The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation has approved three private insurers to assume up to 135,540 personal residential multiperil policies from Citizens Property Insurance Corp., continuing the state’s effort to reduce the size of its insurer of last resort.
According to approval orders issued earlier this month, Patriot Select Property and Casualty Insurance Co. received authorization to assume up to 39,500 policies.
Slide Insurance Co., meanwhile, was approved for 15,000 policies, and Mangrove Property Insurance Co. received approval for up to 81,040 policies.
Through the end of February, a total of 102,253 Citizens policies had been transferred to the private market, according to Citizens spokesperson Michael Peltier.
Mark Friedlander (pictured above), senior director of media relations at the Insurance Information Institute, said the depopulation strategy is benefiting from recent stabilization in Florida’s property insurance market.
Friedlander pointed to legal reforms targeting abuse of the legal system and assignment of benefits claim fraud, saying that they have contributed to reduced costs and increased private market participation.
Earlier this month, Citizens also announced that it is seeking $2.94 billion in new private risk transfer as part of its $4.54 billion private reinsurance coverage plan for 2025.
Citizens has experienced significant changes in its policy count and depopulation efforts between 2023 and 2025.
In 2023, private insurers received approval to assume up to 1 million policies from Citizens, with approximately 407,643 policies transitioned to the private market.
In 2024, efforts to depopulate the program intensified. As of the end of the year, over 428,000 policies had been moved off Citizens' books through take-out offers.
The trend continues this year. By February, Citizens' policy count had dropped to approximately 844,688, marking the lowest total in nearly three years.
As of mid-March, Citizens reported 851,210 policies in force, down from 936,182 at the end of 2024.
What are your thoughts on this story? Please feel free to share your comments below.
