Positive signals for Florida's property insurance market as Citizens sees drop in policy county

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The state-backed insurer of last resort, Citizens, is finally seeing policy counts drop after years of rapid increases.

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Insurance industry insiders claim it’s a positive sign for the Sunshine State’s property insurance market, which as recently as last year was considered to be on life support.

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More than one million Floridians are still covered by Citizens Insurance, but things are trending in the right direction, with private insurers taking on roughly 400,000 Citizens policies since the start of 2023.

Citizen’s Property Insurance has been assuming a lot of market exposure over the past few years, including here in Duval County.

Policy counts have skyrocketed from roughly 4,000 in Duval County in 2021 up to nearly 23,000 as of this week.

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Statewide, Citizens has seen policy counts climb from 800,000 in mid-2022 up to roughly 1.23 million policies at the start of this year.

But since January there have been some positive signs, with the state-backed insurer of last resort reducing its policy count by about 4.5 percent down to 1.17 million.

“They have reduced their exposure by over 300,000 policies just since October,” said Mark Friedlander with the Insurance Information Institute.

Friedlander said the drop in policies is a great sign for the Florida insurance market overall, as it means more private insurers are able and willing to take on Citizens policies.

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“That’s really the critical takeaway, is private insurers are expanding risk, meaning they are much healthier than they were a year ago,” said Friedlander.

Citizens CEO Tim Cerio said the goal is to depopulate a total of 315,000 policies by the end of the year, which he argued would not only help Citizens Insurance lower its risk, but also help lower the risk for all Florida citizens.

“If we’re large and a major storm hits that increases the risk that Floridians, even Floridians who are not Citizens customers, will face an assessment,” said Cerio.

And Friedlander explained if you’re a current Citizens customer and receive a takeout offer in the mail, you’ll want to act fast, especially with hurricane season just a month and a half away.

“If you get an offer, if it’s within 20 percent [of your Citizens policy], you must either accept that takeout offer from a private insurer or you have to shop on your own because Citizens will drop you,” said Friedlander.

Friedlander anticipates by the end of the year Citizens will drop below one million policies for the first time in roughly two years.

The ultimate goal according to Citizens is to get its policy count down to roughly half a million.

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