One arrives warm and gets sold to four other agents. The other arrives cold and costs a penny and a half. Here is the math on both, including where shared leads win.
Shared internet leads are the default first purchase for most agents. Someone filled out a quote form, an aggregator sold that form to several agents at once, and you paid $8 to $30 for the right to call them quickly. It works. The question is what it costs per policy once you account for the three other agents dialing the same number.
| Shared web lead | Aged data list | |
|---|---|---|
| Price per lead | $8–$30 | $0.015 |
| Intent | Real, recent, explicit | None — demographic match only |
| Competition on the same record | 3–8 agents at once | Rested 90 days after each sale |
| Speed pressure | Call within 60 seconds or lose | None — work it on your schedule |
| Conversion | 5–15% of leads | 0.1–0.3% reply, then your funnel |
| Cost per deal | $150 on paper; $400–$800 commonly reported per bound policy | ~$65 typical, ~$390 at the floor |
| Volume for $390 | ~20 leads | 10,000 records |
| What you own afterward | Nothing | The list — rework it for months |
The advertised close rate on a shared lead assumes you are first to call. Industry research on speed-to-lead is consistent and brutal: the agent who calls within the first minute wins a disproportionate share, and by the time you are the fourth caller that afternoon, the consumer is annoyed and already quoted. That $150 "cost per deal on paper" is why reported CPA on bound P&C policies frequently lands between $400 and $800 instead.
Practically, shared leads reward whoever can drop everything and dial instantly. If you are with a client, teaching, or asleep, you bought a lead that someone else closed.
The full calculation for 10,000 records, adjustable in our ROI calculator:
The comparison that matters: that same $390 buys you roughly twenty shared web leads, which at a 10% close rate is two policies — and only if you win the race on all twenty.
Genuinely, in these cases:
Most agents who do well run both, for different jobs. Shared leads are the "I need someone to talk to this afternoon" purchase. An aged list is the always-on layer underneath — the thing that keeps the pipeline fed at a cost per conversation nothing else matches. If you can only afford one and you cannot reliably dial within a minute of a form fill, the aged list will produce more conversations per dollar, provided you actually work it on a schedule.
For the same comparison against pre-qualified phone leads, see aged leads vs live transfers, or the full price map in how much insurance leads cost in 2026.
This is the most important paragraph on the page. Aged data records are not consented insurance-form leads, carry no TCPA express consent, and are not DNC-scrubbed when we deliver them. Before you contact anyone on an aged list you are responsible for scrubbing against the National and applicable state Do-Not-Call registries, registering your 10DLC campaign with your SMS provider, and honoring every opt-out permanently. Budget for the scrub — it runs a few dollars per thousand records and it is not optional. Our walkthrough is here: how to DNC scrub an aged lead list. None of this is legal advice; talk to your own compliance counsel.
They are worth it if you can call within the first minute consistently. Shared leads carry real, recent intent, which is something aged data does not have. The economics depend almost entirely on speed-to-lead: the advertised 5 to 15 percent close rate assumes you are first to the phone, and reported cost per bound policy often lands between $400 and $800 once you account for being the fourth caller.
Typically three to eight agents receive the same shared web lead simultaneously, depending on the aggregator and the vertical. That is what separates a shared lead priced at $8 to $30 from an exclusive real-time lead priced at $20 to $60.
Per record, aged data is cheaper by roughly a thousand times — $0.015 versus $8 to $30. Per closed policy the gap narrows sharply but still favors aged data in our funnel assumptions: about $65 typical and $390 at the pessimistic floor, versus $400 to $800 commonly reported for bound policies from shared leads.
Aged data is sold non-exclusively across the industry, which is why it is priced per record. On our store specifically, a record is pulled from the sellable pool for 90 days after it is purchased before it can be sold again, so you are not working the same numbers as another buyer from the same week.
As close to immediately as possible. Speed-to-lead research consistently shows response within the first minute wins a disproportionate share of shared leads, and effectiveness drops steeply after that. If you cannot reliably drop what you are doing to dial, shared leads are a poor fit and bulk aged data works better around a real schedule.
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