I have a solution, close Citizens. Pay for insurance on a open market. Nobody wants to pay high premiums but they want(need) coverage and Citizens is not being fully funded(hence the lower rates). Citizens should be “of the last resort” and the highest. I do not want to be on the hook for some else’s claim, just because they wanted a cheaper premium. I know there is a little more to it than that but the State(and tax payers) need to be out of the insurance business.
Bad idea!
Citizens has been making plenty of money. It has $6.1 BILLION in reserves and with re-insurance the ability to pay out claims of $19.5 BILLION
Very few storms would come close to wiping out its reserves. ( a storm of the century, which has a 1% chance of happening in any given year would be expected to produce claims of $21 Billion.). Every company doing insurance business in Florida has the backing of the state, which means that any claim will be paid by the state if the insurance company goes out of business, as does Citizens.
Citizens has been in business since 2002 and in those 11 years has built up that reserve. Almost every other company in Florida are subsidiary companies of large carriers, built on a business model that allows the parent company to make huge profits from the Florida market, whilst at the same time limiting their exposure if things go wrong!
Any new company basically has to keep its fingers crossed for a lot of years until it builds up the necessary reserves to be able to meet a catastrophe. Exactly as Citizens has done.
Most of the new companies (non subsidiary) doing business in Florida are politically connected to be able to be paid to take away the policies from Citizens. They make great money, and if there is a problem the state will cover the losses!
One way or another, everyone in Florida who buys insurance is responsible for any major claim, so instead of these companies taking all of the gravy, it should be Citizens that gets the profits when times are good, thus enabling it to pay out on the claims when times are bad!
According to some experts for the last couple of years, they do not have enough to cover a large storm. That is why they are shedding policies and raising rates.
So you want to advocate the state run an insurance company? Why no just make it so they others must build the reserves. The reason why Citizens is successful is because they were forced to take lower rates and they got lucky there was no big claims. Actually we got lucky. I want out of the insurance business and do not want to subsidize high risk properties, because that is exactly what is happening. We all pay for the properties that they do not charge enough for.
How about we divide the company up and sell it? Oh wait, they are shedding policies and giving away their book of business. They should continue until there is none left.
That is why it has been crooked as hell from the start. All those involved with citizens should be fired or prosecuted and none are really for the citizens of Florida.
That is one org that is truly rotten from the head and beyond down. Hell the ones who came up with the idea are crooked.
The free market is the only way to do anything right. As soon as the gov gets involved all goes to cronies and hell.
The OIR should be disbanded and recreated in some manner that forces them to truly look out for the citizens of our State. I am not saying controll what the insurance companies do just prevent them from raping us. Guess what if you cannot afford insurance then oh well not my problem, the States problem or anyones but your own.
This is coming from a guy who’s insurance rates for both my home and health are flat out breaking me and I am totally against ALL Government involvement subsidies etc… I am against all the BULL S H I T that many of you fools believe is in place to help us. I am their prime target and I know better. I would say wake the hell up before it is to late but I believe that ship has already sailed. That is why we are in the mess we are in. BECAUSE OF THE GOVERNMENT. Oh and do not forget that fool so many working poor voted into office twice in a row. Now look surprise just as I said everyone is now seeing just how bad it is really screwing us all. Welcome to a failed version of socialism. Our government cannot even get that right. Pathetic…
Yep, thanks for the free publicity Next time post a link at least so all can see.
although the info below is not just a sample report showing how a report host report would look. I do not advertise that.
Time started: 10:30am
Time finished: 12:30pm
Inspection Fee: 200.00
Payment method: Check
Present during inspection: None
John, they are not giving away policies, they are paying people to take policies! (Paying because the companies can’t afford to take them on.) Essentially they are paying badly funded, well connected, insurance companies to take these policies. When they fail, WE are left on the hook anyway! The difference is nobody looks closely at these companies, so they can fill there own pockets, and when it comes time to pay the big claims, they wont be there! As the state guarantees all insurance companies, WE pick up the tab!
So as we are going to be responsible for all failed insurance companies anyway, I would prefer the one that is closely regulated.
The extent to which Citizens can cover major storms is public knowledge, so it really doesn’t take an “expert” to inform us of their claims paying ability. Just look at my first post. Any storm that causes more damage than that, to Citizens’ policy holders, and we are on the hook for the rest. The thing is, every year without a major storm, that pot (reserve)increases, as does there ability to pay out ever larger claims amounts. IF Citizens was disbanded, do you think that 6.1BILLION would be given to the state, and then kept in reserve for future claims, or just frittered away on vanity projects and bonuses for the Citizens executives?
Sometimes its better the devil you know!
"Another company slated to get 50,000 policies under this latest downsizing is Heritage Property Insurance and Casualty. The start-up insurer struck a controversial deal with Citizens earlier in the year to absorb as many as 60,000 policies for $52 million. The deal was unique because usually Citizens does not pay companies to absorb policies.
Michael Peltier, a spokesman for Citizens, said that so far only 39,000 Citizens customers had shifted to Heritage under the previous agreement. That has limited Heritage’s payment so far to $33 million."
Be careful! Do you see that black SUV outside your house with the dark tinted windows? The one with the extra antenna on it. You do know that they have a drone flying over you at all times don’t you. The way you are talking, you could be already labeled as a domestic terrorist - or even worse- a Republican, or even much worse- a Tea Party extremist.
You proved my point, Citizens did not/does not charge enough for these policies. Now they are shedding them and raising rates. The free market will work if you let it.
John, far from proving your point! Citizens charges enough for their policies. An insurance company can only ever weather a large storm after it has been in business for a lot of years. To expect any insurance company to be able to handle a major catastrophe without having built up years of reserves is asinine.
They are shedding the policies because our state governor mandated that they shed them. It just so happened that he received a campaign contribution of over $100,000 from the company that was paid to take them! But I am sure that was just a coincidence!
Next time post a link at least so all can see.