The Home Insurance Guru

Let’s clarify this Home insurance situation in Florida. Homewise preferred is 1  company in Florida under the Homewise name. The other Homewise company Homewise Property & Casualty is still fully viable as a company. That book of business (Home Wise preferred)will be  rolled over into Homewise Property & Casualty Insurance company.We all hope that this is all that will happen to the company as home Insurance issues in Florida are bad enough. Northern Capital is a differnat situation altogether. Northern Capital and all 3 of it’s differant carriers have all lost the A rating by Demotech. They are still going to process renewals at this time, but are not taking any new business. to my knowledge they have not taken new business since mid hurricane season 2009, but that may not be 100% true. We await more news on the subject matter and I am sure it will be a topic of discussion in Tallahassee when the Legislators ressume sessions next week.One thing is for sure, no one wants this business going into Citizens Insurance!!

Next week on 3/2 in Tallahassee our Lawmakers get together again and the Insurance isues are now bigger and badder than before. The  Home Insurance companies are all loosing money and we have not seen a Hurricane since Hurricane  Wilma in October 2005 in Florida. How can this be, but it is a reality that must be faced by all. The problems are that the large Insurance companies that have national  businesses like State Farm do not write busienss in Florida and they are dropping customer’s again this year by by almost 200K  more  overall. The smaller companies in Florida that do write busienss struggle and the State of Florida is on the hook w/ reinsurance and the Florida Cat Fund! The responsibility is in the  Billions for the State of Florida and the only way to resolve the problem to get Florida off the hook is to allow companies to raise prices and hope that a deregulation policy that is likely to get passed this session is the only possible scenario for Florida. Like it or not, this will have to be the way to save Florida financially. This means that we are all going to pay higher rates so the cat fund can be built up w/ enough surplus to handle a  1 in 25 year storm so it has the ability to pay. This should be a  5 year plan that eventually, could then see rates come down. So much can happen in that time that there is no way to tell. Higher rates can come in many ways and 1 of them is wind Mitigation credits being reduced or tougher rules made to make the discounts for true hurricane protection and not just a discount like it has been. Citizens has already determined that 70% of all inspections re done has found errors that will yield higher prenmiums without a rate increase. All companies are now doing this  as well and the cost of Insurance will bget much higher for most. I do not know who can afford this or will want to afford this, but it is what is happening now. Please stay tuned to this blog for more info as it deveelops over the Florida Legislative session.Rset assured that the good new curently is that there are still multiple companies writing Insurance and the ability to  shop is still there for most, but they may not like the news as increses are still the norm.

Citizens Home Insurance company has currently inspected 452 homes for credits from Hurricane protection.Of the ones being inspected 39 have been found to not be getting enough of a discount, but 311 are going to be told that they will pay more at the renewal. 102 are actually ok. This is terrible news and who is to say that the inspector Citizens used is not looking to get more premium for Citizens. This puts the burden of proof on the consumer when they did what was requested of them. Hurricane season is close, State Farm and Liberty Mutual are dropping 185K policies between them and everyone else will pay more for insurance. Calgon take me away as customer service is a  huge problem w/ all of these issues. Please read the full article below;

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/southeast/2010/02/22/107541.htm

This is not good news for policyholder’s of this company as we head into hurricane season!  More info to come, but the bad news is that not having an “A” rating by some agency means the banks  do not accepth the paper it is written on and now the State of Florida will come in and begin to take over the company unless some good news happens quickly! Please watch for more updates on this big issue that relates to home Insurance in Florida. Please  watch my blog or tweets for more info.

Find out about Free Mitigation Inspections by the State of Florida in the My Safe Florida Home Project. Florida is trying to help you save money if your hame has real protection from Hurricanes and this will also help to keep you out of Citizens. This is true because the companies writing in Florida give nice discounts when there are discounts to give so the choices are better with a good mitigation and a 4 point inspectionas well for home over 30 years old.Please read the full article below from   Alex Sink Office;

http://www.mysafeflorida.org/mysafefloridahome.html

If your home was inspected recently, don’t fear when the insurance compnay wants to do it again at their expense. They are checking for accuracy for Hurricane mitigation credits on your Home Insurance policy. If it was done accurately and by a licensed inspector, then you should be fine. If not then expect additional premium increases than would be already schedule. You may even get charged for last years incorrect premium and yes, you can still get dropped. Fraud is a huge problem in Florida and the customer service of this industry is being challenged with all that goes on in Florida. Please read the full article below and be sure to call us to shop your policy for you;

http://www.floridatoday.com/article/20100202/COLUMNISTS0207/2020311/1086/rss07

No Hurricanes and Insurance compnies still struggle w/ reserve requirements among other things. Home Insurance rates are on the rise and the big boys like State Farm are going up even more then the Florida based companies.Mitigation discounts can be large, but Fraud is even larger and many may feel the crunch going into hurricane season as rates go up because new inspections show smaller discounts.Other companies have gone under like keyStone and  Coral Insurance last year. This year Magnolia is going down and Edison will soon be purchased by Florida Peninsula. On top of this larger companies besides State Farm will drop people like Nationwide and their 60K loosing coverage.Because of capacity issues, time will tell how many will be forced into Citizens Insurance even though they are tring to shrink in size. Time will tell what the deregulation bill will do when it comes up in session over the next few months. Please read the full article below;

http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2009/nov/29/florida-insurance-market-still-house-cards-despite/