Florida Homeowners Insurance Solution “Coming Soon?”
Florida homeowners have all eyes and ears on what Florida’s senate is going to do that will relieve Florida homeowner’s insurance rate hikes. Our new elected governor Charlie Crist promised a special session right after being put into office to address this issue. They are serious about getting to a real solution during their special meeting on January 16th in Tallahassee. The most perceived proposal will be the state accepting the burden of the private insurers of a cap amount ($40 billion was the suggested cap). This would allow private insurers to reduce there rates for insurance by one third. They will raise money for this fund by bonds, assessments, and sales tax. The senate does view this as concerning liability for the tax payers. Nothing thus far has been finalized proposals from both Houses and the Senate is scheduled to reach the chambers’ floors by Tuesday following the special session. Some of the other proposed ideas where as follows:
- Allowing insurers to more easily buy reinsurance from the Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund (CAT Fund).
- Forcing auto insurers that write property insurance in other states to also write property policies in Florida.
- Allowing Citizens to offer full coverage in its high risk account, where it is now allowed to write only the wind policies.
- Allowing Citizens rates to be competitive with the private market and freezing Citizens rates as of Dec. 31, 2006.
In general, Floridians are pleased to see the whole insurance issue being addressed and are hopeful that a solution will be put into place soon.
Portions of this article courtesy of St. Petersburg Times.