On 61st Street since 2004
About the agency
An independent agency placing personal and commercial insurance across western Queens. We are paid by carriers, we charge you nothing, and we will tell you when the answer is to stay where you are.
What an independent agency actually is
We are not an insurance company. We do not decide premiums, we do not underwrite risks and we do not decide claims. What we do is hold appointments with a number of carriers, work out which of them has an appetite for your particular facts, and then stay with the policy for the years afterwards — the renewals, the endorsements, the certificates and the claim.
That last part is where the value actually sits, and it is worth saying because the sale is what gets advertised. The commission a carrier pays us is paid for the year rather than for the afternoon, so an agency that places business badly and loses it at renewal earns less than one that places it well. Keeping you is worth more than winning you.
Why this site reads the way it does
Because the dishonesty in this trade is not incidental to the work — it is built into how the work is paid for. A producer is compensated by the company selling you the thing they are advising you about, as a percentage of what you spend on it. That is a workable arrangement and it is the arrangement almost everywhere, but it only stays honest if somebody says it out loud.
So this website says it out loud, at some cost. It explains why nobody here can beat a filed rate, which removes the easiest sales pitch in the business. It publishes what we are paid and where our interests diverge from yours. It explains why the gift card another agency is offering you for a quote is a violation rather than a bargain. And it points you at a free state complaint process and at the people you should hire instead of us when that is the honest answer.
What we will not do
We will not describe cover on a certificate that is not on the policy, whatever Friday afternoon it is. We will not leave a licensed household driver off an application, or write a Queens car at somebody else's garaging address, or understate the height a contractor works at. Every one of those buys a cheaper premium and a declined claim, and the customer carries the consequence rather than the producer.
We will not present one policy's price against another policy's cover in order to get you to move — New York has a name for that and a statute about it. And we will not tell you on the telephone that you are covered, because the carrier's adjuster decides that and we would be guessing with your money.
The arrangement, in full
How this agency is paid, and what that buys you
Commission, from the carrier
Eight to twenty per cent of premium depending on the line. Inside the filed rate whoever sells the policy, so using an agency costs you nothing extra.
No fee from you, ever
No broker fee, no policy fee, nothing for certificates or claims work. That last one also keeps us out of public adjuster territory.
The number on request
Ask what we make on your policy and you get the percentage and the carrier in writing before you sign anything.
Which hat, said first
Broker acting for you, or agent of a particular insurer. New York treats those as different duties and we tell you which applies.
The conflicts, written down
Higher premium means higher commission. Permanent life pays far more than term. A move pays more than a renewal. All three are on this site.
No borrowed authority
No carrier logos, no rating letters, no accreditation seals, no stars. The only checkable credential is a public licence record.
What the carrier pays us, and where that pulls against you. We are paid a commission by the insurance company whose policy you buy, as a percentage of your premium. It varies by carrier, by line of business and sometimes by how much business we place in a year, which means our interests and yours are aligned on most things and not on all of them. New York Regulation 194 requires us to tell you our role, that we are compensated, and that you may ask what we are paid. We would rather publish it than wait to be asked: ask, and you will get the percentage and the carrier in writing before you sign anything.
Nobody has voted us anything. There are no carrier logos on this website, no rating-agency letters, no accreditation seals and no review-platform stars. Displaying a carrier's mark borrows an insurer's authority for a broker's opinion, and a directory badge is a purchase rather than a finding. The one credential that means anything is the producer licence, which is a public record you can look up at the Department of Financial Services without asking us. Ours reads 00000, because this is a demonstration website for a business that does not exist.
Bring the declarations page and we will read it with you
Ask us what it would cost
Send or bring the summary pages of what you already have — those two sheets are where most of the useful conversation is. We will tell you what we would place it with and what that would cost, what we are paid for doing it, and whether you should move at all. Quite often the answer is that your current policy is priced fairly and you should keep it, and that is an answer we give in writing like any other.