance Agency and the agent on every policy the agency writes — not the figurehead of a team that quietly hands you off to junior staff after the sale.
The work isn't glamorous. Pulling declarations pages, running rebuild estimates, calling underwriters who don't return calls, sitting on hold with adjusters at 7am, comparing endorsement language line by line, explaining the difference between admitted and E&S markets to clients whose carriers just walked away. But it's the work that decides whether a fire-mapped home in The Bridges actually has coverage when fire season starts again, or whether a Fairbanks Ranch escrow closes on time, or whether a $4M Covenant estate gets rebuilt at today's San Diego construction costs instead of last decade's bluebook number.
What changed in the California market
Between 2023 and 2025, California's insurance landscape underwent its hardest contraction in a generation. State Farm stopped writing new homeowners policies statewide. Allstate pulled back. USAA non-renewed thousands of fire-mapped properties. Travelers, Liberty Mutual, Farmers all tightened underwriting. CalFire's 2023 brush-score remap moved most of Rancho Santa Fe, Del Mar, Encinitas, Carlsbad, La Jolla, and the inland foothills into elevated wildfire risk tiers. Premiums tripled. Non-renewal letters became normal mail.
Then the January 2025 Palisades and Eaton fires happened. The market got harder, not easier. Coverage that was previously available disappeared. Specialty E&S carriers became the only option for many high-risk properties. The California FAIR Plan went from a last-resort wrap-around to a first-look solution. Premiums kept climbing.
The agencies that grew through that period were the ones with deep specialty-market relationships and the willingness to do the work. That's the agency Kiyoma built. When CBS 8 needed someone to explain the crisis to San Diego viewers in January 2024, they called Kiyoma. When real estate agents needed an explanation of why escrows were canceling in April 2024, CBS 8 called him again. When the post-fire questions piled up in January 2025, Heather Myers sat down with him for the long-form interview.
Where to find Kiyoma in the press
- Why are homeowner's insurance rates going up in California? — CBS 8 San Diego, January 2024.
- Home insurance woes impacting San Diego real estate market — CBS 8 San Diego, April 2024.
- Sorting out the lesser-known California insurance carriers — CBS 8 San Diego, April 2024.
- Questions to ask your California insurance agent after the 2025 fires — Heather Myers, January 2025.
How we work.
Every quote starts the same way: send the basics — what you need coverage for, the property address, your timeline — and we shop across 30+ carriers (admitted and specialty E&S markets), and come back with options usually within 24–48 hours. For escrow-sensitive transactions, that turnaround compresses to same day, often within four hours.
No fee for quoting. No obligation to switch. When a policy binds, we're paid by the carrier — never by you. When a claim happens, you call my cell, not a 1-800 line. When your renewal comes due, we re-shop your rate automatically — no email asking if you'd like us to, no upcharge for the service. It's the model that turns one-time clients into ten-year clients.
The lines we write
Homeowners Insurance · Auto Insurance · Life Insurance · Business Insurance · Classic Car Insurance · Recreational Insurance · Annuities · Umbrella Insurance. Personal and commercial, coordinated under one roof so the policies actually talk to each other and there are no gaps when something happens. Homeowners is the line we get the most questions about — for obvious reasons in the current California market — but every line gets the same shopping rigor and the same direct-to-Kiyoma claim handling.
Why neighbors keep referring us
Most of our new business comes from referrals — from realtors who need an agent who can close escrow on a fire-mapped property in 48 hours, from neighbors who got non-renewed by State Farm and didn't know who else to call, from estate planners and family attorneys who work with us on the back end of complex claims. The model is simple, and thirteen years in, it still works: do the work that other agents won't, answer the phone when other agents don't, and put your name on every policy and every claim.
If you've been looking for an independent insurance broker near me in Rancho Santa Fe, an insurance agent near me in San Diego County, or just someone who'll actually pick up when escrow timing matters — this is the agency.
Tell us a little about what you need to protect.
Send the basics and we'll come back with shopped quotes within 48 hours — same day if it's an escrow.