How often should I shop my insurance?

The events that genuinely change your pricing

Buying or selling a home. Adding or removing a driver, especially a teenager aging into or out of the household. Marriage or divorce. A significant change in annual mileage, including a shift to remote work. Paying off a vehicle, which makes collision and comprehensive optional. A ticket or an at-fault accident aging past three or five years. A meaningful improvement in credit.

Each of those changes the inputs carriers rate on. A policy priced before one of them is priced on facts that are no longer true.

Why rates drift upward on their own

Carriers file rate changes with the state periodically, and those apply at renewal whether or not anything about you changed. Meanwhile the discounts you qualified for at signup do not automatically expand as your situation improves. The gap compounds quietly.

When not to bother

If you filed a claim in the last few months, if you are mid-term with a cancellation fee, or if you moved carriers within the past year, sit tight. Loyalty tenure has real value with several carriers, and switching repeatedly can cost you more than it saves.

What re-shopping should look like

Not a phone call asking for a better price. A fresh comparison across carriers using your current declarations page, matching coverage line for line so you are comparing the same thing. If the answer is that your current policy is already the right one, that is a legitimate result and worth knowing.