Home Insurance

Farmers Insurance may know a thing or two, and one of them is that the company is not going to write new policies or renew existing policies. The non-renewals will play out over several months.

The market for reinsurance — a critical piece of Florida’s property-insurance system — is improving. But it comes at a price.Those are takeaways from new reports as Florida insurers try to bounce back after two years of homeowners losing policies and facing major rate increases because of financial troubles in the industry.Reinsurance, which is essentially insurance for insurers, helps drive the catastrophe-prone Florida insurance system. When the market for reinsurance is tight and costly, the effects trickle down to homeowners’ policies.

State insurance regulators last week signed off on a plan that will lead to policyholders throughout Florida paying extra on their bills because of property-insurer insolvencies.Insurance Commissioner Mike Yaworsky issued an order that approved a request by the Florida Insurance Guaranty Association to collect a 1 percent emergency “assessment” to cover costs of claims.

The Citizens Insurance proposal would need approval from the Office of Insurance Regulation before it could take effect and would lead to increases that would vary by types of policy.

The 13 participating insurance companies involved cut checks for 1,086 residents impacted by Hurricane Ian.

The Department of Financial Services is hosting three Insurance Villages January 23 through January 28 in Punta Gorda, Englewood and Fort Myers

Hurricane Ian dealt a major blow to Florida’s already crippled property insurance market. The Category 4 storm is expected to go down as one of the costliest in U.S. history, and that’s expected to drive more of the state’s private insurers out of business.

A new analysis says overall reinsurance prices are expected to increase by more than 10 percent in 2023, pointing to losses from disasters such as Hurricane Ian and “increasing frequency and severity of natural catastrophe claims.”

The Florida Housing Finance Corporation is awarding $5 million to local housing partners to help Floridians impacted by Hurricane Ian pay their home insurance deductibles in the six hardest hit counties: Charlotte, Collier, DeSoto, Hardee, Lee, and Sarasota counties.

A financial ratings agency says an analysis indicates insured losses from Hurricane Ian could range from $25 billion to $40 billion, putting additional pressure on Florida’s troubled property-insurance market.