If you’re a homeowner in Florida, you’ve probably asked this question every renewal period for the last few years, “How can I lower my homeowner’s insurance costs?” I know personally the policy for our home in Tallahassee, has doubled since 2020. The first and easiest answer is, if you haven’t had a wind mitigation inspection done, you need to, because this is the formal document your insurer needs to document what discounts you will qualify for. Click here for a link to our sister company’s website that talks more about wind mitigation inspections and reports. Once the report has been completed, everyone will have a better idea of what can still be done to lower your homeowner’s insurance cost.
A common reason your policy is high is if you’re missing the discount credit for not having a proper roof-to-wall connector, which in this area, is almost always a hurricane clip on older homes. We call this, ‘the clip credit.’ Sometimes the clips are there, but not installed correctly, other times they’re missing altogether. For the majority of homes, this credit accounts for a 35-60% discount on the wind premium portion of your policy. For some of our clients, this has represented thousands of dollars a year.
So, the best answer to, “how can I lower my homeowner’s insurance cost,” is to install hurricane clips if you don’t have them or fix the ones that are not installed correctly. If you’re missing hurricane clips or need to get them corrected, get a quote from a contractor who specializes in wind mitigation retrofitting. It literally pays for itself. Here’s an article from May of 2023 about how you can protect your home and save.
Insurance discounts are state law.
A follow up question then gets asked, “what if my insurance doesn’t give me any discount?,” and our answer is always, “It’s not really up to them.” This isn’t a voluntary program that only some insurance companies participate in, this is a state law that applies to all insurance companies that operate in Florida. The below snippet is straight from the Florida Statutes and we put in bold and underlined what we consider very straightforward language stating the purpose of this law. Insurance discounts must be given for certain wind mitigation features or components when proper documentation of such features is provided to the insurance company. State Lawmakers want homeowners to take steps to strengthen their homes against windstorms. This is the same direction that things have been going for decades and it makes perfect sense. People who spend money to purposefully make their home more resistant to high wind events should not have to pay the same rate as a homeowner who did not.
627.0629 Residential property insurance; rate filings.—
(1) It is the intent of the Legislature that insurers provide savings to consumers who install or implement windstorm damage mitigation techniques, alterations, or solutions to their properties to prevent windstorm losses. A rate filing for residential property insurance must include actuarially reasonable discounts, credits, or other rate differentials, or appropriate reductions in deductibles, for properties on which fixtures or construction techniques demonstrated to reduce the amount of loss in a windstorm have been installed or implemented. The fixtures or construction techniques must include, but are not limited to, fixtures or construction techniques that enhance wind uplift prevention, roof strength, roof covering performance, roof-to-wall strength, wall-to-floor-to-foundation strength, opening protection, and window, door, and skylight strength. Credits, discounts, or other rate differentials, or appropriate reductions in deductibles, for fixtures and construction techniques that meet the minimum requirements of the Florida Building Code must be included in the rate filing. . . . Click this link to see this in it’s entirety: Statutes & Constitution :View Statutes : Online Sunshine (state.fl.us)
This house in Wakulla County will not be receiving any discounts for hurricane clips until two more nails are added, but would recommend adding three.
A Leon County homeowner had hurricane clips installed to lower their homeowner’s insurance premiums.
If your hurricane clips look like this, you are not receiving the clip credit discount on your homeowner’s insurance policy.
Here is an example of a hurricane clip not installed in the proper orientation or with the correct number of nails at a house in Leon County. This will not get you any discounts on your Homeowner’s insurance.