#Compare car selling websites series#

Many of these sites are lead generators: companies that capture shoppers’ personal information in order to sell or share it.

#Compare car selling websites series#

Annually, that adds up to a $120 to $480 difference.Ĭertain quote-comparison sites ask you a series of questions about yourself, your driving record, and your car-then they sell those details to insurance companies and brokers, who can follow up with calls, emails, and texts. Most quotes from comparison sites were $10 to $40 off per month from the quotes I got directly from the same insurers, with the same details and coverage levels. Using my colleague’s details, I compared initial quotes from five comparison sites with quotes I got directly from insurance companies-and I found some pretty big differences. But I got a ton of quotes when I tested the sites using personal information from a colleague in Texas (with her permission!). Where you live matters a lot: I live in California, where industry experts say auto insurers are currently hesitant to write new policies, so I got very few quotes from the comparison sites I tried. If you have at-fault collisions or less-than-stellar credit that you didn’t disclose in the initial questionnaire, for example, you might end up with a higher final quote once you finish the process. The quotes that do appear on comparison sites are usually preliminary estimates, which isn’t always obvious as you go through the process. (Neither insurer responded to CR’s questions about how they work with independent agents.) In fact, Farmers and State Farm are among several insurers that don’t allow independent insurance agents to sell their policies at all, experts tell CR-whether online, in person or over the phone. And none that we came across displayed a quote from every major carrier. Since each company has relationships with different insurance carriers, you likely won’t get the same set of quotes from any of them. But depending on your situation, they can be hit-or-miss.

When they work well, they’re useful tools. They function like a traditional independent insurance agent you’d call up on the phone, except they let you shop at your own pace online. Sites that let you compare several quotes directly include Experian, Jerry, Policygenius, Way.com, and The Zebra. No quote-comparison site is perfect, but some of them can help you get a lay of the land as you begin shopping around. (I didn’t use my main phone number or email address, so that I wouldn’t drown in messages.)Ī few simple tips can help you keep your personal details private while getting the most out of quote-comparison sites. When I tried out more than a dozen popular quote-comparison sites, I usually didn’t know which was which until I’d gone through the whole process and entered a lot of personal data. Where you live-and who you are-can affect your experience on these sites, too. It’s not obvious which sites will give you online quotes and which will sell your information to outside companies. These companies say their model helps widen your search-but it can also cause you to lose control of your personal information. Instead, they pass along the data they’ve gathered about you to insurance agents and marketing companies that can use it to call, text, and email you with offers. Other sites usually don’t show you quotes at all. These platforms often let you buy a policy online, or you can call the company’s agents to get set up. Some are like insurance agents, serving up an array of quotes from different carriers. But there are big differences between comparison sites.