WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Any additional price hike in home insurance premiums in Florida could be too much for many residents already struggling to pay the current prices.
Denise Clark has had her home insurance increase multiple times over the past 10 years.
Her thoughts on the home insurance industry here in Florida are clear.
"I don't think it's well monitored, regulated or enforced," Clark said.
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She understands there's a great risk for insurance companies, considering the storms that hit Florida.
But she feels the insurance companies have made profits from abusing the system.
"There's a lot of companies that flee," Clark said. "They take our money for years, and then they leave."
All eyes are on now on a special session being held by state lawmakers in Tallahassee this week.
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Everyone from policyholders to private insurance companies is hoping legislators can come up with something that will stabilize Florida's insurance market.
Lee Burke, the president of Burke, Bogart and Brunel, an independent insurance agency in Boca Raton, said the current crisis is creating financial insecurity and making home ownership unaffordable for some.
"On the surface, people see the high premiums, and they think it's a pricing issue," Burke said. "Well, that's the effect, not the cause. The cause is that there's almost no availability of product."
In a nutshell, there are fewer policies to sell people. Burke would like to see Legislature fix the abuses in the litigation process.
"Property insurance claims should be simple to resolve. You insure something, it was broken, it was damaged, it was destroyed, you pay to get it fixed," Burke said. "That's not the system we have in Florida."