Getting an insurance license in New Mexico
New Mexico licenses through the New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance, which calls the licensee a producer. Which license you need depends on what you intend to sell, and the requirements differ sharply between them.
License types
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Adjuster
Adjusts claims in New Mexico. The Producer Licensing Bureau's rule asks for the examination and no course, and the fee is the same $30 a producer pays.
No course
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Bail Bondsman
Writes bail bonds in New Mexico. Ten clock hours, where a clock hour is fifty minutes rather than sixty.
40 hrs
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Bail Solicitor
Solicits bail in New Mexico. Ten clock hours, where a clock hour is fifty minutes rather than sixty.
40 hrs
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Credit
A limited producer license for somebody employed full time by a shop or a lender, covering only the credit cover sold alongside the loan. The job comes first here: the license is not available to anybody who is not already working for the seller or the lender.
No course
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Independent Review Organization
Reviews a health plan's refusal from outside it, for a New Mexican who has appealed. New Mexico licenses it rather than approving it, and the license only appeared in the fee schedule in 2017.
No course
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Insurance Administrator
Adjusts, settles or manages somebody else's insurance or self-insurance plan for New Mexicans. New Mexico charges a $75 examination fee for the license and publishes no examination behind it.
No course
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Insurance Consultant
Advises on insurance for a fee rather than selling it. New Mexico prices it above the producer at every stage and charges it a second examination fee of its own.
No course
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Insurance Producer
Sells insurance in New Mexico. One license carries every kind of insurance the holder is examined for, so New Mexico has no separate life or property license to hold.
No course
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Insurance Vending Machine
A license for a machine rather than for a person. New Mexico issues one per machine, at $25 each, to a producer who wants to sell travel accident policies out of a box at an airport.
No course
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Motor Club Representative
Sells motor club memberships in New Mexico. The club registers the representative rather than the representative applying, and four of the five qualifications are about character rather than knowledge.
No course
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Pharmacy Benefits Manager
Manages prescription drug benefits for a covered entity. It costs $1,000 to get and $500 every single year to keep, on a licensing calendar where almost everything else in New Mexico renews every two years.
No course
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Portable Electronics
The limited producer license a shop holds so its staff can sell cover on a phone. How much of the shop's revenue comes from the insurance decides how many people have to be named on the application.
No course
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Insurance Premium Financing
Lends people the money to pay their premiums. The license runs on the state's own calendar rather than the holder's: it renews every year on the first day of May, whenever it was first issued.
No course
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Rental Car Agent
The limited producer license a rental car company holds so its counter staff can sell cover with the car. The insurer has to vouch for the applicant in writing before the license issues, and it has to have read the staff training program first.
No course
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Self-Service Storage Insurance Producer
Lets the owner of a storage facility insure what occupants keep in it. An owner who only leaves the insurer's brochures on the counter needs no license, and the statute says so in its own subsection.
No course
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Service Contract Provider
Sells the extended warranty on a car or an appliance. New Mexico registers rather than licenses it, for a year at a time, and the statute's own fee sentence is written in the conditional because it was drafted before the bill that set the price had passed.
No course
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Surplus Lines Broker
Places New Mexico risks with insurers that are not authorized here. At $100 to apply and $200 to continue it costs more than three times what a producer license does.
No course
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Temporary Insurance Producer
A producer license for up to 180 days, issued without an examination where the superintendent decides one is needed to keep an insurance business being serviced. It costs the same $30 as a permanent license and the examination fee is not charged at all.
No course
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Title Insurance Producer
Sells title insurance in New Mexico. The fee schedule prices no title license separately, so the producer figures are what an applicant pays.
No course
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Limited Lines Travel Insurance Producer
Stands behind the travel agents and booking sites that hand out travel insurance without a license of their own. New Mexico had made travel a limited line, deleted it in 2013, and gave it an article of its own in 2025.
No course
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Viatical Broker
Acts for the owner of a life policy in selling it. The provider who buys the policy pays ten times as much for its own license.
No course
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Viatical Settlement Provider
Buys life policies from the people who own them. It costs ten times what the broker on the other side of the same transaction pays to apply, and twice as much to keep.
No course
Is a course required?
New Mexico requires no pre-licensing course for Insurance Producer, Temporary Insurance Producer, Adjuster, Insurance Consultant, Viatical Broker, Viatical Settlement Provider, Surplus Lines Broker, Title Insurance Producer, Credit, Portable Electronics, Rental Car Agent, Self-Service Storage Insurance Producer, Limited Lines Travel Insurance Producer, Insurance Vending Machine, Insurance Administrator, Insurance Premium Financing, Motor Club Representative, Pharmacy Benefits Manager, Independent Review Organization, Service Contract Provider.
The Producer Licensing Bureau's own rule for resident licenses runs to more than a hundred sections and mentions pre-licensing education in none of them. What it requires of the license types it covers is the examination, and its only education provisions are continuing education. A sourced zero read off the rule that governs the license rather than off a page about it. The list is longer than the rule because most of what the Office issues is not in the rule at all: the Insurance Code creates the limited producer lines, the administrator, the premium financing company, the pharmacy benefits manager, the independent review organization and the rest, and not one of those articles sets a course. Three of them do set training, and in every case it lands on somebody other than the applicant: NMSA 59A-62-8 makes the supervising entity train the storage facility's counter staff on a program the superintendent approves, 59A-32A-5(D) makes the rental car company train its endorsees on a program the insurer has to have reviewed, and 59A-64-3(B)(6) makes the travel producer train the travel retailer's staff on a program the superintendent may review. None of the three is a condition on the person applying, and no school is approved to sell any of them.
Read at srca.nm.gov on 2026-08-21 . 13.4.2 NMAC
New Mexico requires pre-licensing education for Bail Bondsman, Bail Solicitor , at 10 hours.
Ten clock hours of formal classroom education, and a clock hour here is defined as 50 minutes of continuous instruction rather than 60. On top of it sit thirty clock hours of on-the-job training under a plan the sponsoring bail bondsman files with the superintendent each January, and 13.20.2.14 NMAC bars the examination until both are finished, so the real total is forty hours and only ten of them are for sale. The superintendent may waive the education where the applicant's background and experience warrant it. New Mexico also tells providers where to teach: courses must be offered in at least two parts of the state 150 driving miles apart until enough classes exist statewide.
Read at srca.nm.gov on 2026-08-16 . 13.20.2.11 NMAC
Fees
| Charge | Paid to | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Original producer license Set in statute at NMSA 59A-6-1(E)(1), covering the application and the issuance together. A temporary license is the same $30 under paragraph (4) and carries no examination fee. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $30.00 |
| Biennial continuation of producer license Twice the original, which is unusual, and not a cost of getting a first license. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $60.00 |
| Appointment, per kind of insurance, per insurer Filed and paid by the insurer, and $20 again each year to continue, so it scales with how many insurers appoint the producer and across how many kinds of insurance. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $20.00 |
| Agency business entity license The entity form of the producer license and an alternative to the individual's $30 rather than an addition to it, so no cost page may total it. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $30.00 |
| Insurance vending machine license, each machine Per machine, so an operator of ten machines pays ten times. The biennial continuation is $50 a machine. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $25.00 |
| Surplus lines broker license The biennial continuation is $200. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $100.00 |
| Adjuster license The biennial continuation is $60. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $30.00 |
| Insurance consultant license The consultant is priced its own examination fee of $75 at 59A-6-1(M)(2) as well as the general one at (H), and the biennial continuation is $100. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $50.00 |
| Viatical settlement broker license The biennial continuation is $200. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $100.00 |
| Viatical settlement provider license Ten times the broker's fee for the other side of the same transaction. The biennial continuation is $400. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $1,000.00 |
| Insurance premium financing license Renewed annually on 1 May for the same $100, whenever the license was first issued. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $100.00 |
| Motor club representative registration Per representative, filed by the club. The biennial continuation is $60 each. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $30.00 |
| Bail bondsman or solicitor license The examination is $50 each time it is sat, which is $25 less than every other New Mexico examination, and the biennial continuation is $60. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $30.00 |
| Insurance administrator license For the business entity. The biennial continuation is $200, the examination $75 and the annual report $50. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $100.00 |
| Pharmacy benefits manager license Continued annually rather than biennially, at $500 for each year continued, with $200 for each annual report. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $1,000.00 |
| Independent review organization license The biennial continuation is $100. The row was added to the fee schedule with effect from 1 July 2017. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $250.00 |
| Service contract provider registration Set by NMSA 59A-58-5(A)(4)(b) rather than by the fee schedule, which prices no service contract provider. Valid for one year from the date it is filed. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $500.00 |
| Continuing education provider, per course of instruction Paid by the school rather than by the applicant, per course, with $40 for the biennial continuation of each one. | New Mexico Office of Superintendent of Insurance | $80.00 |
Every amount above was read at its own source on 2026-08-21. Exam and fingerprint charges go to a vendor, not to the Department, and say so.
Approved courses
New Mexico accredits the provider, and only for bail bonds: the insurance education committee and the superintendent approve who may teach the ten hours and the curriculum they teach. For producers there is nothing to approve. The state runs on State Based Systems and a New Mexico pre-licensing search there returns nothing at all, so the bail bonds accreditation is not published as a course register anywhere we can read. The fee schedule confirms the shape from the other end: 59A-6-1(CC) charges a continuing education provider $80 to file a course of instruction and $40 to continue it, and prices no pre-licensing course at all.