Latest Homeowners Headlines
All the headlines from our Homeowners Topic Page, ordered by recency.
Up-Market Home Insurtech Openly Opens for Business in 2 States After Raising $7.6M
Dec 2 2019 // The tech-enabled high-end home insurance provider Openly has begun selling in Illinois and Arizona at the same time it announced a $7.65M seed round of funding led by Gradient Ventures, Google’s AI-focused venture...
Wildfire Crisis is Roiling California’s Insurance Market
Nov 27 2019 // Lauris Bye, a homebuilding industry veteran who moved to Southern California’s wildfire-prone hills decades ago, felt confident about the newly built house he was buying about 30 miles north of downtown Los...
Up-Market Home Insurtech Openly Opens for Business in 2 States After Raising $7.6M
Nov 26 2019 // The tech-enabled high-end home insurance provider Openly announced it has begun selling in Illinois and Arizona at the same time it announced a $7.65M seed round of funding led by Gradient Ventures, Google’s...
Home Insurance Insurtech Hippo Buys Home Services Startup Sheltr
Nov 25 2019 // Digital home insurance managing general agency Hippo Insurance has acquired an early-stage startup in a bid to beef up its digital home insurance services for clients, Carrier Management reported. The insurtech said it...
Wildfires Likely to Boost California Surplus Lines Homeowners Share; FAIR Plan Expansion Questioned
Nov 22 2019 // Premium volume from homeowners polices written by California’s surplus lines industry, although still small, has doubled over the past four years, seemingly pushed by an increase in wildfires in the state. Some...
PG&E Cuts Power to 50K California Homes And Businesses During Wildfire Risk
Nov 21 2019 // About 50,000 homes and businesses across Northern California were without power on Wednesday during the latest planned outage instituted by utility Pacific Gas & Electric Co. to guard against risk of wildfire during...
California Commissioner Issues Emergency Notice to Expedite Wildfire Claims
Nov 20 2019 // California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara on Wednesday issued an emergency notice to all property/casualty insurers doing business in California requesting they expedite claims handling for wildfire survivors to help...
California’s Fair Plan Balks at State’s ‘Misguided’ Order to Expand Coverage
Nov 18 2019 // The insurers behind California’s Fair Plan, the insurance market of last resort for homeowners, think it’s a bad idea to broaden the coverages available from the Fair Plan beyond basic dwelling fire insurance,...
‘Water Line’ Insurance Offer Not Affiliated with City, Madison, Wisconsin Says
Nov 18 2019 // The City of Madison, Wisconsin, has issued a warning to water utility customers regarding letters that are being sent to homeowners by a company claiming to offer insurance coverage for water lines to the home. Madison...
Conn. Supreme Court Finds Insurers Not Liable for Crumbling Foundations
Nov 15 2019 // Insurers are not liable for crumbling foundations caused by defective concrete unless the home is on the verge of collapse, the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled. The decision will likely amplify public pressure for a...
California Commissioner Orders FAIR Plan to Increase Homeowners Coverage Options
Nov 14 2019 // California’s property insurer of last resort will soon be offering more homeowners coverage options as directed by the state’s insurance commissioner in response to the pressure put on the property insurance...
Australia Wildfires Continue to Rage, Destroying Homes, Forcing Evacuations
Nov 14 2019 // Scores of wildfires continued to rage across vast tracts of Australia’s drought-stricken east coast on Wednesday, forcing hundreds of residents to evacuate their homes, some for the second time in a week. The most...
Kentucky Man Accused of Burglarizing 17 Homes for Scrap Metal
Nov 14 2019 // Police in Kentucky say they’ve arrested a prolific thief, a man who they say broke into 17 homes within a few miles (kilometers) of each other. They say he wasn’t going for high-end appliances, cash or jewelry:...
PURE Programs Launches California High Wildfire Risk Homeowners Program
Nov 13 2019 // PURE Programs has launched a new High Wildfire Risk Homeowners Insurance program, with coverages for retail insurance brokers serving clients that own high value homes in California at greater-risk of loss from...
FEMA Postpones Switch to New Risk-Based Flood Insurance Rating Until 2021
Nov 8 2019 // The federal government is delaying implementation of a major change to its pricing formula for federal flood insurance that bases rates on a more accurate assessment of the real flood threat for each home and reflects the...
Madison, Wisconsin: ‘Water Line’ Insurance Offer Not Affiliated with City
Nov 5 2019 // The City of Madison, Wisconsin, has issued a warning to water utility customers concerning letters being sent to homeowners by a company claiming to offer insurance coverage for water lines to the home. Madison Water...
Resolving Claim Disputes: Step 3 Research and Document the Interpretation – Part 3 of 3
Nov 4 2019 // In the past two columns, we examined eight legal and contractual principles nonlawyers can use to resolve most claim disputes without litigation. In this month’s column, we’ll wrap up this discussion with nine...
Washington Insurance Commissioner Issued Numerous Fines, Disciplinary Actions
Nov 1 2019 // Washington Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler took disciplinary action in July, August and September against insurance companies, agents and brokers for violating state insurance regulations. A summary of cases of...
Kincade, Tick and Getty Fires Currently Threaten Nearly 1,000 Homes with a Reconstruction Cost Value of $535M
Oct 31 2019 // This post is part of a series sponsored by CoreLogic. As of October 29, there were at least 18 fires burning in California, ranging in size from a few acres to more than 74,000 acres as in the case of the Kincade Fire in...
Velocity Risk Underwriters Expands Coverage to Coastal Homeowners in New Jersey
Oct 31 2019 // Velocity Risk Underwriters, LLC, has expanded its home insurance products to include coastal homeowners policies in New Jersey. According to Jose de Diego, director of Independent Agencies, New Jersey is the sixth state...
