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Home insurers seek higher rates
By LOUIS HAU Florida's two largest providers of homeowners insurance are seeking to raise their insurance rates by an average of 20 percent or more statewide. State Farm Florida Insurance Co. has asked the state Department of Insurance for an average rate increase of 22 percent only months after being granted a 14.3 percent increase in January. Allstate Floridian Insurance Co. has requested an average rate increase of 20 percent, which would be its first increase since 1996, according to the Insurance Department. State Farm is the largest homeowners insurer in the state, with almost a quarter of the market, followed by Allstate, which has a 17.8 percent share. They are the only companies among Florida's 10 largest homeowners insurers to request rate increases so far this year, according to department spokeswoman Tami Torres. Torres attributed the rate requests to a nationwide uptick in homeowners insurance claims, the mounting cost of building and repairing homes and the rising rates that the insurance companies must pay the reinsurers that back them up. She said it was too early to determine if the insurance department is likely to approve the requests. The Insurance Department has up to 90 days after a rate request is filed to make a decision on whether to grant the request, with another 90 days if the department asks for further information. State Farm filed its request April 9. Allstate applied for its rate increase in February, and the department last month asked for more information. State Farm has proposed increasing rates an average of 16.1 percent in Pinellas County, 11.4 percent in Hillsborough County, 21.9 percent in Hernando County, 22.1 percent in Pasco County and 22.2 percent in Citrus County, according to State Farm spokesman Tom Hagerty. Allstate representatives said they didn't yet have a breakdown by county. Both companies said that homeowners in coastal neighborhoods would face stiffer increases than their counterparts further inland. In many areas the new rates will affect only those already insured by the companies, because they are not taking new customers. Neither State Farm nor Allstate accepts new homeowners insurance applications in Pinellas, Hillsborough, Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties, which is largely a legacy of the deluge of claims in South Florida that hit insurers after Hurricane Andrew in 1992. Allstate also refuses to write new homeowners insurance policies in Pasco, Manatee, Sarasota and Monroe counties. Wednesday, State Farm also dropped a long-standing policy of allowing its existing customers from other counties or states to sign up for new homeowner policies in the Florida counties where it has otherwise stopped accepting new customers, Hagerty said. -- Louis Hau can be reached at hau@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3404.
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From the Times Business report
From the AP
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