PANAMA CITY -Hurricane Ian left behind a path of destruction across the state of Florida. But the panhandle got lucky and the storm did not impact us.

However, we could see financial impacts from increased home insurance rates.

“Hurricane Ian is going to have more of an effect on our rates up here than Hurricane Michael did,” Trey Hutt, President of Hutt Insurance Agency said. Rates increasing may be hard to believe since rates are already pretty high. ‘I was talking to a banker not too long ago and he said that with the insurance rates with what they are he sees within the next 3 to 5 years that the insurance is going to cost more than the house payment,” Casey Tuggle, owner of Tuggle Insurance Agency, said.   “Homeowner rates in the state of Florida are about triple the national average and they are still going up, mostly because of the fraud and litigation,” Hutt said.

Fraud and litigation issues can be seen after storms according to Hutt.

“Most people think that Hurricane Ian is going to be the rate driver here but the rate driver since before Hurricane Michael has been excessive litigation and fraud. That’s with a fairly small segment of contractors, roofers, public adjustors, and people like that. They just want to drive up the cost of a claim. Most of the dollars that are involved in a claim now don’t go to the homeowner. They go to an attorney,” Hutt said.

There are ways you can get discounts on your rates, like having a new roof or getting a wind mitigation inspection.

“The best advice I can give people is to buy the newest house you can afford,” Tuggle said.

Hutt said that it will probably be around the first quarter of the new year when we start to see changes.

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