Making Money as an Insurance Producer

[ewilkins]

Okay, I'm curious. As a brand new agent, should I dive into the business full-time right off the bat, or should I work it part-time, while keeping my other full-time job?

I would start out as a producer because I'd rather not start my own agency until I make sure this is the field I want to invest in.

How realistic is it to expect to start making enough money to live on right off?

I'm currently looking at my choices. I have an agent with Allstate who I'm speaking with, Farmers, etc. I've even thought about working for Liberty National, so I really need to decide. I'm about to take my exam prep course as well.

Ah, and one other thing in case it makes a difference. I currently live in Texas, but am prepping to move to Oregon, so will be selling out of that state.

Thanks.

 

[Stephen]

Re: Making Money

I started part time. After a month of getting my feet wet, I went full time when my first commission check came in.

 

[NCAgent]

Re: Making Money

life and health or P&C? I take it P&C from what I see so far.

There is no way to do this PT. What your choices are is whether you have one FT job or two. You will honestly have 2 full-time jobs instead of 1 FT and 1PT. You will need to learn the products, learn some presentation skills, learn some prospecting techniques, and some systems. This isn't something you learn 1-2 days a week, you spend time reading forums and underwriting guidelines and things like that.

With that said, can you handle that in the short-run? For P&C you don't get a lot of commission compared to L&H so every hour counts. Think about where you are in terms of selling and prospecting in general, and time management, and then gauge what to do.

 

[ewilkins]

Re: Making Money

Yeah, I was initially thinking P&C. This is my reasoning...I personally feel it would be easier to sell because of laws to have car insurance etc (at least here in Texas) but I also realize this might not be the case everywhere. Whereas life insurance is strictly by choice. I guess I was thinking I'd be able to sell more P&C policies than life but as I said, I'm new so not sure.

I guess to make a long story short, you just have to pick what interests you the most and go with it. Thanks for your reply. I feared that I would probably be too busy with this to only do it p/t. I guess this is one of those careers that you just have to take some risk with. You jump off the cliff and hope it works out.

I work in software right now so could always come back to it. I'd hope not to though. That's for sure!

 

[medsuptage]

Re: Making Money

If you want it bad enough, you can have it.

 

[Wallin06]

Re: Making Money

You wont earn enough to survive on P/C starting out get into Final expense and that will pay you very well until you learn the business then expand your business to other products . And besides you need to know the business pretty well before you start writing someones homeowners or car insurance it is more detailed than just FE . and while your doing the FE you will be building your reputation that means alot

 

[moonlightandmargaritas]

Re: Making Money

If you want it bad enough, you can have it.

Sadly, "wanting it bad enough" is NOT enough.

 

[xrac]

Re: Making Money

I would get my license but stay at my full time job until I move to Oregon.

 

[nyc2phi]

I say dive in.

I don't think you will get a good feel of the pros and cons of this industry doing this part-time. I think you will mostly see the cons.

Its all relative to your current situation, if you feel like you need a full time jobs pay and can't rely on commission from your own production then I say stay with the full time job