The Hartford has become the latest insurer to pull back from homeowners insurance in California.
The Hartford will no longer offer new personal property insurance coverage in California from February 1, a spokesperson confirmed to Insurance Business.
“The homeowners’ insurance environment in California has unique challenges that have required us to reconsider the viability of writing new homeowners’ business in the state,” The Hartford spokesperson said. “Based on these challenges and our analysis of the trends, we have decided to stop offering new homeowners policies starting Feb. 1, 2024.
The homeowners pull back does not affect The Hartford’s other existing products in California, including business insurance and personal auto insurance.
The Hartford will “continue to renew existing homeowners' business consistent with our underwriting guidelines,” the spokesperson said.
The insurer has a homeowners insurance market share of less than 1% in the state, according to S&P Capital IQ data.
The Hartford’s new homeowners insurance business pause, first reported by The San Francisco Standard, is the latest in a tide of insurer pullbacks from the wildfire-prone state.
Insurance giants State Farm, Farmers, and USAA are among insurance carriers that have pulled back from or cut down their appetite for the California’s homeowners insurance market in recent months.
Other insurers to have announced withdrawals include Kemper and CSE Insurance Group.
California’s Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara has sought to tackle the homeowners insurer exodus with the Sustainability Insurance Strategy, hailed as the largest insurance reform initiative since the introduction of Proposition 103 in 1988.
The strategy was welcomed by the American Property & Casualty Insurance Association (APCIA) as including the “first steps of many” needed to address California’s spiraling insurance crisis, though a California broker association leader has deemed them “long on hope and short on specifics”.
“We do not enter into this decision lightly, and we appreciate and support efforts like Commissioner Lara’s Sustainability Insurance Strategy to help bring stability to the market,” The Hartford spokesperson told Insurance Business.
The insurer spokesperson said it will be “watching those efforts closely”.
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