BOCA RATON, Fla. — Florida Peninsula Insurance Company is announcing a 2% statewide average rate reduction in homeowners insurance premiums.
In January, WPTV met Lori Lanni.
"I received a letter from them maybe about a month ago," Lanni told WPTV.
Lanni had just received a letter from Citizens Property Insurance, the state's insurer of last resort, letting her know they were shedding her policy and she needed to choose between several private insurers.
"Florida Peninsula, I'm paying about $1,000 more. Slide they're just under that, with $978," Lanni said.
Now, months later, there's good news for Florida Peninsula Insurance customers.
"We're very excited. We're getting ready to reduce rates by 2% for our condominium and homeowners insurance customers," Clint Strauch, president of Florida Peninsula Insurance, told WPTV.
It's a statewide average reduction, effective for new customers on July 15 and for renewals on Aug. 1.
"Given the climate that we're in, rising prices for almost everything that we use on a daily basis, I think that's really good news," Strauch said.
Strauch said a piece of legislation, Senate Bill 2A which passed in 2022, made this possible.
"The reason that legislation was so instrumental, is it did change the claims environment and it prevented a lot of frivolous lawsuits," Strauch said. "We were seeing a lot of frivolous lawsuits and I think the changes made a big difference and that is the main reason we have the rate decrease today."
Florida Peninsula currently has 130,000 policies in Florida and they've taken over 55,000 Citizens Insurance policies since the company started shedding policies.
That number continues to grow and with it, Strauch said more reductions are possible.
"I think this is just the beginning. I think given the environment, unless things change, more hurricanes, more inflation, I think we're going to start seeing a trend of lower rates, rate decreases and that's going to help consumers," Strauch said.