Florida has seen a trend in the past decade of rising sea levels along its coastlines. It’s been causing high-tide flooding in a few areas, which is growing in severity, according to a new report from the National Oceanic and …
Lisa’s Blog
Coronavirus & the Florida Market
As we enter the second week of the partial business re-opening of Florida, virus-related insurance claims are being filed, insurance companies are fighting back in court, and the industry is making dire predictions on its future. A national data call …
How a $41,000 Plumbing Leak Turned Into a $1.2 Million Attorney Fee
Florida’s fee-shifting statute authorizes an attorney to recover a “reasonable fee” when their client prevails. To calculate the award, Florida courts follow the federal Lodestar method which multiplies the hours reasonably expended by a reasonable hourly rate.
However, in 2017 …
A Disaster Resilience Framework: Investing now to pay less later
Under the assumption that it cannot control severe weather, nor deny recovery money to communities struck by future catastrophes, the federal government is developing a framework for how best to invest its finite taxpayer resources into more efficient and effective …
A Personal Look at Dorian’s Destruction
In last week’s LMA Newsletter, I mentioned two recent trips I took to the Bahamas with a longtime Florida insurance company executive to examine Hurricane Dorian damage first-hand. This up-close and personal video highlights the findings of those trips, …
Examining Florida’s Hurricane Vulnerabilities
Is Florida’s building code protecting all of us? That’s what we asked in two recent episodes of The Florida Insurance Roundup podcast. “It’s not that we expect to have no damage when we have a Category 5 hurricane, but we …
Key AOB Reform Effective Immediately
Today is the day Florida’s old Assignment of Benefits (AOB) system ended in a dramatic flourish, and with it, much of the abuse that has left consumers and insurance companies on the hook for unfinished repairs, excessive charges, and a …
New Miami Zoning Tackles Flooding, While NFIP Rate Plan Challenged
Lots of things are continuing to happen in the world of flood mitigation and insurance. Miami has passed its first law designed to protect against sea level rise, Governor DeSantis this past week selected the state’s first Chief Science Officer …
Flood Follies
2018 was a tough year for flooding in the United States, and nowhere worse than in the Carolinas, where Hurricane Florence dumped three feet of rain in spots. Damage is estimated at $13 billion but at least half of that …
Post-Michael Coordination Questioned as Death Toll Rises, Debris Everywhere
Although we reached the official end of the Atlantic Hurricane Season last Friday, its effects will be with us here in Florida well into 2019 due to Hurricane Michael’s destruction. The death toll is increasing, nearly 100,000 Panhandle residents are …
