Blog Archives

Florida Appellate Court Holds that Deadline to Report Claims Does Not Nullify Prompt Notice Provision

Florida’s Third District Court of Appeal recently affirmed a summary judgment entered in favor of a property insurer, holding that there is no conflict between the policy’s three year limitation for reporting hurricane claims and the requirement that the insured give prompt notice. In Navarro v. Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, No. 3D22-0032, 2023 WL 219032, — So.3d —- (Fla. 3d DCA Jan. 18, 2023), the insured sought coverage for Hurricane Irma damage nearly three years after the storm. The court found that the policy unambiguously required prompt notice, and that the insured failed to rebut the presumption of prejudice against the insurer.  About The Authors

Posted in Hurricane, Notice

A Consequential Ruling: Florida Supreme Court Rejects Recovery of Consequential Damages in First-Party Breach of Contract Actions

In first-party breach of insurance contract actions, the parties oftentimes dispute whether the policyholder may seek damages that are not explicitly provided for in the policy, with the policyholder arguing such indirect damages flow from the alleged breach of contract. By doing so, policyholders blur the lines between breach of contract actions and bad faith actions. The Florida Supreme Court recently considered this issue in Citizens Property Insurance Corp. v. Manor House, LLC,[1]  and held that “extra-contractual, consequential damages are not available in a first-party breach of insurance contract action because the contractual amount due to the insured is the amount owed pursuant to the express terms and conditions of the insurance policy.” Manor House arose from a Hurricane Frances

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Posted in Hurricane

New Hurricane Harvey Opinion Provides a Roadmap to Defeating Common Policyholder Attorney Tactics

Policyholders attorneys often try to skip the threshold steps of bringing their client’s claim within coverage and allocating between covered and non-covered causes of loss.  Instead, the policyholder attorney would have the insurer first disprove coverage, or at least first justify its coverage position.  These tactics unfold in a familiar way. The policyholder attorney will engage a consultant to write up an Xactimate estimate.  Or, perhaps a public adjuster already wrote up the estimate and then brought the claim to the attorney.  Everything that is wrong with the structure will go into the estimate.  Every water-stained ceiling tile, bent AC condenser fin, and dent on the siding will go into the estimate regardless of causation.  The bigger estimate, the better

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Posted in Catastrophes, Coverage, Hurricane

New Texas Laws Take Aim at Common Practice in Storm-Related Repairs

Texas policyholders can no longer cut deals with storm repair contractors to pocket their deductibles for storm repairs.  The Texas Legislature has amended the Texas Insurance Code and Texas Business & Commerce Code, targeting construction companies that offer “free roofs” and “waived deductibles” as enticements to policyholders.  Previously, for example, contractors would reach an agreement to perform work for a policyholder, but waive or absorb the portion of the repair cost equal to the deductible.  This waiver or absorption could occur through numerous paperwork tricks.  Now, the policyholder must pay its deductible, otherwise the insurer can refuse to pay certain claims and the contractor can be charged with a crime.  About The Author

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Posted in Deductible, Flood, Hurricane, Waiver

Texas Court Holds That Unpaid Appraisal Award Does Not Conclusively Establish Causation or Damages in Hurricane Ike Insurance Dispute

While Hurricane Ike made landfall in Texas almost ten years ago, the resulting litigation is alive and well as evidenced by the recent decision in Texas Windstorm Insurance Association v. Dickinson Independent School District, 14-16-00474-CV, 2018 WL 2436924 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] May 31, 2018, no pet. h.). In that case, Houston’s Fourteenth District Court of Appeals addressed whether an unpaid appraisal award established an insurance company’s liability under a named-peril insurance policy as a matter of law.  In analyzing and applying the Supreme Court of Texas’s decision in State Farm Lloyds v. Johnson, 290 S.W.3d 886 (Tex. 2009), the court held that the appraisal award, by itself, did not conclusively establish liability for purposes of the policyholder’s motion for

Posted in Arbitration and Appraisal, Hurricane, Hurricane Ike

Fifth Circuit: Total Loss Amount Caps Insured’s Recovery Even Under Multiple Policies Covering Different Risks

We don’t usually cover cases dealing with Standard Flood Insurance Policies (SFIPs) issued pursuant to the National Flood Insurance Program, but a Texas case decided by the federal Court of Appeals earlier this month addresses a broader issue – where the policyholder has multiple policies covering the same property against mutually exclusive risks, such as an SFIP covering flood and a homeowner’s policy covering wind, can his or her recovery ever exceed the total loss amount.  In Lowery v. Fidelity Nat’l. Prop. & Cas. Ins. Co., 2015 WL 6848323, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 19443 (5th Cir., Nov. 6, 2015), a unanimous panel of the Fifth Circuit answered no, in reliance on the insurance principle that bars a double recovery. The

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Posted in Actual Cash Value, Depreciation, Flood, Homeowners Coverage, Hurricane, Hurricane Ike, Replacement Cost, Valuation, Water, Windstorm

Hurricanes vs. Wildfires — 2015’s Dramatic Contrast

Two of this blog’s four rotating headers depict a hurricane and a fire as examples of potentially-destructive types of property damage, and the hurricane season (June through November) and the wildfire season (late spring through mid-fall) are both well under way.  This year has brought good news to the east coast with respect to the former and catastrophically bad news to the west coast with respect to the latter. There are obviously many reasons for this.  The west is undergoing a historically severe drought; the snowpack in California is currently 5% of what it should be.  The region is also suffering from extreme heat; 2015 is the second warmest year ever recorded in Alaska, and temperatures in the west as

Posted in Fire, Hurricane, Wildfire

New Jersey Judge Writes a Primer on How Not to Draft a Denial Letter

Last month, a federal trial court in New Jersey shot down an insurer’s arguments that it had unambiguously denied coverage for Superstorm Sandy damage in a letter to the insured.  In Liguori v. Certain Underwriters at Lloyds, 2015WL 4402851. 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 93090 (D.N.J., Jul. 17, 2015),  the judge found that correspondence announcing that the carrier was “pleased to inform you” that wind damage was covered while flood was “expressly excluded” and concluding with what he called an “open-ended statement that the letter could be amended should new information become available” simply did not pass muster as a formal denial. The insureds owned a home in Seaside Heights that was demolished by the storm on October 29, 2012, and

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Posted in Homeowners Coverage, Hurricane, Loss Adjustment, Suit Limitation, Superstorm Sandy

Texas Supreme Court Enforces Anti-Concurrent Causation, Bars Coverage Where Wind and Flood Combine to Cause the Loss

Last Friday, Texas’ highest court unanimously endorsed lower court and federal court decisions giving effect to anti-concurrent causation (ACC) clauses and held that such provisions bar coverage where a combination of an excluded peril and an included peril operate together to cause the loss.  In JAW The Pointe, LLC v. Lexington Ins. Co., 2015 WL 1870054, 2015 Tex. LEXIS 343 (Tex., Apr. 24, 2015), that meant that the insured could not recover where flood and wind damage triggered the enforcement of city ordinances even though the covered wind damage component was arguably sufficient in and of itself to cause the loss. The policyholder owned The Pointe Apartments – a complex in Galveston, Texas that was heavily damaged when Hurricane Ike

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Posted in Anti-Concurrent Causation, Causation, Flood, Hurricane, Hurricane Ike, Ordinance or Law, Windstorm

Late Notice Held to Bar a $6,000,000 Hurricane Wilma Claim in Florida

In The Yacht Club on the Intracoastal Condo. Ass’n. v. Lexington Ins. Co., –  Fed.Appx. –, 2015 WL 106862, 2015 U.S. App. LEXIS 293 (11h Cir., Jan. 8, 2015), a unanimous panel of the Eleventh Circuit recently held that a Florida condominium association’s multi-million claim for extensive Hurricane Wilma damage was barred because the insured failed to give notice of loss for fully 55 months.  The policyholder’s arguments that it was initially unaware that the damage exceeded the deductible and that it had created an issue of fact with respect to whether the presumption of prejudice had been rebutted because both parties were ultimately able to put up expert evidence of causation were unavailing. The Yacht Club had 380 units

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Posted in Conditions, Hurricane, Hurricane Wilma, Investigation, Notice, Prejudice
About The Property Insurance Law Observer
For more than four decades, Cozen O’Connor has represented all types of property insurers in jurisdictions throughout the United States, and it is dedicated to keeping its clients abreast of developments that impact the insurance industry. The Property Insurance Law Observer will survey court decisions, enacted or proposed legislation, and regulatory activities from all 50 states. We will also include commentary on current issues and developing trends of interest to first-party insurers.
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