General & Any Policy
How Often Should You Shop for Insurance?
General insurance-shopping cadence guidance, not tied to a specific dollar figure or single external source.
The right answer is different for auto and home than it is for life insurance, and treating them the same way wastes either time or money.
Auto and home: once a year, timed to renewal
Once a year is a reasonable default for both auto and home insurance, ideally timed around your policy renewal date rather than mid-term. Insurers regularly adjust their own rates and underwriting appetite based on their own claims experience and business goals, which means a company that quoted competitively last year is not guaranteed to still be the best option this year, even if literally nothing about your own situation has changed.
To get a fresh baseline before your next renewal, the car insurance cost calculator and the home insurance premium estimator both give a quick sanity check against current market averages.
Events that should trigger re-shopping outside the annual check
A handful of life events are worth re-shopping around immediately, rather than waiting for your annual cycle: moving to a new address, buying or selling a vehicle or home, a marriage or divorce, a teen driver being added to or aging off a policy, a significant change in your credit score in a state that allows credit-based insurance rating, or completing a defensive-driving or home-safety-improvement course that could newly qualify you for a discount you were not previously getting.
Any of these can shift your actual rate meaningfully enough on their own to justify checking outside the normal schedule.
Shopping around does not hurt your credit, but switching too often can cost loyalty discounts
Getting insurance quotes generally does not affect your credit score the way applying for a loan or credit card would, most insurers pull a soft inquiry for quoting purposes specifically.
There is no insurer-side penalty for shopping frequently either. The one real tradeoff worth weighing is that switching companies too often can forfeit insurer-specific loyalty or long-term-customer discounts that build up gradually over multiple years with the same insurer, worth factoring into the decision alongside whatever a specific switch would actually save.
Life insurance runs on a completely different schedule
Once a term life policy is issued, the rate is locked in for the full length of the term, regardless of what happens to insurance rates generally in the meantime, so there is no annual re-shopping cycle the way there is for auto or home.
The right trigger for revisiting life insurance is a major life event that changes how much coverage is actually needed, a new child, a new mortgage, a significant income change, not a fixed calendar schedule the way auto and home benefit from.
Frequently asked questions
How often should I re-shop my auto and home insurance?
Once a year is a reasonable default for most people, timed around your policy renewal rather than mid-term. Insurers regularly adjust their own rates and underwriting appetite, so a company that was competitive last year is not guaranteed to still be competitive this year, even with nothing about your own situation changing at all.
Are there specific events that should trigger re-shopping outside the annual check?
Yes, several: moving to a new address, buying or selling a vehicle or home, a marriage or divorce, a teen driver being added or aging off a policy, a significant credit score change (in states that allow credit-based rating), or completing a defensive driving or home-safety-improvement course that could newly qualify you for a discount.
Any of these can shift your rate meaningfully enough to be worth checking outside your normal annual cycle.
Does shopping around too often hurt my rate or my credit?
Getting insurance quotes generally does not hurt your credit score the way applying for a loan or credit card does, most insurers use a soft inquiry for quoting purposes.
There is also no penalty from insurers themselves for shopping frequently, though switching too often can occasionally cost you insurer-specific loyalty or long-term-customer discounts that build up over multiple years with the same company, worth weighing against whatever savings a switch would produce.
Is life insurance the same, should I re-shop it as often as auto or home?
No, life insurance works differently. Once a term policy is issued, your rate is locked in for the length of the term regardless of what happens to rates generally, so there is no annual re-shopping cycle the way there is for auto or home.
The right time to revisit life insurance is after a major life event, a new child, a new mortgage, a significant income change, that changes how much coverage you actually need, not on a fixed calendar schedule.