What This License Is
An Alaska Property license authorizes coverage on physical property and its direct loss — homeowners, dwelling fire, commercial property, inland marine and the property side of package policies. It is issued by the Alaska Division of Insurance under AS 21.27.
Alaska splits Property and Casualty into two separate lines with two separate exams. There is no combined P&C exam and no combined exam code; a producer who wants full property-casualty authority passes level 04 (Property) and level 05 (Casualty). Property alone is a real, usable license — but it does not include liability, auto or workers' compensation, and it does not include Personal Lines, which is its own separate line and its own separate exam in Alaska.
One important downstream link: surplus lines. A resident surplus lines broker license requires you to already hold a producer or managing general agent license with property and casualty lines of authority (AS 21.34.020(a)) — Property alone will not get you there. The broker license itself runs $300 biennially, four times the producer fee.
Exam Options & Format
Property is level 04, two parts in one appointment. Per the March 2025 content outlines: general part 50 scored plus 5 pretest, Alaska part 40 scored plus 10 pretest — 90 scored, 105 items. The 2023 handbook prints 60 and 50 for 110 items. Handbook timings are 1 hour 15 minutes plus 1 hour.
The Alaska Specific part breaks down as roughly 30 questions common to all lines and 10 on property insurance — which means the Alaska property content is a small, learnable target. Rate regulation, credit-based underwriting, the absence of a FAIR Plan and the surplus-lines placement rules are where it lives.
The Division's CY2025 data shows Property candidates passing at 60% first-time in test centers (61 of 102) and 87% online (27 of 31). As always with the online figures, the cohort is small. What is not small is the practical difference: Property and Casualty may be combined into one test-center session for a single fee, which is the sensible booking for anyone heading for full P&C authority.
Most Tested Topics on the Alaska Property Exam
Alaska's property section rewards knowing how the market is shaped — a seismic state with no residual property mechanism and a busy surplus-lines channel — rather than memorizing forms.
| Concept | The Alaska rule |
|---|---|
| Rate regulation, ordinary filings | File-and-use with a 30-day waiting period — file at least 30 days before the proposed effective date (AS 21.39.220) |
| The flex band | A cumulative rate change of 10% or less over 12 months takes effect without prior approval (AS 21.39.210) |
| Prior approval carve-outs | Workers' compensation, medical malpractice, assigned-risk rates, and insurers under supervision or rehabilitation |
| Credit history in underwriting | Permitted only in combination with other substantive underwriting factors — never as the sole basis (AS 21.36.460(c)) |
| FAIR Plan | None. Alaska has no FAIR Plan and no residual property market |
| Dominant catastrophe peril | Earthquake — the most seismically active state in the union |
| Surplus lines prerequisite | Producer or MGA license carrying property and casualty authority (AS 21.34.020(a)) |
| Surplus lines premium tax | 2.7% of net premium, remitted with the quarterly report (AS 21.34.180) |
| Surplus lines filing fee | 1% of gross premium less return premiums (AS 21.34.190(a)) — 3.7% all in |
| Wet marine and transportation | 0.75% on gross written, with no filing fee and no diligent search |
| The placement (export) list | A risk on the list needs no canvass for declinations — but the file must document that the list was evaluated and how the risk appears on it |
| Reusing a declination | A declination may be cited for other insureds for no more than 180 days (3 AAC 25.035(b)); a diligent search is required annually before renewal |
| Broker fee | Surplus lines broker license $300 biennial — four times the $75 producer fee |
The surplus-lines tax is worth pinning down, because Alaska publishes two numbers that look contradictory. The statute sets a 2.7% premium tax, and a separate section adds a 1% filing fee — 3.7% in total on ordinary surplus-lines business. The 0.75% figure that appears on the Division's surplus lines page is not an alternative rate for the same business; it applies to wet marine and transportation only, which also escapes the filing fee and the diligent-search requirement. A question offering 0.75% as the general rate is offering the marine exception.
The other reliable trap is rate regulation, because "file-and-use" is only two-thirds true. Alaska is a flex-rating state first: change rates by 10% or less cumulatively over twelve months and no prior approval is needed at all. Above that band you file and wait thirty days. And a handful of lines — workers' compensation, medical malpractice, assigned risk — sit outside the whole scheme under prior approval. Answer according to the size of the change and the line, not the label.
Where to Sit the Exam in Alaska — All Twelve Sites
Finding an exam seat is a real logistical problem in Alaska in a way it is not in most states, and the reason is arithmetic: the handbook lists twelve Pearson VUE sites across roughly 665,000 square miles, most of them not connected to each other by road. Understanding the network before you book is worth more here than in any other state.
Only one site is a dedicated Pearson Professional Center, in Anchorage. The other eleven are Pearson VUE authorized test centers hosted inside university, college and vocational campuses, which in practice means limited seats and limited testing days rather than walk-up scheduling. The handbook does not publish per-site seat availability, so treat campus sites as appointment-scarce until the scheduler proves otherwise.
The sites named in the current handbook, by city:
| City | Site |
|---|---|
| Anchorage | Pearson Professional Centers, Anchorage |
| Bethel | Yuut Elitnaurviat — The People's Learning Center |
| Dillingham | University of Alaska Fairbanks — Bristol Bay Campus |
| Fairbanks | University of Alaska Fairbanks — Tanana Valley Campus |
| Homer | Kenai Peninsula College — Kachemak Bay Campus |
| Juneau | University of Alaska Southeast |
| Ketchikan | University of Alaska Southeast |
| Kodiak | Kodiak College |
| Nome | University of Alaska Fairbanks — Northwest Campus |
| Palmer | Matanuska-Susitna College |
| Seward | Alaska Vocational Technical Center |
| Sitka | University of Alaska Southeast |
No street addresses appear in the handbook — Pearson VUE prints facility names and cities only, with the standing caveat that locations and schedules change and candidates should confirm with Pearson VUE. Get the address from the scheduler when you book; do not rely on a third-party listing, and do not assume a campus site is where the campus's main building is.
Coverage gaps are real. The sites cluster in Southcentral (Anchorage, Palmer, Homer, Seward) and Southeast (Juneau, Ketchikan, Sitka), with Fairbanks covering the Interior and Nome, Bethel, Dillingham and Kodiak serving the west and southwest. The North Slope, the Aleutians, the Northwest Arctic and much of the Interior have no listed site at all. For a candidate in Utqiagvik or Unalaska, the realistic choice is a flight or OnVUE — which is the strongest practical argument for online testing anywhere in the country. The [Health guide](/insurance/alaska/health-only/licensing-guide) covers OnVUE's requirements and its four-attempt cap.
Booking and changing. Appointments may be made as late as one calendar day before the desired date, subject to availability — which in Anchorage is often achievable and in Sitka often is not. To change or cancel without losing the fee, call Pearson VUE at (800) 274-5993 at least 48 hours ahead. Book Property and Casualty into the same session if you want both: two exams in one test-center appointment share a single fee.
What It Costs
Nothing about the Property line is priced differently from any other Alaska producer line: $89 an attempt, $47 for fingerprint processing, $75 biennially for the license however many lines it carries. What can change the total is travel — a candidate flying from a village to Anchorage for a seat may spend more on the trip than on the entire licensing process, which is the calculation OnVUE exists to change.
If surplus lines is the destination, budget for the step beyond: the surplus lines broker license is $300 biennially, and it requires property and casualty authority underneath it, so the Casualty exam is a prerequisite cost as well.
Eligibility Requirements
AS 21.27.020 sets three conditions and no others: 18 years of age, bona fide Alaska residency before a resident license issues, and a passing exam score. No education requirement appears anywhere in it, and the Division walks the process as reside, test, apply, fingerprint — four steps, no coursework.
For property producers specifically, the qualification that comes later is recordkeeping, not education: AS 21.27.350 requires records of each transaction to be kept for five years — ten for reinsurance transactions — at your principal place of business, open to the director at any business time, with a written response to a records inquiry due within 10 working days. Most states require three years; Alaska's five is a genuine difference and a common exam question.
Keeping Your Property License Active
Important CE details: 24 credit hours per two-year license period, of which at least 3 must be insurance ethics (3 AAC 23.100). Holding more lines of authority does not raise the number. Up to 8 hours carry forward; no more than 8 hours may come from management, marketing and sales training, and those hours cannot be carried over.
24 hours every two years, 3 of them insurance ethics, with no line-specific split and no increase for holding additional lines (3 AAC 23.100). Eight hours carry forward. Management, marketing and sales training is capped at eight hours per period and does not carry.
Property producers who write flood should note that Alaska's Division points to the federal NFIP producer-training requirement rather than imposing its own hour count — the Division states the requirement without a citation or a number, so treat any specific figure you see quoted as a federal one, not an Alaska one, and confirm it with your carrier. Renewal timing itself is covered in the [P&C guide](/insurance/alaska/property-and-casualty/licensing-guide): last day of your birth month, in odd or even years matching your birth year.
Quick Reference
Official Links
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