Posted on 05/27/2023 3:12:05 AM PDT by Libloather
America's biggest home insurance company has announced it will no longer insure houses in California, saying that the risk from wildfires was too great and the cost of rebuilding too high.
State Farm, the nation's biggest car and home insurer by premium volume, said existing customers would not be affected.
But from Saturday, no new home insurance policies will be issued. The company will continue offering auto insurance.
State Farm said it 'made this decision due to historic increases in construction costs outpacing inflation, rapidly growing catastrophe exposure, and a challenging reinsurance market.'
In its statement, State Farm said it takes 'seriously our responsibility to manage risk.'
The Bloomington, Illinois-based company said it was 'necessary to take these actions now to improve the company's financial strength.'
They added: 'We will continue to evaluate our approach based on changing market conditions.'
State Farm's move follows the decision last year by American International Group to end the insurance policies taken out on thousands of expensive properties. The group notified their high-net-worth clients in California that their policies would not renew.
The notices were part of a plan by AIG to cease selling home policies in California through a unit regulated by the state's insurance department.
Michael Soller, a deputy insurance commissioner for California, told The Wall Street Journal that the state was working hard to reduce wildfire risk.
He said they were 'really going after the root causes of the insurance issues, which is the wildfire risk'.
Soller said California has created an insurance-discount program that takes into consideration wildfire-mitigation investments by consumers.
'The factors driving State Farm's decision are beyond our control, including climate change, reinsurance costs affecting the entire insurance industry, and global inflation,' said Soller.
The EPA, in their section devoted to California's wildfires, confirm the situation is worsening.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
When a major insurer leaves a state, it’s almost certainly driven by state regulatory issues that it simply can’t deal with anymore.
Not a problem, California will just start its own insurance company and outlaw all private insurance. What could possibly go wrong?
“When a major insurer leaves a state, it’s almost certainly driven by state regulatory issues that it simply can’t deal with anymore.”
I don’t know why it’s SO DIFFICULT for people on our side to figure that out. Obviously State Farm could just raise rates to the level needed to make a profit...but then obviously something prevents that, or that is what they’d do.
As to openly stating it, OBVIOUSLY they know to keep their mouths shut, as they still have huge operations there, and so they best not anger the Leftist regulators that can run them to the ground with a few keystrokes of their computers.
So true. A man at our church here in Virginia is on the board of a condominium complex in the Ft Meyers area and he tells me that about the only option left for them is the state run insurance program, and they are so overwhelmed with applications that many units will be uninsured by June 1. The end result is that the banks that hold the mortgages on these units will most likely be calling the loans.Not a good time to be a condo owner in Florida. Many homeowners are facing the same fate.
First, almost every wildfire in California is caused by human beings, and most often by deliberate arson.
Second, the density of trees and underbrush are at record levels because California allows almost no tree thinning or preemptive controlled burns of underbrush.
That density guarantees raging uncontrollable fires in the dry summer months.
Isn’t this where the US taxpayer steps in to subsidize the rich?
Perhaps my blodgette production should be increased?
Sounds like a lot of people will be leaving florida broke and homeless.
1930 is going to look like a picnic when 2024 hits.
Most people dont realize what time zones and faster communications mean to a country as big as the U.S. people on the west coast get up 4 hours after NYC and whatever is happening in D.C. its like playing chess when your opponant can see your next 4 moves before they make their move.
California winds up leading the country because they can see 4 hours into the future and make decisions based on things that haven't hit them yet.
Concrete block walls and poured concrete columns every 20 feet with roof trusses locked into the columns and walls.
South Florida homes built in the 1950s and 1960s NEVER had structural damage after a hurricane - only broken windows and falling tree damage, and on rare occasions water damage.
Sometime in the 1970s the code was changed and entire subdivisions of stick framed houses were built in western Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach counties.
Long time residents were in shock when hurricanes in the 1970s and 1980s flattened thousands of homes in areas that were sometimes five miles inland from the coast.
And then there is Miami.
In Miami, there are literally countless residential and business structures literally within a few feet of not only the ocean but all kinds of waterways. A hurricane driven storm surge of less than a mere five feet will have water flooding all these structures.
Dade county was the leader in the development of extreme hurricane building codes that are primarily protection from wind related damages. The stringent codes do nothing to protect a multimillion dollar residential property that lies a mere 17 feet and two feet in elevation from a river or canal.
It boils down to the fact that the risk in Miami is in fact uninsurable
Miami has been ever so lucky in that the hurricanes have come up the Gulf side of the Florida peninsula. But....... lucks gonna run out and the damage will literally bankrupt all the insurors
I was born in Clewiston, Fl right on Lake Okeechobee, I think it was in the 1920s a hurricane came thru and killed thousands of people when the lake flooded the low-lying areas, back when not that many people lived down there, the Federal government started and eventually finished the dike system around the entire lake which has save them countless times.
When the next hurricane Andrew hits South Florida it will catastrophic in terms of property damage and potential loss of life.
Cars burn too.
Years ago I was faced with an increased insurance premium & increased deductible. This is not in Florida or California; but what should be a fairly low-risk state, but I think the insurer was trying to compensate for what they might lose in the high-risk states so that the company overall would have the same income. I can’t do this if I decide to work part-time instead of full-time. Why should I take the heat because somebody in California wants to live in a heavily forested area or a Floridian insists on living on the ocean?
Yup. I bought a lovely condo by the sea in South Florida. We got in just before the prices went stratospheric. The building is built like a rock. We stayed put during Nicole and never felt threatened.
Our HOA fees are projected to double in 2 years, which is why this retired man has gone back to work.
We have been told the true reason for the the hike was not just the Surfside disaster, but the fact that lawyers figured out a way to siphon huge amounts of money from it.
The true problem is that lawyers in South Florida have always had the run of the place, and that they are largely responsible for rendering the state uninsurable.
Coast dwellers are becoming a bit unhappy with DeSanctus (just kidding, we LOVE him), but short of sweeping legal reform I don’t know what he can do about it. The lawyers make the Teachers (Comm)Unions look like pikers.
I have the inside info-the insurance commission in CA will not allow the much needed rate increases due to the cost of repair so many insurance companies are pulling out. SF is also regulating which auto policies they are letting in
State Farm pulled out of Galveston County years ago. I refuse to do business with State Farm.
Spot on correct!!!
It won’t be long until the State takes over. Think of it as Obamacare for Homeowners.
If you like your Home, you can keep your Home.
☑️
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