State Leaders Say They Fixed Florida’s Insurance Crisis. A New Survey Shows Homeowners Don’t Buy It

State leaders insist they’ve resolved Florida’s property insurance crisis. Florida homeowners aren’t buying it.

They’re reporting surging premiums, a staggering rate of being dropped by their insurers, and deep dissatisfaction with the coverage they’re getting.

Overall, 55% see no signs the insurance market is improving, and 26% contend it is getting worse. Most homeowners – Democrats and Republicans alike – say the state’s vaunted 2022-23 property insurance overhaul has primarily benefited the insurance industry, not the consumers who were promised relief.

Those are the key findings of a landmark survey of 1,511 Florida property insurance policyholders by the South Florida Sun Sentinel, Orlando Sentinel and the University of North Florida’s Public Opinion Research Lab. It is the first statewide opinion poll of its type as the news organizations launch “Uncovered” — a months-long investigation into Florida’s enduring property insurance crisis.

The survey, and followup interviews with respondents, reveal a wide gulf between the experiences of beleaguered policyholders and the promises of Gov. Ron DeSantis, Republican legislators and insurance industry leaders that Florida’s new limits on lawsuits against insurers would encourage competition and reduce rates.

“All I can see is it’s helped the insurance companies,” said St. Augustine homeowner Patrick Shea, who got dropped by his private insurer and wound up on state-owned Citizens. “It really hasn’t helped the availability of insurance for homeowners. Or prices.”

“God knows we need help, that’s for sure,” echoed Dan Caudill, the owner of a Royal Palm Beach home whose annual premium increased by $1,300 this year to $5,700. “I don’t know if it’s going to be the Legislature or if it’s going to be the insurance companies but somebody’s going to have to give us a break somewhere.”

Shea and Caudill join a large group of skeptics. Nearly half of survey respondents reported premium hikes totaling 50% or more over the past five years. Nearly three-quarters say increases continued into the last year, even though state leaders have promised premiums would start to go down.

And of policyholders who have changed insurers over the last five years, 47% said they were forced to do so because they were dropped, either by a private insurer or state-backed Citizens Property Insurance Corp.

By comparison, just 9% of homeowners nationwide who changed insurers over the last five years said they were dropped by their insurer, according to a 2025 Consumer Reports survey.

Sean Freeder, associate professor of political science at the University of North Florida, who oversaw the survey, called that gap “absolutely insane.”

A constant worry of being dropped results in “a lot less stability for homeowners,” Freeder said.

The Sentinel and Sun Sentinel began examining Florida’s property insurance market late last year as state leaders proclaimed their property insurance remedies were taking hold – and, for the most part, those leaders have blocked additional efforts at reform.

The state’s narrative isn’t entirely baseless. Five years after complaining they were on the brink of collapse in Florida’s uniquely punishing, hurricane-driven environment, nearly 90 percent of property insurance companies operating here were profitable last year, the news organizations’ examination shows.

The state’s litigation reforms have slashed Florida’s nation-leading proportion of claims-based lawsuits by over 30%, and 20 new insurers have joined the market, increasing competition.

But skepticism about those developments runs deep in the survey. Even as the GOP agenda has moved on to property tax reform with a tax-slashing measure on the November ballot, survey respondents by a 63-36 margin say property insurance remains the bigger problem.

Many issues remain. A previously suppressed state study conducted in 2021 and 2022 — uncovered by the news organizations’ reporting and detailed in stories last week and again today — indicates that dozens of Florida property insurers earned profits they didn’t publicly disclose as lawmakers considered their need for relief. Yet little has been done to improve transparency.

Upcoming stories in the news organizations’ examination will show:

More Florida customers dissatisfied

Count Brandon Reich among Florida’s unhappy property insurance customers.

His home on the Caloosahatchee River in Fort Myers Shores was inundated by 3.5 feet of water during Hurricane Ian, in addition to suffering extensive wind damage. But when his insurer’s adjuster arrived to assess the damage, Reich was told that most of the damage wasn’t covered.

“Insurance companies, by and large, their first line of thinking is, ‘Reject your claim,’ and hope you go away,” Reich said recently. “And the (policyholders) who, you know, have too much going on or aren’t informed, they just give up.”

Like Reich, many respondents to the UNF poll said the insurance premiums they pay to own a home in Florida often do not buy satisfaction.

About 22% of Florida homeowners said they were strongly satisfied with their insurer, and just over half said they were somewhat satisfied. That might sound like a degree of contentment, but it compares poorly with the nationwide results in the 2025 Consumer Reports survey of 23,917 U.S policyholders, which show 54% of policyholders across the nation said they were strongly satisfied.

At the other end of the scale, 22% of Florida policyholders said they were “somewhat” or “strongly” dissatisfied with their insurers, compared to 13% of national respondents who answered similarly.

The same contrast extends to claims-handing, with just 32% of Florida respondents strongly satisfied with how their insurer handled their most recent claim, half the 64% reporting a high level of satisfaction in the Consumer Reports nationwide survey.

About one-fifth of Florida policyholders said they had filed a claim in the past five years.

Asked to comment on the survey’s findings, Mark Friedlander, senior director of media relations for the industry-funded Insurance Information Institute, said its results “appear to be intentionally skewed toward an anti-insurance industry false narrative.” He added that the survey does not “reflect the reality of a vastly improved Florida marketplace, which most consumers are benefitting from.”

The claims process was what frustrated Reich. Like most survey respondents, he was not specifically insured for flood, saying he found the coverage too expensive. And that turned out to be a major gap in his policy.

When his property insurer’s adjuster showed up, “the guy basically walked around the house and goes, ‘Oh, this is flood. No, this is flood. Sorry, this is flood.’”

Their insurer paid only $30,000 to repair roof damage, “which wasn’t enough,” Reich said. This year, Reich and his husband finally saved enough money to replace their roof.

The coverage shortfall forced the couple to complete a majority of repairs on their own. They hauled soaked furniture to the curb, tore out and replaced damaged drywall, wheeled dehumidifiers into the house to prevent mold growth, raised their home’s windows, storm-proofed their garage, built a cement wall around their swimming pool and installed flood gates from the wall to their house.

They also had to replace their cars, which were totaled.

The ordeal carved a major hole in the couples’ finances, Reich said.

“Before Ian, we were basically debt free,” he said. “We didn’t owe anything on our house, we didn’t owe anything on our cars, we didn’t have credit card debt. And now we have, you know, about $130,000 in credit card debt.”

‘Not very confident’ insurer could pay claim

The survey revealed sharp contrasts in satisfaction, confidence and attitudes between homeowners covered by well-known national companies and the many policyholders who are customers of Florida-focused firms. Those results reflect a complicated and difficult reality in Florida’s insurance marketplace.

Beginning after Hurricane Andrew in 1992 and continuing to this day, smaller companies sprang up and took on big roles here, as national insurers pulled back rather than risk the financial catastrophe of another huge, damaging tropical system. The state then created the publicly-owned Citizens Property Insurance Corp. as its “insurer of last resort” to cover coastal properties shunned by private market insurers, and it too became a major player.

Today, about two-thirds of Florida homeowners trust companies many had never heard of before to safeguard their homes and possessions – while paying thousands of dollars each year for the privilege. Those companies rely on the resources of international finance firms called “reinsurers” and the state’s multi-billion dollar catastrophe fund to back their policies, rather than spreading risk across a national market using their own substantial reserves, as more traditional insurers do.

The survey quantifies the sense of unease and frustration many customers of these new-wave insurers feel.

Florida customers of national carriers, including State Farm, USAA, AAA, Liberty Mutual, The Hartford, Progressive and Geico, were about twice as likely to say they were “strongly satisfied” with their insurer. Thirty-four percent voiced that sentiment compared to just 16 percent with Florida-focused companies.

Even more striking were the disparities when respondents were asked how confident they were that their insurer would be able to cover necessary repairs if their homes were severely damaged. About 36% of homeowners with national insurers said they were “very confident,” compared to 17% of customers with Florida-focused insurers.

“I get offers from names I’ve never heard before,” said retired engineer Robert Harris, who has been with State Farm since he moved from Alabama to the Titusville area 20 years ago.

“You know, like Flamingo Insurance. I’m making these up, OK? Sunshine State Insurance. Blah blah blah. And you think, ‘Well, if we have a hurricane, is there going to be any money coming from them?’ At least I feel with State Farm, there might be a fight but you’ll get something.”

Premiums up 50% or more

Floridians have long endured some of the nation’s highest home insurance costs — the price for many of living in hurricane country. And, survey respondents said, they just keep going up.

Only a handful of policyholders said they have escaped insurance cost increases over the past five years. Just 8% said their premiums have decreased (4%) or stayed the same (4%) during that time.

Nearly half of the Florida respondents – 47% – said their premiums increased by 50% or more in that time period.

Across the nation, increases of 50% or more over the last five years were reported by just 2% of policyholders, according to the 2025 Consumer Reports survey.

Patti Kanegae, a former resident of Largo, said her bill to insure her older home there doubled over four years, from $2,000 to $4,000, despite improvements to protect it against damaging hurricane winds.

“We had done everything we could,” she said, adding, “We fixed the roof. We had new air conditioning. We put new windows in.” None of it was enough.

The UNF survey indicates premium increases have continued into the last year, with more than one-third citing hikes of 25% or more even as state officials claim premiums overall have begun to drop. The state’s data reflects industry-wide averages, not individual experiences as the survey does.

The survey also suggests that substantial premium increases await those who file claims.

Among homeowners who pursued at least one claim, 53% said their premiums increased by half or more over the past five years.

Arthur Gallagher, a Clewiston homeowner, filed a water damage claim after his dog damaged an outdoor spigot by pulling on the attached hose. Water flowed inside the building, damaging floors and molding.

After giving him $2,000 to make repairs, his insurer raised his premium to more than $6,000, he said. He was able to get it reduced to around $4,000 by agreeing to eliminate water damage coverage from his policy, he said.

“If I’d known then, I would have never made the claim against them,” he said.

Premiums $3,000 a year or more

Florida homeowners’ insurance burden largely depends on where in Florida those homeowners live, the survey indicated.

Simply put, residents of storm-plagued South Florida, where the population is particularly concentrated on the coast, pay the most and see the biggest increases, while North and Central Florida residents suffer relatively less.

Lake County resident Brian Hodson has lived that story.

In 2021, insurance cost increases drove Hodson and his wife out of a manufactured home they owned in the southern part of the state – a Fort Myers Beach community called Bayside Estates – and into a newly built home in Central Florida’s Mount Dora.

In 2016, they had paid $1,700 for their annual property insurance, but five years later they had been dropped by their insurer and were confronting costs of as much as $4,000 with a new company. Meanwhile the separate flood insurance policy required under their mortgage had surged from $1,300 to an anticipated $5,800 by 2026.

“It was easy to realize that in five or six years we would be paying (a total of) $10,000 to $12,000 for insurance,” Hodson said. “So on the first of September 2021, we drove up here to Mount Dora, looked at three communities, wrote a contract the next day, went back and sold the place down there for our asking price.”

The couple’s current property insurance bill is less than $2,000 annually, flood insurance included.

If Hodson’s goal was to escape Florida’s highest insurance premiums, he was smart to relocate north.

Fifty-one percent of policyholders living in the southern portion of the state said in the survey that their premiums increased by half or more over the last five years. Among homeowners in the northern and central parts of the state, that percentage was 46%.

Six of every 10 homeowners – 60% – in the south paid $3,000 or more for their current policy. Forty-four percent paid $4,000 or more.

That compares to roughly one-third of homeowners in the north and central regions who paid $3,000 or more, and roughly one-fifth who paid in excess of $4,000.

Insurance experts have long attributed higher prices in southern Florida to a number of factors, including higher values of insured properties, its concentration of older homes that are more prone to equipment failures, and a perception that the region is more vulnerable to hurricanes.

Is the perception justified? Brian Hodson lived that story too.

Six months after he and his wife left Fort Myers Beach, Hurricane Ian struck their former community, destroying almost half of the park’s 585 homes. The Hodsons’ former residence survived, but took on five feet of water.

Dropped by insurer

Floridians have learned not to get too comfortable with their home insurers. A majority of survey respondents – 54% – reported changing their insurers at least once over the past five years.

Nearly half of them had no choice: They were dropped.

Evelyn Gonzalez, a North Miami Beach homeowner, said she received a letter of non-renewal this year and had to find a new company. Although her insurer told her it was no longer writing policies in her neighborhood, she believes the real reason was that she had recently filed a $15,000 mold claim.

Also, she had enlisted help from a public adjuster, a move insurance companies tend not to like.

Rather than use an agent, Gonzalez said she and her husband looked for a replacement on their own. After spending four or five hours on the phone – “talking to insurance companies and then, you know, they ask you questions and you have to answer them” – they ended up with Loggerhead Insurance Exchange.

Loggerhead offered the lowest price of available options, she said. “It was not lower than what we had,” she said, “but the lowest possible that we could find. We’ve never had our insurance get lowered.”

While getting dumped is a common experience for Floridians, it’s rare elsewhere. Nationally, just 9% of insurance customers who reported switching companies recently said they were dropped by their previous company, the Consumer Reports survey found. Most had simply shopped for a better rate.

In Florida, the percentage of switchers who said they were dropped is five times as high. Of those, 22% were ditched by a private insurer, typically by being told they won’t be renewed at the end of a policy term, while 25% were dropped by the state-run Citizens.

The Citizens removals mostly stem from a years-long effort by state leaders to reduce the public company’s size. This “depopulation” program, which has shed more than a million policies from Citizens since 2023, urges private companies to “take out” policies they believe would be profitable. Citizens’ customers are told they may not renew if any private offer comes within 20% of Citizens’ estimated renewal premium.

Alan Jackson, an Ocala homeowner, said Citizens sent him a letter of non-renewal along with a notice that his home, built in 1990, had been selected for takeout by American Integrity with a $200 premium increase. Jackson said he looked for a less-expensive company but couldn’t find one.

But Jackson said he’s just relieved the company that took over his policy didn’t require a detailed inspection.

When he received his letter notifying him he was being depopulated, “I wasn’t as much angry as I was scared,” he said. “So when they said I’d only have to pay a $200 increase and go onto American Integrity, I was like, ‘Well, yeah, that sucks, but at least I didn’t have somebody come out and re-survey the house and tell me I need a roof and this, that and the other for them to insure me.’ They just picked me up.”

Is the insurance market improving?

In a polarized political climate, at least one thing unites Floridians across the political spectrum: pessimism about the state’s property insurance market.

Fifty-five percent of Republicans and 54% of Democrats said they see no signs of improvement. Additionally, 34% of Democrats and 18% of Republicans believe the market is getting worse, according to the survey.

The narrow partisan divide is surprising, considering that the state’s property insurance overhaul was the handiwork of its Republican leaders, survey coordinator Freeder said.

DeSantis continues to tout the changes. “Premiums are lowering because we’ve enacted real reforms and withstood the pressure to reverse course,” he declared in January.

But Freeder noted that only one in 10 Democrats and independents and 1 in 4 Republicans see signs of improvement. “That is an unusual degree of bipartisanship on an issue that’s really important to Floridians,” he said.

The nonpartisan skepticism extends to the question of who benefited most from the overhaul, with 79% of Democrats, 74% of independents and 57% of Republicans tabbing insurers rather than consumers as the victors.

Tampa homeowner Ashley Lee has her own reasons for pessimism, tied to the $20,000 to $30,000 she spent to repair her home after Hurricane Milton struck the region in 2024.

The storm drove water into Lee’s house through the front and side doors. Milton’s winds damaged her roof. Water flowed in from above, causing a ceiling to collapse inside the home.

An adjuster estimated the storm caused more than $50,000 in damage and indicated her policy would cover the cost after the deductible, Lee said.

Instead, she said, her insurer concluded that nearly all of the damage was caused by floodwater, for which she wasn’t covered. She received $2,000, she said. Her leaking roof still isn’t fixed.

She has little faith in property insurance because “all anybody does is find loopholes around helping the way they’re supposed to.”

She added, “If they’re not actually trying to help you, then I don’t understand why they’re taking your money in the first place.”

©2026 South Florida Sun-Sentinel. Visit sun-sentinel.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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