Commission is paid by the insurer out of the premium — shown here for complete transparency. Same commission either way.
Set by the insurer based on deal risk, coverage limit, retention, and underwriter appetite. Identical regardless of broker.
Roughly 15%–17.5% of premium, paid by the insurer out of the premium the insured already pays. Identical regardless of broker.
Paid to the insurer to cover outside counsel's diligence review. Varies by deal type and complexity. Identical regardless of broker.
Set by applicable state law (typically 2%–6% of premium). Identical regardless of broker.
Many retail brokers add a limits-based fee on top of the commission already paid by the insurer. Typically 0.65%–0.75% of the coverage limit, with minimums in the $40,000–$80,000 range. Often not disclosed upfront.
WolfTRI's compensation is the insurer-paid commission embedded in the carrier's premium. WolfTRI does not charge an additional retail broker fee.
| Deal type | Rate-on-line | Underwriting fee | Typical retention |
|---|---|---|---|
| Commercial Real Estate | 1.3% – 2.2% | $20K – $40K | 0.10% – 0.25% of purchase price; steps down to 0.10% after 12 months |
| M&A / Operating Business | 2.5% – 3.5% | $35K – $50K | 0.75% – 1.00% of purchase price; steps down to 0.50% after 12 months claim-free |
| GP-Led Secondaries | 1.5% – 2.0% | $25K – $40K | 0.25% of NAV; steps down to 0.10% after 12 months claim-free |
Certain true fundamental representations may have no retention. Rate-on-line is the premium as a percentage of coverage limit.
Send us your last 12 months of RWI invoices — anonymized is fine. We'll benchmark each one against the wholesale-access pricing above and send back a confidential one-page analysis within 48 hours. No obligation; no follow-up unless you ask for it.
If you're the one tasked with taking cost out of the portfolio, RWI broker fees are an unusually clean target — identical scope of work, identical carriers, identical underwriters, and a fee structure that's rarely been benchmarked inside the fund. Consolidating placement through a wholesale-access broker is typically a single procurement decision with no operational disruption.
Two or three preferred carriers is usually enough to cover the full range of deal types across a typical PE portfolio. We work from your preferences, not ours — including insurers you're already comfortable with, including any carrier you currently access through your incumbent broker, whatever the existing fee arrangement.
Access the same RWI market through a U.S. wholesale platform. Same policy forms. Same underwriters who already know your deal patterns. Same claims desk. The only thing that changes is the line item on the binder: the 0.65%–0.75% of limits (or $40K–$80K floor) a retail broker would have added on top of the carrier commission is removed. WolfTRI's compensation is the insurer-paid commission embedded in the carrier's premium. WolfTRI does not charge an additional retail broker fee.
Consolidation doesn't mean a service downgrade. Every deal — from $15M asset trades through $500M platform acquisitions and continuation-vehicle secondaries — is quoted, negotiated, bound, and claim-managed at the founder level. No junior handoff. No intake queue. Founder-level attention across every portco, every deal, every year.
At 6–10 RWI placements per year with average coverage of $30M–$50M, the eliminated fee typically runs $400K–$1.2M across the portfolio annually. Because the fee was a direct deal expense, the savings flow through to portco EBITDA and ultimately to fund-level returns — not to GP management-company economics.