The difference between the lowest and highest insurance quotes for the same type of cover has widened significantly, with the average difference for house insurance policies now over $1000, the chief executive of insurance comparison website Quashed says.
Quashed data from its latest quarterly index found that the average difference for the same property hit $1401 for house insurance.
Not only was this across house insurance but Quashed data showed a widening gap when it came to contents insurance and car insurance too.
The average difference between the lowest and highest quotes for the same type of comprehensive car insurance was $651. For contents insurance, the average difference was $599.
Quashed chief executive Justin Lim says you could point to risk-based pricing as a reason for this widening gap.
Risk-based pricing is when insurers take a range of risks into account when setting their premiums such as flooding, earthquakes, landslips, and storm surge.
Lim says the data indicated that’s the "impact of certain insurers pricing in a way where they’re saying ‘hey, there’s certain business we want to write and certain business that’s not really part of what we want to do'".
Quashed was seeing really high prices showing up in those situations, he says.
But with insurers pricing differently in the market, Lim told interest.co.nz that was ultimately good news for consumers if they’re shopping around.
Lim says if you’re paying more for your insurance cover, that does not mean you’re going to get more coverage or better benefits.
He encouraged people to shop around and to not only compare policies based on price, but also check what they’re covered for and what the limits are on the cover they’re looking at.
Rising car insurance premiums
Quashed data from the June quarter shows that average car insurance premiums increased 6% year-on-year, which is a jump of $75 - going from $1236 to $1311. (This is the average premium for the second quarter of 2026 for comprehensive insurance, with a 6% year-on-year rise.)
Despite comprehensive car insurance being the most popular option, Quashed has noticed more car owners are looking at basic Third Party cover (including fire and theft).
General insurance saw a 1% decrease in the past year, going from $5154 to $5120 and house insurance has seen a 3% year-on-year decrease with the average premium going from $3055 to $2949.
The average contents insurance premium saw no major year-on-year change, remaining around $860.
Quashed lets people upload their insurance policy documents so they can read about detailed information on their plans, costs and renewal dates. At least 100,000 people have used the platform. The website also has a comparison tool which analyses and compares different policy options.
Regional break down
Regionally, there was a year-on-year decrease to average house premiums in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch.
Auckland and Wellington saw a decrease of 6% and there was a 7% dip for Canterbury.
Auckland’s average house insurance premium dropped to $2198 from $2056 while in Wellington, the average home insurance premium slipped from $4797 to $4492. Canterbury dropped to $2903 from $3110.
When it came to comprehensive car insurance premiums, Auckland saw no major year-on-year change, going from $1479 to $1496.
Canterbury saw an increase of 4% year-on-year, with the average car insurance premium rising from $1148 to $1189.
Meanwhile Wellington saw no major change with the average car insurance premium moving up from $1126 to $1128.
As for the average contents insurance premiums in Wellington, there was a 12% decrease year-on year, going from $1131 to $990.
Auckland jumped up 10%, to $783 from $714.
In Canterbury, average contents insurance premiums had a 3% dip year-on-year, falling from $939 to $906.
For general insurance, Auckland saw a year-on-year decrease of 1%, from $4391 to $4335.
Meanwhile Canterbury saw a year-on-year decrease of 4%, falling from $5197 to $4998 while Wellington saw a 6% year-on-year decrease for general insurance - going from $7054 to $6610.
People continuing to look at higher excess levels
Lim says they’re seeing more people play around with excess levels this year.
He says the excesses people are picking are up by 15% on average year-on-year across house insurance, car insurance and content insurance.
Excess is a person’s contribution to a claim while the insurer pays for the rest of the claim, and people who choose a higher excess will have a lower overall premium.
House insurance saw the highest excess increase at 19% while car insurance saw a 14% jump and contents was up 6%, reflecting lower baseline premiums.
Lim says house insurance had gone up from $974 to $1160 compared to a year ago.
The jump in excess for house insurance wasn’t surprising because home insurance costs more so if customers could pull the lever on that, it could mean “significantly more savings” for them, he says.
The average excess people were picking for contents insurance had jumped from $459 to $489 while car insurance had gone from $538 to $615.
Quashed has 13 insurers on its platform for comparison. Turners Automotive Group has a 13% stake in Quashed after investing $1 million.
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