Florida court adopts dual approach
There’s another significant development from over the past holiday to report, this one concerning the appraisal of property insurance claims. It has been common practice for Florida courts to deny a property owner’s motion to compel an appraisal during a dispute with the insurance company, until defense arguments are heard and resolved on coverage questions. Over the past decade, there’s been a slow trend toward adopting a dual-track approach to such conflicts; specifically, allowing appraisal in certain cases where the claim was partially denied, while still preserving the right of insurance companies to then argue afterward about coverage.
The trend took another leap recently when Florida’s Second District Court of Appeal ruled that an owner can seek the full value of a disputed claim that was denied in total – not just partially denied by the insurance company. You can read more in this Insurance Journal analysis.
So now there’s different treatments among different District Courts of Appeal. The question – not yet resolved by the Florida Supreme Court – is whether and under what circumstances it may be appropriate for a court to order appraisal before coverage issues are fully resolved. We’ll follow developments in this and related cases and report back!
LMA Newsletter of 1-18-21
