Will Citizens Policyholders See a Home Insurance Rate Decrease? 

Recently, Gov. Ron DeSantis announced that over 20% of Citizens property insurance policyholders will see a premium decrease of roughly 5.6%. DeSantis also claimed that almost 73% of homeowners who have a policy with Citizens in Miami-Dade County will see a rate reduction of 6.3% on average.

The state-run insurer, Citizens Property is finally shedding policies as more insurers move back into the market. Recently, Citizens had roughly 1.4 million policies in force making them the largest insurer in the state until last year when over 400,000 policies were moved to private insurance companies. 

When the lower Citizens rates was announced, numerous homeowners questioned whether they could return to Citizens as their rate would likely be lower there. 

“It’s complicated,” President of HH Insurance Group Jake Holehouse said in a recent WTSP 10 story. “If a rate is within 20 percent of Citizens, apples to apples, you are not able to move back into a Citizens policy. So, if that policyholder is paying $3,000 and now Citizens is $2,600, technically the math on that would say you cannot move to that $2,600 dollar Citizens policy.”

Holehouse was optimistic about the Florida insurance market as new insurers move into the market. “You have 11 carriers who have come into the market in the past 18 to 24 months and competition breeds rate decreases,” Holehouse said in the WTSP story. 

The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation recently issued their final order for the 2025 Citizens insurance rates. The final order allows a 6.6% overall statewide average increase for the multi-peril program and a 14.5% increase for the wind-only program. 

The order spells out minimum rate changes which is capped at -10% and the maximum rate change which came in at 14% for primary residential policies. 

Citizens Property responsed to the OIR’s 2025 rate order approval with the following: 

“As it does every year, Citizens submitted a set of proposed rate recommendations to the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation for review. The agency reviewed the proposal, sought additional information, and approved rates for the upcoming cycle. It is common and appropriate for Citizens’ rate-making process to involve a deliberate and thorough regulatory analysis, especially after a particularly active hurricane season. Moreover, as Governor DeSantis stated, the 2025 rates reflect the many positive developments that have taken place in the Florida property insurance market since our original recommendations were filed. We thank OIR for its consideration and will implement the approved rates as required by law.”