How Much Do Final Expense Leads and Calls Cost?

The short answer

Final expense leads and calls are sold several different ways, and their prices only compare once you know what each one pays for. A shared lead, an exclusive lead, an aged lead, a direct mail lead, a live transfer and an inbound call are six different purchases. Every vendor sets its own price and changes it often, so this page does not list other companies' rates. It shows you what to ask for, and how to turn any quote into the number that matters: what one sale costs you.

Our own prices are public. Our final expense TV calls are $70 each and our final expense social calls are $47 each, billed only when connected time passes the buffer. A call that ends before the buffer costs $0. The seat is $97 a month per agent, first 30 days free. The whole rate card is on the final expense call pricing page.

Six ways final expense leads and calls are sold

• Shared leads. A name and number from a web form, sold to more than one agent. Usually the lowest price per lead. You race the other buyers to the phone.
• Exclusive leads. The same kind of record, sold to one agent only. It costs more per lead because nobody else is dialing it.
• Aged leads. Older records, weeks or months old, sold at a discount. Many of those people have already talked to an agent or stopped answering.
• Direct mail leads. Reply cards a senior filled in and mailed back. They suit field agents who visit people at home, and they arrive at the speed of the post.
• Live transfers. A screener talks to the caller first, then connects them to you. The vendor decides when the bill starts.
• Inbound calls. The senior dials the number on an ad and the call rings one agent. You pay for the call, not for a record.

The first four are leads. You get a record, and you still have to reach the person. The last two are calls. A person is already on the phone when you pick up. That difference changes your cost more than the price tag does, and it is the whole subject of pay per call vs pay per lead.

What the price pays for

Every lead or call price is tied to an event that starts the charge. Find out what that event is before you look at the dollar figure.

• Per record. You pay when the name is delivered, whether or not anyone ever answers.
• Per connect. You pay the moment the call connects, even if the caller hangs up two seconds later.
• Per duration. You pay once the call runs past a number of seconds the vendor picked.
• Per qualified transfer. You pay when a screener marks the caller as qualified, using the vendor's own definition.
• Per buffer. You pay once connected time passes a buffer you can see before you go online. This is how we bill.

Two vendors can quote the same price and bill on different events. A lower price that bills on connect can cost more per conversation than a higher price that bills after a buffer, because every wrong number and early hang-up lands on your bill. One question tests it: what does a call that lasts five seconds cost? With us it costs $0. The billing models are explained on pay-per-call final expense.

The costs that are not on the price tag

The price per lead or per call is rarely the whole bill. Add these up before you compare two offers side by side.

• A monthly platform or seat fee. Ours is $97 a month per agent, first 30 days free.
• A minimum purchase or minimum top-up. Ours is $350, which is 5 TV calls or about 7 social calls.
• Tools for working leads: a dialer, a CRM, phone numbers, and a service that checks numbers against the Do Not Call registry. An inbound call needs none of them. Ours needs Chrome and a headset.
• Your time. Every hour spent dialing records that never answer is an hour you are not quoting a policy.
• Disputes. Find out what you can dispute, how long you have to file, and whether an approved dispute comes back as money or as credit.
• Credits you never use. Some vendors let credits expire. Ours do not expire while the account is open, but top-ups are final, so unused credits are not refunded when you close.

How to work out your cost per sale

Cost per sale is the number to compare, because it puts leads and calls on the same scale. Take everything you spent in a month on leads or calls, add the monthly fees, and divide by the policies you wrote from them.

1. Add up one month of lead or call spend.
2. Add the monthly fees: seat or platform, dialer, CRM, phone numbers.
3. Count the policies you wrote from those leads or calls in the same month.
4. Divide the total by the number of policies. That is your cost per sale.
5. Compare it with the commission on your average policy. The gap is what you keep.

Work it in calls before you work it in dollars. Here is an example, not a forecast: if 1 in 4 of your billed TV calls becomes a policy, each policy cost you 4 TV calls plus its share of the $97 seat. Run leads the same way: count how many leads it took to write one policy, then add the dialer, the CRM and the hours you spent dialing them. Your own ratios are the only ones that count. We do not publish a close rate, because yours depends on your script, your follow-up and the carriers you write with.

The take-home calculator on our home page runs the same math with your own calls a day, close rate, average premium and commission, and it takes the seat off the answer. Treat its result the same way: example numbers until your own log fills in.

Why the cheapest lead is not always the cheapest sale

Low cost final expense leads look good on an invoice. A cheap record that never picks up still cost money, and so did the time spent dialing it. Shared leads cost less because several agents call the same person, and the senior often talks to whoever gets through first. Aged leads cost less because many of those people have already been called, sometimes many times.

A higher price can still mean a lower cost per sale when more of what you buy turns into a real conversation. That is the case for paying for a call instead of a lead: you pay only after a person has stayed on the line past the buffer. It is not a promise that the call will close. A billed call can still end without a sale, and there is no time limit on the call.

Exclusive final expense leads sit between the two. You are the only agent dialing, but you still have to reach the person, and the record may be hours or days old by the time you call. Ask the vendor how old the lead is when it reaches you and where it came from: a web form, a mailed card or a phone call.

What our calls cost, line by line

• TV calls: $70 when connected time passes the buffer. The senior saw our ad on TV or streaming TV and called.
• Social calls: $47 when connected time passes the buffer. The senior saw our ad on social media and called.
• Under the buffer: $0, for either kind of call.
• Long calls: the price does not go up, however long you talk.
• Seat: $97 a month per agent on your card, first 30 days free, cancel any time, no contract.
• Agencies: $147 a month for the owner dashboard plus $97 per agent. Volume rates above a monthly minimum we agree in writing.
• Wallet: the first top-up is $350, and later top-ups are $350 or more. Card, instant bank payment or ACH.
• Disputes: file from the call in your Call Center within 48 hours. A team member listens to the recording and replies in writing within one business day. An approved dispute comes back as wallet credit.

Each call goes to one agent. It is never shared or resold. A missed ring goes to the next online agent licensed in that state, and you are not billed for the miss. Calls come 9am to 8pm ET, Monday to Friday, from the states where you hold a life license. Streaming TV calls are the same $70 call, explained on CTV final expense calls. The plan for a team is final expense TV calls for agencies. How connected time is measured is in the buffer guidelines.

How to compare quotes from different vendors

Put every offer on one line with the same columns. If a vendor cannot answer one of these in writing, you do not have a quote you can compare yet.

1. What do I receive: a record to dial, or a live call?
2. What event starts the charge?
3. What does a five-second call cost?
4. Is it sold to one agent or to several?
5. What monthly fees come on top?
6. What is the least I have to buy, the first time and after that?
7. What can I dispute, and does an approved dispute come back as money or credit?
8. Do credits expire, and what happens to them if I leave?

The full list, with what to listen for in each answer, is questions to ask before buying final expense leads. If the vendor sells transfers, read live transfers vs inbound calls before you compare the two prices. If they sell names and call them inbound leads, final expense inbound calls explains why that is a different purchase.

Before you spend the first dollar

If you buy leads to dial, the rules for calling them are part of the cost: consent records, Do Not Call checks and calling hours in the senior's time zone. A call the consumer placed to us works differently, and our compliance page describes how we source calls and what to do about callbacks. This isn't legal advice; talk to your compliance team or attorney.

To start with us, you answer a few questions, book a short call with our team, and fund the wallet with us on that call. When the numbers make sense for your desk, apply for final expense calls. Every final expense page we have is listed on final expense calls.

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