Getting an insurance license in Virginia
Virginia licenses through the Virginia Bureau of Insurance, which calls the licensee an agent. Which license you need depends on what you intend to sell, and the requirements differ sharply between them.
License types
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Health
Sells accident and health insurance in Virginia. The Bureau writes the qualification as Health and lists twelve classes of insurance inside it.
No course
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Life and Annuities
Sells life insurance and annuities in Virginia. Annuities are inside the qualification rather than beside it, except the variable ones, which need a qualification of their own.
No course
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Life & Health Consultant
Advises on life and health insurance in Virginia for a fee rather than selling it. It needs an examination and no course.
No course
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Limited Lines Credit Insurance
Sells credit insurance in Virginia without sitting any examination.
No course
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Limited Lines Life & Health
Sells a closed set of life and health products in Virginia without sitting any examination.
No course
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Limited Lines Property & Casualty
Sells a closed set of property and casualty products in Virginia without sitting any examination. Portable electronics, self storage and travel are inside it rather than licensed separately.
No course
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Managing General Agent
Manages all or part of a Virginia insurer's business. Its threshold is a share of the insurer's surplus rather than anything the applicant has studied.
No course
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Motor Vehicle Rental Contract Insurance Agent
Sells cover with a Virginia vehicle rental. Five named coverages and nothing else, and only in connection with the rental contract.
No course
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Personal Lines
Sells personal property and casualty insurance in Virginia. Twenty-one classes of insurance, and every one of them is also inside the Property and Casualty qualification.
No course
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Property & Casualty Consultant
Advises on property and casualty insurance in Virginia for a fee rather than selling it. Twenty-three classes of insurance, ending with contingent and consequential losses.
No course
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Property and Casualty
Sells property and casualty insurance in Virginia. It contains the Personal Lines qualification whole, which the Bureau marks with an asterisk on its own page.
No course
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Public Adjuster
Adjusts a Virginia first-party property claim for the insured. Virginia's definition of what that is has a boundary written into it, and third-party and bodily injury claims are outside it.
No course
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Reinsurance Intermediary Broker
Places reinsurance cessions for a Virginia ceding insurer without power to bind it. The absence of that power is the whole difference from the manager license.
No course
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Reinsurance Intermediary Manager
Binds reinsurance risks or manages a Virginia reinsurer's assumed business. The half of the reinsurance intermediary pair that carries authority.
No course
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Surplus Lines Broker
Places Virginia risks with non-admitted insurers. No examination of its own: it stacks on an active property and casualty license and a $25,000 bond.
No course
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Title
Sells title insurance in Virginia. It is the only Virginia line with a pre-licensing course.
16 hrs
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Variable Contracts
Sells variable life insurance and variable annuity contracts in Virginia. It stacks on the Life and Annuities qualification and on a FINRA examination, and Virginia sets no examination of its own for it.
No course
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Viatical Settlement Broker
Introduces a Virginia viator to settlement providers, or negotiates the contract between them. Anyone selling life settlements here holds this license.
No course
Is a course required?
Virginia requires pre-licensing education for Title , at 16 hours.
Sixteen hours of classroom study, distance learning or any combination of the two, certified on an affidavit signed by the instructor and handed to the proctor at the test center. The Title exam must be passed within one year of finishing the course; miss that and the course has to be taken again before re-testing. The Bureau tells applicants to report any provider who suggests that less than sixteen hours is acceptable. The statute defines distance education as instruction delivered under the general supervision of an instructor and says it "shall not include self-study or correspondence courses", so every one of the sixteen hours is instructor-led. That is why no national seller carries a Virginia title product: there is no self-paced version of this course to sell.
Read at scc.virginia.gov on 2026-08-16 . Code of Virginia ยง 38.2-1814.1
Virginia requires no pre-licensing course for Health, Life and Annuities, Personal Lines, Property and Casualty, Variable Contracts, Limited Lines Credit Insurance, Limited Lines Life & Health, Limited Lines Property & Casualty, Life & Health Consultant, Property & Casualty Consultant, Public Adjuster, Managing General Agent, Motor Vehicle Rental Contract Insurance Agent, Reinsurance Intermediary Broker, Reinsurance Intermediary Manager, Surplus Lines Broker, Viatical Settlement Broker.
Every qualification Virginia issues except Title, and none of them carries a course. The Bureau's own "Lines of Authority & Application Fees" page marks each one either "Exam Required" or "No exam required", lists the classes of insurance it covers, and states the Title course, sixteen hours, on the same screen. That is a sourced zero read off a complete departmental enumeration rather than off a silence, and Title is the proof the enumeration would carry a course where one exists.
Read at the Department on 2026-08-17
Fees
| Charge | Paid to | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Application processing fee Non-refundable, and charged per qualification per application rather than once per applicant, so an application carrying two qualifications costs $30. It is not the Bureau's only application fee and this row used to be scoped as if it were: the managing general agent and both reinsurance intermediaries are charged $500 on the same page. | Virginia Bureau of Insurance | $15.00 |
| Managing general agent or reinsurance intermediary application fee The Bureau publishes $500 for the managing general agent, the reinsurance intermediary broker and the reinsurance intermediary manager alike, against the $15 per qualification everything else pays. None of the three requires an examination, so the fee is the whole barrier. It is charged per application rather than per qualification. | Virginia Bureau of Insurance | $500.00 |
Every amount above was read at its own source on 2026-09-05. Exam and fingerprint charges go to a vendor, not to the Department, and say so.
Approved courses
There is no register to search, and this page carries no link because there is nothing at the other end of one. The Bureau states that neither it nor its exam vendor reviews or approves study materials or pre-licensing schools, and points candidates at the examination content outlines instead. Title is the exception: its course is mandated by statute and certified by affidavit, but the schools that teach it are still not on an approved list. Virginia is one of the seventeen states carried by Sircon's approved courses inquiry and a Virginia pre-licensing search there returns nothing, which is the same answer from the other direction.