[Wondering]

You are not considering Federal support - FEMA - in you calculations. Insurance companies are making record profits - greed!

[retiredguy123]

Originally Posted by Joe C.

Perhaps the insurance industry could make roof replacement a RIDER on the normal homeowner's insurance policy. Maybe make the rider a $1000.00 option. That way, the homeowner who has a new or newer roof can opt out of roof replacement for several years and take his/her chances. Also roof shingle manufacturers have a warranty.

The problem is that the insurance company doesn't really care as much about a roof replacment. They are more concerned about the damage to the rest of the house and contents when an old roof blows away. That is why they require some homeowners to buy a new roof before they will insure them.

[Whitley]

Originally Posted by Rainger99

I am not a legislator and I do not work for an insurance company but I assume that the insurance companies have lobbyists in Tallahassee and that they are in contact with the legislators.

The insurance companies do have lobbyists. I handle the finances for several COA's and HOA's in Florida. All of the Associations are paying in excess of 1,000,000.00 on insurance, with the highest breaking 2,000,000.00.
If you breakdown the cost of paying claims vs legal expenses, you may be shocked. While there are many people and groups abusing the system, the insurance companies are not innocent. I was at on meeting between the BOD and the insurance company. As you would expect everything was the blame of roofing companies, laws etc.. I pointed out the capital this specific provider spent in the prior year for legal expenses. I then asked him to confirm that over 70% of those cases (denial cases) were lost by the insurance company.There is plenty of blame to go around. Another COA I represent pays over 900k for Wind insurance. They have 21 buildings. Instead of one policy for 21 buildings we are required to have 21 policies, each with a 200k deductible. On top of that, we are spending large amounts to assure our roofs. Should there be a storm, the carrier does pay based on the remaining life of the roofs. Their issue is that they put a new membrane down on all 21 buildings, for which there are 12 years remaining on the material and labor warranty. The insurance providers show the value of each roof to be 0, as they do not recognize anything other than a new roof to reset the life expectancy. So many people, especially the elderly who have been living in these units for decades, are not able to afford the 1,500. monthly fees being driven mostly by insurance.

[Whitley]

Originally Posted by garykoca427@gmail.com

People living on the coast should pay more for insurance than people living inland. These should not be statewide rates for everyone.

We/they do pay more. Much more.

[Whitley]

I'm sure there is someone here who is an insurance expert. Please, if possible, help me to understand. To obtain insurance we do not go to the provider, we go to an agent who then sends out requests (effectively blocking, which I will explain in a moment) to multiple providers and obtain quotes. Once a provider gives a quote on a property to an agent, they will not provide a quote for that property to a different agent. This suppresses competition from agents. It is important to see the request for a quote sent to the provider by the agent as many times I have found errors which resulted in higher premiums. So now we have quotes from one agent that he obtained from providers. The providers will then reinsure the policy with another provider like Minich, Swiss or Everest reinsurance. SO, we, the end user go to an agent who goes to a provider who goes to a reinsurance company. Is it necessary to have an agent. I know they make good money, as the one I deal with has several Tesla's, multiple homes, and wears Brioni. I can understand that we are not large enough to go to the final step, a reinsurer, but why can we not go directly to the provider, eliminating the agent. It can not be that he/she negotiates for lower rates better than we can. It is the agent's best interest when rates go up. X% of 1m is better than x% of 100k.

[Marine1974]

Farmers serves 100,000 customers in Florida but said there will be no impact to customers who use Farmers' owned subsidiaries like Foremost Signature and Bristol West.
The major insurance companies own smaller subsidiary companies that can file for bankruptcy if their exposure to natural disasters is too high .
They’re collecting your premiums with no intent to pay out claims if they can’t make a profit .

[Whitley]

Originally Posted by MX rider

They already pay more. Our best friends have a home in Bonita Springs very similar to ours. They pay 3 times what we do. Probably going to be more when they renew.

IF they can renew. Many people and organizations/associations are now with Citizen's Insurance, the insurer of last resort (namely the state insurance). During the past 5-10 years million dollar homes and hundreds of millions of dollar associations are now writing with Citizens. I urged my clients to go with Citizens 5+ years ago not because they are a great company (they are not) but because they have a reasonable cap on annual rate increases.

[ChilePepper]

Part of the problem is sites like this (and others) where people (or perhaps roofing trolls) have posted instances of insurance cancelations due to the age of their roof. If that is the case, I feel insurance companies should inspect and recertify roofs based on their structural integrity, not so much their age. I am pretty sure there have been some perfectly good 15, 20, or 25-year-old roofs that have been claimed and replaced because the homeowner felt the threat of being canceled, and of course, roofing company scammers prey on these folks.

[Fltpkr]

Originally Posted by Rainger99

People are complaining about insurance costs going up. However, insurance is merely spreading the risk of losses over a large number of people. The chance of a single home burning down in a year is quite slim so insurance companies can sell home insurance to everyone in a city and use the premiums from those whose homes are not burned down to compensate the few policy holders whose homes are burned down. That is how it works in theory.

However, I am not sure if that works in the case of catastrophic losses such as hurricanes that hit thousands of homes and businesses. Hurricane Ian caused about $100 billion in damages in Florida. The population in Florida is about 21 million people and the average household is about 2.5 people. If you divide $100 billion by 21 million, that is about $4700 a person. If you multiply that by the number of households, each household would have to pay $11,750 just to pay for Ian.

Ian is a bit of an exception since Florida doesn't get an Ian every year. However, Florida gets hit with a hurricane about once every two years and seems to get hit with a major hurricane at least once a decade. Irma cost about $30 billion in 2017.

I am not an underwriter or an actuary but I don't see how people in Florida can pay enough insurance to cover their losses. Hopefully, there are some insurance people on this board that may have solutions.

Just a thought -- Would it be helpful long term to have more stringent coastal restrictions that prevent or restrict rebuilding or new building in the high risk areas and/or require that more "hurricane and flood resistant" structures be adopted and existing structures modified?

Can existing ground-level home or business owners be required to modify their structures to a more hurricane-resistant design? For example, could all homeowners or business owners of ground level structures of one or two stories in high risk areas be required to modify their structures within 10 years so that they are elevated (on stilts) above a certain minimum height and resistant to specified high-level wind forces?

Are there infrastructure changes that would help reduce the damage from hurricane/tidal surge - such as the addition of break-waters, barrier islands, dunes, marshland, etc?

[Rainger99]

Originally Posted by rvalukonis

A big portion of the expense/loss is infrastructure related borne by the state and local governments and utilities, not individual home owners.

Those costs may not be paid for by our home insurance but we still pay for them either in taxes or rate increases.

[OhioBuckeye]

You know with this last hurricane & the damages I’m guessing Ins. rates will go up again. Yes, Ins. rates are terrible but I’m afraid everyone will see higher rates even if your state never got a hurricane or tornado. Time will tell!

[Vermilion Villager]

Originally Posted by Rainger99

I am not a legislator and I do not work for an insurance company but I assume that the insurance companies have lobbyists in Tallahassee and that they are in contact with the legislators.

THEY DO and THEY ARE....and now you know why the costs in FL are so high. (so resisting the urge to go political)

[bcsnave]

Originally Posted by fltpkr

just a thought -- would it be helpful long term to have more stringent coastal restrictions that prevent or restrict rebuilding or new building in the high risk areas and/or require that more "hurricane and flood resistant" structures be adopted and existing structures modified?

Can existing ground-level home or business owners be required to modify their structures to a more hurricane-resistant design? For example, could all homeowners or business owners of ground level structures of one or two stories in high risk areas be required to modify their structures within 10 years so that they are elevated (on stilts) above a certain minimum height and resistant to specified high-level wind forces?

Are there infrastructure changes that would help reduce the damage from hurricane/tidal surge - such as the addition of break-waters, barrier islands, dunes, marshland, etc?

i like your thinking...

[427dave]

Auto insurance has increased a lot since we moved here in 2001, mine has almost tripled and I have not had any accidents or tickets. Like the roof scams here I think the biggest reason is the lawyers. You see all these ads on TV about how many millions they have gotten for their clients. Guess who is paying for all these claims, we are because the insurance companies just raise the cost.

[jimjamuser]

Originally Posted by Rainger99

People are complaining about insurance costs going up. However, insurance is merely spreading the risk of losses over a large number of people. The chance of a single home burning down in a year is quite slim so insurance companies can sell home insurance to everyone in a city and use the premiums from those whose homes are not burned down to compensate the few policy holders whose homes are burned down. That is how it works in theory.

However, I am not sure if that works in the case of catastrophic losses such as hurricanes that hit thousands of homes and businesses. Hurricane Ian caused about $100 billion in damages in Florida. The population in Florida is about 21 million people and the average household is about 2.5 people. If you divide $100 billion by 21 million, that is about $4700 a person. If you multiply that by the number of households, each household would have to pay $11,750 just to pay for Ian.

Ian is a bit of an exception since Florida doesn't get an Ian every year. However, Florida gets hit with a hurricane about once every two years and seems to get hit with a major hurricane at least once a decade. Irma cost about $30 billion in 2017.

I am not an underwriter or an actuary but I don't see how people in Florida can pay enough insurance to cover their losses. Hopefully, there are some insurance people on this board that may have solutions.

I would just like to clarify paragraph 2. It should be.....if you multiply by the average number of people in each household, which would be 2.5 times 4700, which equals 11,750.