All Forum Posts by: Jared Townsend

I strongly disagree. Citizens only offers $100k liability compared to the typical $300k or $500k on other rental policies. Ordinance and law coverage is not offered. If there are excess losses, Citizens can surcharge all policyholders to help pay for the claims.

If you have a long term rental, it is a viable and affordable option, but it should never be construed as the best option. 

If you have a short term rental, it is the worst policy because they will not insure vacation rentals. That means they will deny every claim you have as soon as they see it was advertised for rental. 

Citizens is not an option for STR properties as they do not allow that type of occupancy. This is taken from their website:

Properties meeting at least one of the following criteria will not be eligible for Citizens Personal Residential Multiperil coverage:

• Rented to guests more than three times in a calendar year for periods of less than 30 days or one calendar month, whichever is less
• Advertised or held out to the public as a place regularly rented to guests

@Cameron Griffith I'll send you the info for a local broker with Transworld that specializes in this type of thing. 

@Mitchell Catoe A quick heads up that Citizens does not allow for short term rental use. There are other markets out there, but for a coastal property $6,000 may be the best there is. In the next 12-18 months we should see new carriers to the market and old markets open back up more. This will allow for more competition and push rates back down - so you may only have that astronomical cost for a few years. 

In my experience, most carriers in FL won't write an umbrella with only $100k underlying liability coverage. You would have to purchase a supplemental liability policy in increase your limit to $300k, then you could qualify for an umbrella. 

Alternatively, you can sometimes purchase commercial liability insurance and exclude the Citizens liability completely. This is likely cost prohibitive for a single property but can be inexpensive when insuring 5+ homes together. 
@Oscar Guzman

A large percentage of all FL policies are being written with Citizens these days. Some agents are even pushing policies to Citizens when it could go to a standard carrier or Excess & Surplus (E&S). When you get outside of Citizens it is fairly easy to get $300k coverage with options to increase to $1.3M. 

Quote from @Trevor Hawn:

I appreciate everyone's feedback.

@Jared Townsend My understanding is the agent who pulled the quote is an independent agent but I could be wrong.

As far as the property goes, its a 4 bed 3 bath SFH listed at $675k. It was built in 1980 and the roof is 6 years old. Its about 6 blocks off the beach in PCB and it is not in a flood zone. The annual premium we are being quoted is $14,600. If this in way off please let me know.

 That certainly seems out of line to me. A wind mitigation report could help cut costs considerably, but you'll have to pay ~$100 to get one completed. No agency has access to every carrier so it may be worthwhile to check with other brokers as well. Best of luck!

@Trevor Hawn Without more information about the houses its hard to tell. $15k for an old coastal $3mil home is fairly typical. $15k for a condo would be comically high. You do have a number of rating factors working against you: proximity to coast, age of dwelling, STR use (limits the # of available markets). Overall, rates are rapidly increasing across FL. We have seen rates increase from an average of $1200 to $1800 in the last 2 years.

The Florida STR insurance market is more limited than it has been in many years. We used to have 10+ options for these homes but are now reduced to 6 or 7 due to carrier insolvencies and tighter underwriting standards. We always recommend $1mil+ liability for these homes and the cost for that liability coverage is typically under $300 (unless you are buying in a C or S Corp).

Feel free to send me a DM to discuss any specific questions you have related to the FL STR market. I'd be happy to share my experience. 

You need to be 100% clear that your policy allows for short term rental (STR) use. If you file a claim with a carrier that doesn't allow for STR and they see your postings on Airbnb you can almost guarantee a claim denial. Don't be penny wise and pound foolish!

Some carriers write short term rental on a commercial form, some on the homeowners form (odd, I know), and most are on the DP3 (dwelling fire) form. You will generally find the most favorable rates on the DP3 form but it all depends on the location and characteristics of your home.