Two Insurers Approved To Remove 26,000 Citizens Policies. Hearing Set For Company’s Next Round Of Rate Hikes.

Two private-market insurers have been approved to remove up to 26,000 policies from state-owned Citizens Property Insurance Corp. In a consent order dated May 31, insurers Slide Insurance Company and Loggerhead Reciprocal Interinsurance Exchange were approved by Office of Insurance Regulation Commissioner Michael Yaworsky to assume selected personal lines policies from Citizens under terms approved back in 2016. The two companies requested permission to assume the policies back in April. Slide submitted a proposal on April 28 to assume ownership of up to 25,000 policies, including 24,000 personal residential policies from Citizens’ personal lines account and 1,000 multi-peril policies from Citizens’ coastal account. A day earlier on April 27, Loggerhead submitted a proposal to assume up to 1,000 personal residential policies from Citizens’ personal lines account. While Citizens takeouts had become common prior to 2017, private market insurers have resisted any urge in recent years to grow quickly by taking on large numbers of Citizens policies. But large-scale changes to Florida’s insurance market over the past year have changed that calculus and made it possible for new companies to form with none of the legal liabilities that older companies would bring. Slide and Loggerhead, both formed last year, fit that bill.