Fla. House Passes Bill Intended to Fix Property Insurance Problems

May 3, 2006

  • May 4, 2006 at 5:42 am
    ron says:
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    I have worked hard to get by and can make do but I have no understanding in this country why I should be forced to pay your bill. 12 years ago the state got into insurance that should have been your clue rates would be going up faster than what they would have if they stayed outof it.
    Rates are going up and if there are more storms this year expect the worst.

  • May 5, 2006 at 10:51 am
    KG says:
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    In my opinion, we let the insurance companies have too much control. If they want to write in Fla, they should have to write ALL of their product lines here. Letting them \’cherry pick\’ what they will & won\’t write doesn\’t do the consumers or the industry any good. It\’s just a receipe for failure. Spread the risk over the large numbers.

    What have they done with all the premium they collected for over a hundred years before Andrew hit or since then? Oh wait, I know, it went to pay out obscenely high bonuses and salaries for the top dogs. Maybe the reserve requirements should be higher?

    Another factor in the rate increases is that property values have increased almost 100% in the last 4 years. The rate hikes, which are calculated on the rapidly escalating home values is costing people their homes no matter what their age or income. Salary increases have not come close to keeping up with the increased cost of living. Soon, we\’ll all be forced to become renters in low rent housing while the rich have their homes RIGHT ON the beach rebuilt over and over again in the same high-risk areas AND GET LOWER THAN NORMAL RATES by obtaining their coverage through Citizen\’s, the now defunct state-run insurer. Again, the avg Joe pays for the follies of the rich.

    Insurance Commissioner Gallagher did such a wonderful job of managing the insurance in Florida that we now have a defunct state-run insurance company that is costing every homeowner big $$$$. It\’s no wonder it\’s going back to an \’elected\’ position. And now he wants to be governor? No thank you.

    Besides all that, it\’s all part of the grand plan to force us into a National Insurance Program. You think it\’s bad now…just wait.

  • May 5, 2006 at 12:36 pm
    Humor says:
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    Let\’s see, solution 1 is for the State of Florida to solve the problem via Citizens with no reinsurance other than higher taxes. Solution 2 is to have real insurance companies have reasonably higher rates to solve the problem of the next decade of 8-14 storms per year. Solution 3 is to have the Federal Gov\’t bail Florida out even more than it has. Solution 5 is move to AZ… Gov\’t can\’t fix the problem and you don\’t want to pay a rate for insurance that supports the claims… move is the solution; however, AZ has a million or so illegals who have beaten you to the punch. What\’s solution 6?

  • May 5, 2006 at 1:54 am
    Logical says:
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    Dawn…you have got to be the biggest moron I have ever heard utter a word…You should just not talk!!!FYI The government makes much more that the oil companies off a gallon of gas…I bet you didn\’t know that ExxonMobile paid the gov\’t $7 Billion dollars in federal income taxes of the $8.4 Billion profit they earned first quarter 06\’. ExxonMobil cashed in by investing and working to get their product to the retail customer while the federal government collected 18.4 cents per gallon in tax for doing nothing. Federal, state and local taxes total an average of 46 cents per gallon — significantly more than the 28 cents Exxon earned on a $3 gallon of gas. a jump of more than $2 billion from the same time period in 2005. And that doesn\’t count the more than $7.6 billion in excise taxes — the gas tax — that ExxonMobil collected for the government during the same quarter. Plus another $11 billion in \’other taxes\’ and ExxonMobil sent the government more than $25 billion in the first quarter of 2006…BEFORE YOU DECIDE TO MAKE SUCH A INACCURATE COMMENT MAYBE YOU SHOULD DO SOME RESEARCH FIRST!!!!! PS EVERYONE over age 18 should be personally responsible for thier decisions and that includes moving to a disaster prone area!!!To say that old people didn\’t know hurricanes were a possiblility in S. Florida when the moved here 30 yrs ago is completely insane, I guess you have never heard of the devastating 1929 Hurricane! And do you honestly think that fire claims in the state of Arizona top Hurricane Claims in Florida are you nuts????

  • May 8, 2006 at 8:10 am
    Animal House AKA \"Logical\" says:
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    Mr. Hamilton,
    Pardon me but I was not an English Major as you seem to have been. For starters I did attend public school, I was also awarded a full scholarship to Dartmouth…for BUSINESS, which is neither here nor there as we are not here to discuss education, we are here to discuss the above article. It seems that you missed my main point and the point I tried to make as \”Logical\”. I understand that you may enjoy attacking me for my grammar and spelling errors however if you peered deeper into the piece you would have noticed a few very important points. One of them being that every individual on this planet needs to be held accountable for their actions including but not limited to their choice to move to a disaster prone area. As I\’m sure you are aware Florida is extremely susceptible to hurricanes and this did not just happen overnight, so to say that residents including the elderly should not have to pay the price to live here is simply outrageous. If you do not want to deal with the “high cost” of insurance you can self insure or move from the area. Is it my problem because you do not want to move out of the area? I think not and do not feel that I should be responsible for your actions. If you choose to live in an area that WILL be hit by hurricanes, as I do it should not upset you to pay your insurance premiums. I WILL ASK THIS QUIESTION AGAIN AS I HAVE MANY TIMES IN THE PAST, BUT I’M SURE I WILL STILL NOT GET A LOGICAL ANSWER…IF YOU TAKE THE PROFITS OUT OF INSURANCE WHAT COMPANY WILL WANT TO DO BUSINESS HERE? I am quite perplexed as to how an apparent socialist has made it in the business world, please enlighten me. Nick next time you choose to post a comment please make it relevant to the article and not turn this board into a forum for your personal attacks that do not pertain to the article. Furthermore if you feel compelled to promote wealth redistribution, state ownership of corporations, and other socialist ideals you may want to do so in a format that is more accepting of your type, perhaps http://www.sp-usa.org. But then again what do I know I’m just an uneducated “moron”.

    GOOD DAY SIR

  • May 8, 2006 at 9:09 am
    Marty says:
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    I totally agree with you. I am an insurance agent in a small town in Florida. Most of the homes around here are mobile homes….not worth but maybe 25,000 to 50,000 dont get me wrong there are some beautiful homes out here but for these people who own these 25-50K mobile homes thier insurance is running anywhere from 1,500 to 3,000 for 1 year. And this is with Citizens because there is no market for mobile homes right now. Why not take that money and put it in a savings account and then every year keep putting that in an account. To insure yourself. By the time you would pay your premium and then pay your outragious deductible youve already got the money you need to start to pick up the pieces and put them back together. This pick up and move if you dont like the premium you gotta pay is totally ridiculous. I was born and raised here and now only 20 years old married and with a child on the way lets just pick up and move ….im sure our economy is so great that we would be able to find the same good paying jobs in a heart beat?! Not! When you know no other place why leave your home? People just need to see that not everyone has the money they have or didnt have rich mommy and daddys to help them out with everything. Some people have to work and work hard for what they do have. And just because they cant afford property insurance they shouldnt have to lose thier home.

  • May 8, 2006 at 3:07 am
    Mr. Obvious says:
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    What constitutes a good line of business in Florida?

    Auto? some of the most physically incompetent drivers on the planet.

    GL- a legal system choked with fraud and corruption.

    WC- one of most bureacratic and expensive systems in the country with very high rates and very low benefits?

    Umb- a lottery mindset

    Health Insurance – Median age around 80.

    Maybe property is the best line in this state.

    It\’s a toilet that is overegulated and undercapitalized.

  • May 8, 2006 at 3:16 am
    Animal House says:
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    MARTY GET AN EDUCATION BEFORE YOU OPEN YOU\’RE TRAP…YOU\’RE SOCIALIST IDEALS HAVE BEEN PROVEN NOT TO WORK TIME AND AGAIN(Cuba, Russia, Vietnam, Venezuela). WHEN YOU ARE OUT IN THE REAL WORLD FOR MORE THAN 2 YEARS THEN WE MAY ALLOW YOU TO LECTURE US ON SERIOUS ISSUES. IN OUR WORLD IT IS IMPORTANT THAT EVERYONE IS HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR THEIR OWN ACTIONS, IT IS ALREADY APPARENT THAT YOU ARE MAKING THE WRONG ACTIONS(having a child and getting married before college graduation)AND EXPECTIN UNCLE SAM(taxpayers including me) TO PICK UP THE TAB FOR YOUR MISTAKES. IF YOU DOPES FEEL THAT TAKING ALL OF THE PROFITS OUT OF INSURANCE IS THE CORRECT THING TO DO PLEASE EXPLAIN TO ME WHAT COMPANIES WILL STILL CHOOSE TO WRITE BUSINESS HERE!!!OH YEAH THAT\’S RIGHT THERE ARE NONE

  • May 8, 2006 at 3:55 am
    NIck Hamilton says:
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    Seriously…all you people are morons…Hey ANIMALHOUSE…if you\’re so edumacted how come you don\’t know the proper use of \”your\” as opposed to \”you\’re\”? YOUR is the possessive…YOU\’RE is YOU ARE…you must have went to a public school.

    And to quote you \” IT IS ALREADY APPARENT THAT YOU ARE MAKING THE WRONG ACTIONS\”

    Huh? Making the wrong actions? That doesn\’t even make sense. You TAKE actions..you don\’t MAKE actions.
    Before you post something attacking somebody\’s elses intelligence try to PROOFREAD what you wrote so you don\’t sound like the idiot you obviously are.

  • May 9, 2006 at 9:11 am
    Nick Hamilton says:
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    AnimalHouse,

    Dartmouth? Right…I almost believe that. Do you even know where Dartmouth is? It happens to be in New Hampshire. Funny how your IP address traces back to an insurance agency in South Florida. What\’s even funnier is that Dartmouth classes are still in session. So I find it slightly odd that a \”Dartmouth Student\” is posting from a computer in Florida.

    Second point, you state: \”next time you choose to post a comment please make it relevant to the article and not turn this board into a forum for your personal attacks that do not pertain to the article.\”
    Excuse me for pointing out your blatant hypocrisy as that is all you have been doing. Here are some examples that you yourself posted:
    \”Dawn…you have got to be the biggest moron I have ever heard utter a word…You should just not talk!!!\”
    \”MARTY GET AN EDUCATION BEFORE YOU OPEN YOU\’RE TRAP…\”

    How odd it is that you attack me for doing exactly what you did….but that is a sign of an intellectually challenged person. I\’m sure you\’ll learn that in your classes at Dartmouth.

    Now back to the issue at hand. I happen to be a big believer in Capitalism as long as it\’s REAL Capitalism and not some type of system where the government supports the corruption of certain industries and corporations at the expense of the taxpayers. As I\’m sure you know, being an employee for an insurance agency, insurance works by spreading the risk of losses over a wide pool of people (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurance#How_an_insurance_company_makes_money).I pay my premium every year as do thousands of others and that goes into a large pool of money. The insurance company takes that money and invests it in various things. The insurance company makes money by paying out less claims than it takes in in premiums. It ALSO makes money by any profits from the investments it puts the premium money into (again, I’m sure you’ll learn all this at Dartmouth).
    So far so good and I have no problem with that system. The problem I have is that (and recent history is full of examples…all you have to do is do a simple Google search) many companies will either unwisely gamble with that premium money in shady and risky investments or their accounting practices are so bad (if not criminal…think Enron) that the premium money is severely depleted or completely lost. These insurance companies (who entered a LEGALLY BINDING CONTRACT with you to provide payment in case of a claim) then will cry poverty when some type of disaster hits. They will attempt to stiff the consumer on their LEGALLY BINDING CONTRACT and seek government help to bail them out. None of this would have happened if the company would have invested wisely and conservatively instead of trying to get the quick profit or if it’s accounting practices would have been above board. You claim to hate \”socialism\” so much….but this is socialism my friend. Look at your insurance bill next time and you will see that YOU ARE SUBSIDISING insurance companies shady accounting and investment practices by paying the Citizens fees!

    Finally, your argument(which by the way you back up with NO FACTS)that insurance companies as a whole are losing money is false) Even with the claims paid out for all the hurricanes most companies are still making a profit..see http://www.iii.org/media/facts/statsbyissue/homeowners/
    …just not as big a profit as they’d like to. A big reason many insurance companies are leaving Florida isn’t because of their HUGE LOSSES (granted that a few smaller ones are leaving because of this)….it’s because of the claims they have to pay out. By leaving Florida they can increase their bottom line even more. Again, that’s fine in a nice world but these companies are taking all the premiums paid by their customers over the past 20 years WHEN THEY HAD NO CLAIMS FILED and leaving with it. They are basically stealing the equity from the good times when there were no claims in Florida and leaving now that there is a chance they might have to pay out. .

    Bottom line is I have no problem with fair homeowner’s insurance practices as long as they ARE FAIR across the board. Being a PURE capitalist and libertarian I do not wish to subsidize either PERSONAL LIVING CHOICES OR CORRUPT INSURANCE COMPANY PRACTICES!!! If one lives on the coast or in an older home then yes, they should be paying higher rates than someone in a new concrete home 20 miles from the ocean. If one lives in Iowa as opposed to Florida should they be paying lower rates? Yes they should. But don’t be so naïve that insurance companies have your best interests in mind…they do not. And don’t be so naïve that the Insurance Companies don’t work with the State and Federal Govt’s to get laws passed that help them. They do all the time. I believe in some type of regulation as history has demonstrated in the past the need for it. Insurance is a legally binding contract between you and a corporation. If they break that contract by spending your money foolishly how will you collect? Will you sue them? What good is suing them when they are bankrupt? And meanwhile your house is gone and guess who is gonna end up housing you and the thousands more if a hurricane hits? That’s right, the government….and you will pay the taxes to pay for that. Thus your tax money will go to support the insurance companies who made the foolish and possibly illegal choices. Is that not Socialism as well?



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