Following legislative reforms designed to promote market stability, eight property and casualty insurers were approved to enter Florida’s insurance market, according to Florida’s Office of Insurance Regulation (OIR).

Ovation Home Insurance Exchange, Manatee Insurance Exchange, Condo Owners Reciprocal Exchange, Orange Insurance Exchange, Orion180 Select Insurance Company, Orion180 Insurance Company, Mainsail Insurance Company, and Tailrow Insurance Companies have recently been approved as the latest property/casualty insurers in the state.

“Florida’s insurance market continues to strengthen, showing signs recent legislation is having positive impacts to the property insurance market,” said Insurance Commissioner Michael Yaworsky. “OIR remains steadfast in our efforts to stabilize Florida’s insurance market by implementing legislative reforms and recruiting more insurers to the state. We look forward to continuing this work and promoting a competitive market for policyholders.”

In addition to new companies entering the market, OIR approved the acquisition of Florida domestic property and casualty reciprocal insurer, Trusted Resource Underwriters Exchange, to allow the insurer to expand its underwriting capacity.

As a result of the acquisition approval, more than $1.25 billion of capital is being invested into Florida’s property and casualty insurance market.

Meanwhile, Citizens Property Insurance Corporation (Citizens) continues to improve its financial strength over previous years.

The state’s insurer of last resort increased its surplus by approximately 17.5 percent from previous years and posted a net income in 2023 of $746 million compared to a loss of $2.2 billion in 2022, the OIR said.

Additionally, Citizens’ combined ratio improved drastically from the previous year from 204.4 to 59.5.

The stabilized market has brought continued interest from authorized insurers in the Citizens Depopulation program.

So far, in 2024, OIR approved 13 companies to assume more than 354,000 policies from Citizens.

In 2023, more than 275,000 policies were assumed from Citizens, reducing Citizen’s exposure by more than $113 billion.

Florida’s domestic property insurance companies reported they produced a combined net underwriting that almost broke even in 2023, a stark improvement from losing over a billion dollars during the past three consecutive years.

When combined with investments, the OIR stated domestic carriers reported a net positive income in 2023 for the first time since 2016.

Year end 2023 data reported to OIR reflects a much lower degree of uncertainty in the property insurance market, as insurers reported lower loss reserve development.

From 2022 to 2023, Florida domestic insurers, including Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, reported a 44.8 percent decrease from $772 million to $398 million in loss reserve development at the two year look-back period and a 28 percent decrease from $224 million to $161 million at the one year mark, OIR data showed.

The state’s Hurricane Catastrophe Fund rates are decreasing for participating insurers by a statewide average of 7.38 percent.

The rate decreases are in part based on modeled loss cost indications, even while exposure grows, the OIR stated.