A journalAlbany, New YorkNo. 1 · October 2026

The Kenswick Partners

Straight answers on work, money, and the decisions behind a career.

The Kenswick Partners is a journal written from inside financial services and the businesses around it. The same questions come up every week: what a role really pays, what the first year is like, whether the thing someone read online is true. We write the answers down the way they would be said across a table, with the numbers and the sources attached.

Read the articles See the roles we post

Engraving of a kitchen table at night: a wall calendar laid flat with one date circled in red, a coffee cup, a pen, a folded statement and reading glasses. — From No. 01, the first year

From the desk

$62,280: the median pay for every insurance sales agent in America 14% of new recruits are still in the field after four years A $1,200 policy pays $960 up front, then $36 a year Month four is when the first commission usually lands Six months of expenses in the bank before anyone resigns 15.3% is the self-employment tax, on both halves Five questions to ask the person recruiting you $62,280: the median pay for every insurance sales agent in America 14% of new recruits are still in the field after four years A $1,200 policy pays $960 up front, then $36 a year Month four is when the first commission usually lands Six months of expenses in the bank before anyone resigns 15.3% is the self-employment tax, on both halves Five questions to ask the person recruiting you

No. 01

Start where you are

Three readers come here. Each has a first article, a tool to play with, and a plain next step.

I am weighing a move out of a salaried job.

The first year, month by month, with a runway tool you can set to your own household numbers.

Start with the cash calendar II

I own a business, or share one.

Key person coverage, buy-sell agreements, and the two federal rules that trip owners, explained before anyone sells you anything.

Start with the two rules III

Someone invited me to "hear about an opportunity."

The FTC's own test, what a legitimate commission hierarchy looks like, and five questions to ask before the coffee meeting.

Start with the five questions

No. 02

Try the first-year arithmetic

Nobody puts this on the recruiting slide, so we drew it. Move the sliders to your own numbers and watch the year redraw itself.

The full month-by-month version, with the licensing fees for four states and the sources, is the first long read.

No. 03

Latest from the desk

Every article is dated, sourced, and updated when a figure changes. The newest is first.

Explained, simply · No. 14

What are estimated taxes? Explained like four rent days a year

An employee’s taxes come out before the paycheck lands; a contractor is a tenant with four rent days a year and nobody collecting in between.

27 October 20266 minute readExplainedMoney

Explained, simply · No. 13

Median or average? Explained like a pickup basketball game

Ten players, one seven-footer, and why the midpoint of insurance agent pay tells you more than any average an agency chooses to show you.

27 October 20266 minute readExplainedMoney

Explained, simply · No. 12

1099 or W-2? Explained like running a food truck instead of working the grill

The difference between a paycheck and a commission check is the difference between a shift at a restaurant and owning the truck: who buys the propane, who pays both halves of the payroll tax, and who keeps the regulars.

27 October 20266 minute readExplainedMoney

Explained, simply · No. 11

What is an override? Explained like a referral bonus that never stops

The person who recruited you is paid a slice of every policy you sell, for as long as you sell; here is why that is legal, how the slice is sized, and the one place the comparison breaks.

27 October 20266 minute readExplainedMoney

All articles RSS

No. 04

Say it plainly

Eight words that get thrown around in first meetings. Turn a card over for what each one means in everyday terms.

No. 05

The numbers we keep coming back to

Three figures that frame almost every conversation we have, from the sources we trust most.

572,600insurance sales agents in the United States, 2025 (Bureau of Labor Statistics)
$62,280median annual pay for all of them, May 2025; the bottom tenth under $37,330, the top tenth over $138,140
14%of new recruits still in the field after four years, the industry's own figure (LIMRA, 2025)

A journal that shows its work.

The Kenswick Partners is written by people who have sat through enough first conversations in financial services to know which questions never get a straight answer. What a role really pays. What the first year is like. Whether the thing someone read online is true.

So the journal answers them. The desk writes the long reads and the short explainers; contributors from the industry write from experience under their own names. Each article is checked against the sources it lists, carries the date it was checked, and ends with a door: a way to see how one partner agency, The Miliare Group, answers those questions on the record, if you want to.

We are not an insurance agency, a broker-dealer, or a licensed adviser, and we do not write about products. Partner agencies may compensate us when a reader asks to be introduced to them. We say so on every page, because a reader who knows where we stand can weigh what we say.

About the journal Write to the desk

Roles we post.

The careers page lists the roles we post for partner agencies and for the journal itself. Remote and field, most of them.

View open roles