Hurricane Florida’s Past

Courtesy of iii.org

• Florida accounted for 14 percent of all U.S. insured catastrophe losses from 1985 to 2014: $68 billion out of $498.6 billion, based on data from the PCS division of ISO. (Adjusted for inflation by ISO using the GDP implicit price deflator.)
• Seven of the 10 costliest hurricanes in U.S. history have impacted Florida. Six of these storms occurred within just two years: 2004 and 2005. (See chart below.)
• The costliest hurricane, based on insured property losses to Florida, was 1992’s Hurricane Andrew. It caused $24 billion in damage to Florida and Louisiana (in 2016 dollars). (See chart below.) Florida leads the nation in the number of flood policies, according to the National Flood Insurance Program, with about 1.8 million policies in force in 2015. Standard homeowners policies typically do not cover flood damage. Flood insurance is covered by the National Flood Insurance Program.
• The number of people living in coastal areas in Florida increased by 4.2 million, or 27 percent, from 15.6 million in 2000 to 19.8 million in 2015, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. About 98 percent of the total population of Florida lives in one of the coastal counties.
• The insured value of properties in coastal areas of Florida totaled $2.9 trillion in 2013, accounting for 79 percent of the state’s total insured property exposure, according to an analysis by AIR Worldwide.
• Given the growth in the number and value of insured property, a repeat of the hurricane that devastated Miami in 1926 would result in approximately $130.2 billion in insured damage in 2016, according to Karen Clark and Co.
• After its establishment in 2002, when the state passed legislation combining two separate high risk insurance pools known as the Florida Windstorm Underwriting Association and the Florida Residential Property & Casualty Joint Underwriting Association, Citizens Property Insurance Corp. (CPIC) experienced exponential growth. As a result Florida Citizens has evolved from a market of last resort to the state’s largest property insurer.
• Florida Citizens Property Insurance Corp. provides multiperil and wind-only insurance coverage to Florida homeowners, commercial residential and commercial business property owners.
• Direct homeowners insurance premiums in Florida written by Citizens was $504 million in 2015 down from $795 million in 2014.
• Citizens was the state’s fourth leading homeowners insurer in 2015, with a market share of 5.7, down from 9.1 percent in 2014. It is also the fifth largest commercial insurer, with a 3.8 percent market share, down from 6.6 percent in 2014.
• Florida Citizens had 701,097 policies with an exposure of $150.5 billion in fiscal year 2015, according to the Property Insurance Plans Service (PIPSO).