Policygenius Review

Policygenius is a one-stop insurance shop that lets you compare rates and policies across companies to find the best deal for you. While they help with several products, our Policygenius review will focus on some of the most important types: life insurance, homeowners insurance, and renters insurance.

How Does Policygenius Work?

Policygenius lets you easily compare insurance rates based on some basic information. Because they’re a third-party company, you can see offers from several different companies, all in one place.

Policygenius does not offer any insurance themselves. Instead, they are a useful tool to help you shop around for the best rate.

By filling out a bit of information like your age and gender, combined with industry-standard info about tobacco usage for life insurance or current deductible and coverage for home and auto, Policygenius gives you a list of different quotes from insurance companies.

This list of quotes makes it easy for you to see what options exist for your desired amount and type of coverage.

If you find an offer you like, Policygenius also lets you apply for insurance from their website. That’s right—you can both find and apply for coverage in one go!

How To Get Started On Policygenius

After you go to Policygenius’ site, you’ll see the above dashboard of different insurance types.

Just choose which type of insurance you’re looking for and fill out the brief questionnaire. They’ll ask for very basic demographic information as well as info needed to help determine premiums.

Each form only took me between two to three minutes.

Once you’re done, Policygenius will give you an offer, usually in less than 24 hours. Depending on the type of insurance you want, this part can happen instantly!

After exploring their entire website, I can say it’s super simple to navigate. Policygenius’ user interface is clean, informative, and straightforward. So, you shouldn’t have any problems finding your way around.

Policygenius Pros And Cons

Pros

• Completely free
• Simple and easy policy comparison
• Gives several options for coverage
• Useful Coverage Amount Calculator
• Educational resources
• Brighthouse SimplySelect
• Responsive customer support

Cons

• Does not give offers from every single insurance company

Life Insurance Comparisons

Policygenius focuses on term life insurance, where you pay for monthly coverage through the policy’s duration. While they also have a few permanent options, these are often much more expensive than term policies.

As you go through Policygenius’ life insurance form, you’ll have to answer questions about the following: 

• Are you buying life insurance for the first time or looking to replace your existing policy?
• How soon do you want coverage (months)?
• Gender
• Age
• Zipcode
• Citizenship and marriage status
• Height / Weight
• Tobacco Use
• History of risk factors (alcohol abuse, cancer, depression, etc.)
• Ideal coverage amount
• Policy length

All of these factors can affect your offers’ premiums. Since life insurance is much more straightforward (you receive a flat amount if you die), your best option is usually the cheapest.

After filling out their form, you’ll start seeing insurance offers instantly.

In most cases, you’ll also have to verify the provided information with an in-person medical exam. But, this isn’t always the case. Let’s talk about one way to avoid those in-person exams, SimplySelect.

Brighthouse SimplySelect 

Brighthouse SimplySelect is one of Policygenius’ newest insurance partnerships. What makes Brighthouse’s coverage so unique is that customers can complete the medical requirement over the phone.

This may not seem like a huge deal. But compared to most other insurance companies without in-person medical checks, Brighthouse SimplySelect offers much lower rates.

There are a few caveats, though. Firstly, Brighthouse SimplySelect only offers coverage of up to $2,000,000. While this should be more than enough for most Americans, if your circumstance requires more coverage, you’ll have to look elsewhere.

Brighthouse SimplySelect is also an exclusive partner with Policygenius. So, you’ll only be able to get their life insurance plan if you go through Policygenius. Depending on your situation, this may be reason enough in itself to give Policygenius a try.

There are also restrictions on where and to whom SimplySelect is available. For example, if you’re over 50 years old, you’ll be unable to take advantage of this feature. Also, it’s not available in every state (including New York and California), so check if SimplySelect is currently in your state.

Home Insurance Comparisons

Policygenius lets you either buy homeowners insurance on its own or bundle it with auto insurance. While bundling is often cheaper overall, you may have specific reasons not to. We’ll be going through standalone homeowners insurance here, though the process is similar for bundling.

As you go through Policygenius’ homeowners insurance form, you’ll have to answer questions about the following: 

• Your current annual costs (if you have homeowners insurance already)
• Home address and primary residential status
• Duration lived (more than three years)
• Whether there’ve been renovations in the last decade
• Heating system
• Other risk factors (pets, basement, pool, trampoline)
• Additional coverage needed (flood, earthquake, etc.)
• Protective devices currently installed (smoke detectors, fire extinguishers, etc.)

All of these factors can affect your offers’ premiums. Since homeowners insurance can be complicated, Policygenius also asks you to upload scanned copies of your current insurance policy.

After filling out their form and uploading the necessary documents, you’ll start seeing insurance offers in about 24 hours. You also get a recommendation for whether or not you should consider switching policies.

Renters Insurance Comparisons

Renters insurance is one of the most important things you can buy if you’re living in a rental home. It can help save you in the event of a lawsuit or accidental damages.

Unfortunately, after putting in my name, age, and current address, Policygenius determined they did not have any insurance companies that offered coverage in my area.

Get your free renters insurance quote now.

How Much Does Policygenius Cost?

Policygenius is itself, entirely free. The educational resources, coverage calculator, quote comparison, it’s all free. Which then begs the question, “How do they make money if it’s all free?”

How Does Policygenius Earn Its Money?

Policygenius is actually amazingly transparent about this. They explain how they make money in the FAQ section, but we’ll provide a basic overview.

Simply put, Policygenius earns money through commissions. When you purchase an insurance policy through the site, they receive a commission from the insurance agency.

Though the specifics of how much they earn depends on several things, Policygenius encourages customers to contact their support staff if you’re interested in how much they make on a given product.

How Much Do Policies Cost On Policygenius?

Even though Policygenius earns commissions whenever a customer signs up for life insurance, it doesn’t mean you actually pay any more for coverage. This is partly because of how the law requires insurance brokers like Policygenius to report prices.

Every state has what’s called a “department of insurance.” These bodies make sure insurance prices stay constant across insurance brokers to avoid shady practices by brokerages.

As such, whether you buy insurance through Policygenius or another third-party comparison site, the prices are the same. Note that this is not the same as identical prices across insurance companies, which usually offer different rates for people of different profiles.

I’ve listed the insurance companies Policygenius recommended me, alongside their costs, for life and homeowners insurance below.

Life Insurance

As a 19-year old in relatively good health with no history of tobacco use or other major risk factors, my rates will likely be much cheaper than what you’ll find. With that said, Policgenius showed me the following life insurance options for $500,000 of coverage over 20 years:

• Protective – $18.75/month
• BannerLife – $19.12/month
• AIG – $19.23/month
• TransAmerica – $19.35/month
• PacificLife – $19.38/month
• Principal – $19.52/month (no medical exam required)
• Mutual of Omaha – $23.87/month

Policygenius also showed options for a permanent policy, with rates starting at $303.00/month.

Homeowners Insurance

After reviewing my geographical information and my home’s current coverage, Policygenius showed me the following homeowners insurance options:

Note: This was for $180,000 of dwelling coverage, $55,000 of personal property coverage, and $250,000 of bodily harm/property damage coverage.

• Hippo – $84/month ($1008 annually)
• State Farm – $87/month ($1044 annually)
• Geico $88/month ($1056 annually)

Who Does Policygenius Show Rates From?

Your offers depend on where you are, as most insurance companies have better or worse coverage in different parts of the US.

Luckily, Policygenius will always order your offers from cheapest to most expensive, so you’ll always see some of the best offers first.

As we said earlier, however, Policygenius has not yet partnered with every single insurance company. There’s a limited number of possible companies you’ll get rates from through Policygenius.

For life insurance policies, Policygenius has several partners. They’ve currently written reviews of some of their most well-known life insurance partners, including: 

• AIG
• Banner Life
• Lincoln Financial
• Mutual of Omaha
• Pacific Life
• Protective
• Prudential
• SBLI

For homeowners insurance policies, Policygenius is currently partnered with: 

• Allstate
• Amica
• Chubb
• Farmers
• Geico
• Hippo
• Progressive
• State Farm

For renters insurance policies, Policygenius has several partners. They’ve currently written reviews of some of the most popular renters insurance companies, including: 

• Allstate
• Geico
• Lemonade
• Liberty Mutual
• Progressive
• Stillwater
• State Farm

This isn’t a complete list of all the insurance companies out there. But, Policygenius has many of the biggest and highest-rated ones, so you should be able to find some reasonable offers.

Does Policygenius Work In My Location?

While Policygenius has the proper licenses to operate everywhere nationwide, this doesn’t necessarily mean there will be insurance companies that cover every location.

The amount of coverage available depends partially on the type of insurance you’re looking at and partly on where you are.

On the one hand, for common insurance types like life and auto, it’s a pretty safe bet you can find coverage in your area.

But for slightly less common insurance types, the results may vary. For example, I live in a suburb in North Carolina, where rental properties are less common. Because of this, it’s not surprising that Policygenius did not have renters insurance available for my area.

If you’re curious about whether you can get a specific type of insurance, it’s easy to go on Policygenius’ website and fill out their brief questionnaire.

Is Policygenius Safe?

The short answer is, yes, Policygenius is safe. They only partner with insurance companies that are well-rated by insurance raters. Their personal requirements for any potential partner is at least an A- rating.

This means any insurance company that you see through Policygenius has already been vetted by both Policygenius and financial raters like Standard and Poor’s.

Policygenius Customer Support

Policygenius’ customer support is staffed by a team of licensed professionals. You can reach them via email, phone, or live chat from 9 am to 9 pm ET, seven days a week.

They’re also very flexible and useful. You can speak with them about issues navigating their site, choosing rates, or any other questions you may have. 

Should You Use Policygenius?

Shopping around for different quotes is always a good way to save money. As an insurance comparison tool, Policygenius is currently one of the best and easiest to use on the market.

They’re simple to use, offer a wide range of insurance types, and best of all, they’re 100% free.

However, it’s important to use Policygenius wisely. Since they don’t show quotes from all insurance companies. Neither does any other insurance broker. Just recognize that you may still want to shop around a bit more to find the best quote.

But overall, Policygenius is a fantastic place to start your search and learn more about different insurance types. Their stellar customer support can help walk you through the process of buying insurance without the fancy jargon.

If you’re looking for insurance, you should seriously consider Policygenius.