Starting at 9 a.m. on Monday, there will be a special session to talk about property insurance rates.
This is happening while home insurance rates, home values and construction costs are going up.
Now, legislators have to figure out how to help the insurance companies and homeowners.
Jerry Holland, Duval County Property Appraiser, said the state has a serious crisis.
For homeowner claims, Florida has about 8% of homeowner claims for the nation. However, Holland says that’s only part of the story.
“76 percent of the legal claims for homeowners and for property claims are in the state of Florida,” he said. “So there’s a lot of litigation.
Holland says part of that reason is you can assign your benefits to the contractor to go after the payment for the work. The contractor can go after the insurance company for the payment with legal representation. At times there are improper requests for roof replacement.
“We are getting phone calls every day in my office from constituents that are dealing with this property insurance crisis that we are in,” said Rep. Tracie Davis. “The rates are rising — skyrocketing through the roof — so when we go back to Tallahassee our jobs is to make sure we are focused on consumer protection.”
A consumer protection that will be hard to balance with insurance rates higher, home rates higher and construction costs as well. The challenge will be to appease homeowners and home insurers at the same time.
Holland added despite popular belief, hurricanes are not the primary reason for insurance rates rising.