Florida lawmakers approve property insurance, condo reforms [Orlando Sentinel]

TALLAHASSEE — The Florida Legislature approved sweeping reforms for the financially struggling property insurance industry on Wednesday, with supporters offering no guarantees it would save homeowners any money.

The Legislature also approved a condominium reform bill that includes mandatory inspections and reserves to cover any necessary repairs and maintenance. Both bills, top concerns during the regular session that failed, now head to Gov. Ron DeSantis, who called lawmakers back to Tallahassee for the second special session in two months and is expected to sign them.

Supporters called the property insurance legislation a good “first step” in stabilizing a market on life support and bringing carriers back to Florida. Opponents said it bails out the industry without providing immediate relief to property owners from skyrocketing premiums and canceled policies.

“This is a milquetoast attempt at reform that fails to live up to the urgency of our moment,” said Rep. Andrew Learned, D-Brandon. “This is a tiptoe in the right direction, but make no mistake – this bill will not result in lower premiums. It will not prevent more Floridians from having their coverage drop when their insurance company goes under. And it won’t change the underlying problem that storms are becoming more frequent and more severe because of climate change.”

Other members echoed Learned’s comments, with Rep. Allison Tant, D-Tallahassee, saying, “We’re leaving a lot undone.”

The Florida House voted 95-14 to approve the bill, with several Democrats voting in favor of it despite their concerns about the lack of immediate reduction in premiums and that the measure will make it harder for homeowners to sue bad insurers over legitimate claims issues.

“Even paradise has its problems,” bill sponsor Rep. Jay Trumbull, R-Panama City, said in closing on the bill after five hours of debate on the House floor, pointing out the catastrophic storms that have buffeted the state and cost billions in property damage.

He also noted that generations of lawmakers have stood in the same spot trying to solve Florida’s “complicated, intractable and unsolvable” insurance problems.

“The bill before us isn’t perfect and doesn’t purport to answer every question or solve every problem but offers a balanced solution,” Trumbull said. “It’s a bill that fights fraud without disenfranchising consumers. It helps Florida’s domestic insurance companies without rewarding corporate mismanagement. It’s a bill that provides help for homeowners without endangering the stability of the insurance market.”

Among its top measures are an extra $2 billion in reimbursements for reinsurance due to hurricane losses, which would allow insurers to tap into the Hurricane Catastrophe Fund before they reach the maximum claims payouts when they can normally get reimbursed from the fund.

Another provision that drew criticism would allow insurers to offer an optional 2% deductible for roof damages or for 50% of the replacement cost.

Several reforms are aimed at slowing down the number of lawsuits filed against insurers over claims disputes: cleaning up the definition of assignment of benefits to contractors, eliminating automatic payments for lawyers of contractors who are assigned benefits, and limiting lawyers’ ability to charge double or triple their normal rates.

Another measure restricts how contractors can solicit homeowners to make a property insurance claim for roof damage without disclosing that the homeowner would be responsible for paying any deductible, by making it a third degree felony for a contractor to pay or waive an insurance deductible and to intentionally file a knowingly false claim.

One pro-homeowner measure in the bill prevents insurers from denying coverage to homes with roofs less than 15 years old and by requiring them to insure older roofs if an inspection shows they still have years of life left in them. Another would provide $150 million in grants for homeowners to use to reinforce their homes against hurricanes.

The House also voted 110-0 for condominium reforms to address the Surfside disaster of 2021 that claimed 98 lives. The bill failed to make it during regular session over disagreements between the House and Senate over several issues, but after a day of negotiations among the House and Senate leadership, a compromise was reached to increase the frequency of inspections and require reserves to cover necessary repairs.

Democrats pointed out that the special session wouldn’t have been necessary if so much time hadn’t been spent on culture war issues such as banning abortions after 15 weeks, banning the instruction of sexual orientation and gender identity at K-3 a and regulating it in other grades, and restricting curriculum on topics of race and sex in both the classroom and the board room.

The condo reform bill “was a beautiful example to me of the type of legislation we need to focus on, not the culture wars,” said Tampa attorney Rep. Fentrice Driskell, the newly elected leader of the Democratic caucus for the next session.

But she and fellow Democrats had less than favorable assessment of the property insurance bill, mainly that it doesn’t guarantee any rate reductions for homeowners.

“No company has specifically said they would reduce rates,” Trumbull said in response to a question from Rep. Michele Rayner, D-St. Petersburg.

One amendment proposed by Democrats that failed would have set aside $2 billion to give to property owners to help pay their higher premiums instead of giving it to insurance companies and hoping they would pass the savings onto consumers.

“There is no guarantee (insurers) are going to have savings let alone be transparent about it,” Rep. Anna Eskamani, D-Orlando, said. “This way money goes into the hands of consumers.”

©2022 Orlando Sentinel. Visit orlandosentinel.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.