Also seen in Insurance Journal:
Insurers faced a Monday deadline for filing proposed property insurance rates based on the new law, which increases access to cheaper backup insurance for the companies. Most insurance companies buy large amounts of reinsurance to insulate them against big hurricane losses.[...]
State insurance regulators haven’t compiled a complete list of all the filings, which have been trickling in over the summer but were due by Monday. But of the filings that have been released, more than 30 call for rate increases, rather than decreases.
Allstate Floridian Insurance Co., for example, is asking regulators for a 41.9 percent rate increase.
Allstate Floridian vice president George Grawe said the company did get cheaper backup coverage from the state’s catastrophe fund, but still had to purchase lots of very expensive private reinsurance. He also said the company’s customers weren’t paying enough before, and the back-to-back blasts of 2004 and 2005 made that clear. After those two years, the company didn’t have any capital left.
The article also references a +50% filed by USAA and a +30% from Florida Farm Bureau.
Of course, with the Governor getting national headlines for openly speculating that insurers will be foiled in their efforts to manage their aggregations and/or to seek profit corresponding to the level of risk they face, is it any wonder that Florida isn’t viewed as a particularly hospitable market for property insurance for reasons above and beyond the cat risks?