Founded by Herbert H. Landy in 1949, the Herbert H. Landy Agency of Needham, Massachusetts, has provided professional E&O for more than five decades. As a national administrator for an A++ rated carrier, the Landy agency currently provides E&O coverage for real estate agents and brokers and real estate appraisers, accountants, tax preparers and bookkeepers across the United States.

The agency is now in its second generation. Betsy Magnuson, Landy's daughter, assumed the presidency of the agency in 2002. "Our long affiliation with the leading insurance companies has helped us to develop into a specialized organization viewed as an industry leader in professional liability insurance," Magnuson says. "This experience allows us to provide insight and value-added benefits not matched by others."

Independent agents sell the programs that the Landy agency manages. Says Magnuson: "That's one reason that the Target Markets Association is important to us. Our distribution network of more than 500 independent agents throughout the country has helped us become a leader in the industry. We welcome the opportunity to work with these business entrepreneurs and to provide them access to some of the finest errors and omissions products available. We expect that, through Target Markets, we will attract even more talented retail agents. We like to think that we are partnering with the independent agent and providing the agent with access to this valuable insurance protection for their professional clients. We recognized early in our history that success requires working hard to build strong business relationships and respecting the needs and concerns of all participants. In today's environment this is more important than ever. We integrate our highly skilled staff with sophisticated systems and telecommuni-cations technology to serve our business partners and distribution network with the broadest level of expediency. This formula guarantees success for our firm, our insurance company business partners and our distribution network."

The Landy agency offers agents access to three programs:

Errors & Omissions Insurance for Real Estate Agents and Brokers. This program provides coverage to residential and commercial real estate brokers, agents, consultants, property managers, appraisers and auctioneers. It includes incidental coverage for services provided as a title agent and notary public. Optional coverage is available for mortgage brokering and insurance agent services that are incidental to the practice. Sellers E&O coverage is available to qualified firms. The program is written on an admitted basis except in California, where it is offered on a nonadmitted surplus lines basis. The program is not currently available in Alaska, New York or South Dakota.

Errors & Omissions Insurance for Real Estate Appraisers. This program is for individuals who provide residential or commercial appraisal services only. The application is a self-underwriting and self-rating short form. The program is written on an admitted basis and is available in all states except Alaska, New York and South Dakota.

Errors & Omissions Insurance for Accountants. Two programs are available: the CPA Advantage^TM and the ABC Accountants Program.

The CPA Advantage provides coverage for accounting, financial planning and consulting services offered by accounting firms of all sizes. The program is available in all states except Alaska.

The ABC program offers an economical alternative for accountants, bookkeepers and tax preparers. Coverage is available for practitioners performing bookkeeping, tax preparation, compilations and individual tax planning and reviews (optional). Coverage for part-time sole practitioners is available at a reduced cost. The ABC program is available in all states except Alaska and New York.

Both programs are written on an admitted basis where available except in Louisiana, where they are available on a nonadmitted surplus lines basis.