Florida Insurance Survival Guide: Episode 3 Challenges of Meeting New Insurance Standards

Florida Insurance Survival Guide

Episode 3: Challenges of Meeting New Insurance Standards

The next thing on the discount side of stuff in the windmill world, this is kind of stuff that matters to the condo owners. Now, because some of the units you can, you know, update yourself. You can change your doors and windows. Some buildings, they have to do the whole one because they want to maintain the look, you know, but that’s a discount now impact rated products, you know. So since they implemented the Florida building code, now they had to make products that were approved and tested, Florida approved, impact tested products. And they had small missile and large missile, which was a four pound ball and an eight pound two by four. And now they just go with the large missile rating. There used to be a discount for the small missile they they ask, but they still, they won’t give you a discount. So doesn’t matter. And now it’s literally they shoot a two by four at 32, miles an hour at everything, and they see if it takes it right. So they don’t just test the window, they test the frame and they test the mounting. So the thing gets shot three times, and then it gets approved, and now it costs three times as much, right? So and again, as we update and we change our stuff out, they want you to get to that new building code. So every time you want to change like, for like, it’s like for impact rated like, yeah. Or you have to put a shutter over it, which is the cheaper option, right? So you can buy the cheaper window, but you have to have impact rated protection on it. If you change it, they want it corrected, right? So the older these structures here generally don’t have the impact rated stuff in them, and it goes to every penetration. Is what it’s called. So garage door matters. Oftentimes, the garage door, again, this giant house, it’s got 50 windows in it. They’re all impact rated. The garage door’s got the top panel with the plastic windows in it, not impact rated, sorry, no discount. Yeah, it’s 100% it’s everything or nothing. So, you know, it gets expensive, right? And oftentimes all the windows get changed, but the out swing steel panel door, that’s an entry door is original to construction. Well, there was no test when it was made, so it couldn’t possibly be impact rated, even though it’s a steel door, right? It doesn’t have the label. It didn’t get tested. It’s not going to get the discount, right? So you get, you get like in here, it says, On this last panel, there’s an explanation of what some of the discounts amount to, and they’re not straightforward. So I had one of my insurance buddies give me a bunch of different versions of policies from different underwriters, and I just compared them. And this is just how I wrote it down, just to say, you know, I got four, and this is what the four came back at on these seven questions, right? So the first one, the FBC thing, I think it was 10% discount. No, actually, that one is the most. That one would go up to 68% for some underwriters, right? So that was a huge discount to get if you were built to the residential Florida residential code, not the national residential code. And then the impact rated stuff is another discount. It’s another, you know, 20, 30% depending on who you do. And then How old’s the roof? Well, okay, one, what was the permit application date? And then they want to know what kind of product is it, what type of roof covering is it? And then they want to know a bunch of stuff about what’s going on in the attic, about the roof. So they want to know how many nails are in the roof deck, holding the decking to the truss. Right? That used to be that you could put they wanted. The standard code was six inch spacing around the perimeter and 12 inches in the field. Now they want six inches everywhere. And they used to put in Staples, you know, here the guys with the stable gun putting the deck down. Now, Staples not accepted. That was one of the big things that just pulled apart really easily. So they wanted that majorly corrected. So that was one of the big things the insurance industry said, Hey, anybody that gets a new roof, every roof has to get re nailed. Now the county doesn’t inspect it, because when they tear the old roof off, they got to get it covered back up before the afternoon rain. Well, ain’t nobody going to get there to inspect it in time. So the roofer signs an affidavit that said, Yes, we re nailed it. Well then they want that on that form, and they send me into the attic with a metal detector to find the damn nails. I take a picture. There you go. So there you go. That’s the next question. Is that next thing after staples was the six penny nail, and it was just a little smaller, and now they want an eight penny nail, right? And then, typically it should be a ring shank nail. And they do make a hell of a difference between pulling out a six penny nail and pulling out a ring shank nail, or, like trying to compare a screw to a nail,