As state lawmakers scramble to get the industry under control, consumers will be paying more.
The Florida home insurance industry has been in a dire situation for some time now, and even as lawmakers implement strategies to help, the situation is only getting more expensive for the state’s property owners.
Last year, state lawmakers held two special sessions to deal with the serious property coverage problems.
According to many of those lawmakers, the Florida home insurance situation isn’t getting better, as the goal right now is to simply try to stop it from getting worse.
“We’re just trying to triage,” explained Senator Linda Stewart when discussing the moves being made to repair the industry in the state.
“Just trying to stop the bleeding,” added Representative Fred Hawkins at the time.
That said, a few months have passed since the last special sessions, and the situation is still far from getting better.
“It’s now at stage four,” explained former State Senator Jeff Brandes when discussing the condition of property coverage in the state. “It’s going to take 18 to 24 months for things to start to stabilize, and in the meantime, it is going to get much worse.”
Florida home insurance policies are expected to become notably more expensive this year.
Citizen’s Property Insurance recently voted to proceed with a 14.2 percent rate increase on the 1.2 million policies it is currently carrying following a rapid rise over the last couple of years. That rate increase request is over two percent higher than the statutory guidelines, which are set at 12 percent. This indicates that the state-backed insurer of last resort is under high pressure.
Former Governor Rick Scott had the state paying insurers to take policies from Citizen’s load in order to promote market stabilization and reduce the state-backed carrier’s exposure. Under Governor Ron DeSantis, a similar move could potentially start being made again, though neither the governor nor the legislature have indicated that this is among their plans.
In the meanwhile, the state’s Office of Insurance Regulation is receiving requests from Florida home insurance companies for rate increases as high as 60 percent.
