Meet Debbie

Debbie Austin began her insurance career in 1979 as a policy typist. She soon discovered she needed more of a challenge and became a licensed agent selling personal and commercial insurance. In 1985, she began her 17-year stint at Bray & Oakley Insurance Agency as a producer and manager of the agency. In 2002, she re-located with her family to the Teays Valley area working as a Commercial Lines Underwriter in the Excess & Surplus Lines side of the industry. Ten years later, she remarried and became co-owner of Ramsey Insurance Services, Inc., a third-generation family-owned independent insurance agency in Weston, WV. She collaborated with her husband, and later became the agency Principal upon his death. Ramsey Insurance Services recently merged with Bray & Oakley Insurance Agency, where she now works remotely as a Commercial Lines CSR from her new home in Asheville, NC.

Debbie holds designations as an Accredited Adviser of Insurance and an Associate in Surplus Lines Insurance. She is a Hillbilly from Man, WV, graduating from MHS in 1973. She attended Marshall University, focusing on creative writing, journalism, and accounting. She also attended the Harleysville School of Insurance.

Debbie is married to Carl “Skip” Austin, also originally from Logan. Together they live with their puppy boy, Artie, in Asheville, NC. She is the mother of two sons, having recently lost her youngest son, Zachary, who had followed her in the insurance business. She is a grandmother to Connor Wade who will be getting a little brother in the spring of 2022.

Debbie enjoys quilting, reading, and hopes to rekindle her life-long desire to write. She is the author of two published non-fiction articles, and various trade articles.