hi, this is joel curran coming from the towerhill insurance group, llc offices in gainesville, florida, where we have been serving the insuranceneeds of floridians for 40 years. our customers are loyal – every year, morethan 95% accept our renewal offer. more than 100,000 have been with us for 5years or more. unfortunately, everyone has to endure rateincreases. but you still think: “why did you increasemy premiums? i live in the same house and the market value has declined, there wereno hurricanes, and i haven’t had any claims.†the simple answer is that we need more premiumsto cover our costs. but before i give more detail, let me tellyou about good faith and spread of risk.
insurance is a good faith contract which meansin part that you pay us, and we promise to pay you for damage or injuries covered bythe contract. we take that promise seriously.we need to be financially strong enough to pay claims especially if there is a catastrophe.i’ll tell you more about that in a minute. the second principle is spread of risk.two hundred years ago when ben franklin started the first mutual fire insurance company, insurancemeant that a small group chipped in equally, and if one house burned down there was moneyfor rebuilding it. but if only ten people paid in and there weretwo house fires in a year, there would not be enough money to rebuild both homes.but the bigger the group, the broader the
spread of risk, and pretty soon you get toa large enough number that the risk is low compared to the number of insurance buyers.that makes the overall risk more predictable. the more predictable – the lower everyone’scontributions will be. florida homeowners have a higher-than normalrisk. our 1,300-mile coastline is longer than anystate except alaska. the narrow shape of florida means even non-coastalareas are very exposed. our love of being near the water comes witha cost. to spread the risk and keep insurance accessibleto everyone, we have to spread the cost as well.so, what are those costs?
your premium goes towards three main costareas: first, we make sure we can pay claims.we set aside surplus funds, as well as claims reserves, and we make conservative investmentsto fund them. we never take a risk with your premiums byputting them into risky investments. second, we cover the cost of operating thecompany, which provides jobs for more than 350 people in florida.through sales commissions we also support local independent insurance agencies in everyflorida county. in addition, we have to make sure that ifthere is a hurricane, our facilities can keep running at full capacity so we can be therewhen you need us most.
third – and this may surprise you – thebiggest cost is reinsurance. reinsurance is exactly what it sounds like– insurance for insurers, to make sure we can cover catastrophic losses.reinsurance spreads risk globally, meaning that homeowners around the world are actually helping fund claim payments ifa hurricane makes landfall in florida – which happened in 2004 and 2005-- when we paid outmore than $2 billion to repair homes in florida due to 8 hurricanes.by the same token, florida’s contributions help fund recoveries in other state and countries.when you watch the weather channel and see tornados in kansas, or monsoons in china,know that premiums paid by insurance buyers all over the world, including us in florida,will help repair the damages.
reinsurers need to be prepared for the worst,and tower hill insurance group, llc buys only from the best, most stable reinsurers whohave demonstrated year over year that they can fund the losses they insure.the bottom line on reinsurance is that, no matter how well we run our company and manageour investments, if tower hill insurance group, llc were on our own to fund years like 2004and 2005 we would have to charge premiums that are a multiple of what we charge now.so back to your question, “why is my premium increasing this year�well, in determining rate changes every year, florida insurers have to balance the needfor keeping insurance rates competitive with the need for keeping their businesses stableand for buying reinsurance.
recently, two things have contributed.in 2011, even though florida had a mild year, the world had its worst year on record forweather catastrophes. because their risk is spread globally, reinsurersare increasing their rates to recover. that rate increase is hitting florida justlike everywhere else. in addition, while the value of homes everywherehas drastically dropped, the cost of repairing and rebuilding has not dropped.when we pay property damage claims we expect to pay contractors a fair price for theirwork, so we need to collect premium accordingly. we don’t take rate increases lightly, andwe know you don’t either. we go through extensive analysis to determinethe fairest rates, and we file our rate changes
with the office of insurance regulation whois charged with making sure rates are adequate, not excessive, and do not unfairly discriminate.hopefully what i have said makes sense to you.i want you to know that everything we do at tower hill insurance group, llc is done toensure peace of mind for our individual and commercial policy holders.forty years of experience means we know how to make the right decisions to protect yourinterests, so stick with us and we’ll ride out any future catastrophes together.page 3 of 3
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