North Carolina DOI Reaches Settlement on Mobile Home Rate Hikes

The North Carolina Department of Insurance has settled a months-long disagreement with the state’s rating bureau on mobile home insurance rates, resulting in an increase that’s about half of what insurers had wanted.

Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey announced this week that the overall statewide average increase will be 12.5% for mobile home fire policies and 4.7% for casualty policies. The North Carolina Rate Bureau in February had recommended a 24.9% increase for mobile home fire insurance and an 11.3% increase in casualty coverage.

That set off months of negotiations between the bureau and the department, and hearings on the matter were rescheduled. A Jan. 18 hearing has now been canceled, the department said in a bulletin. The increase will take effect after May 1, 2022, for new and renewed policies.

A similar dispute over homeowners’ insurance rates is still brewing. The DOI said earlier this month that a hearing set for Nov. 1 had been postponed again, until Jan. 3. The Rate Bureau has recommended a 24.5% average increase for non-mobile home homeowners’ insurance policies, but Causey has balked at that.

The bureau’s recommended increase follows one in 2018, in which the bureau asked for a statewide average hike of 17.4%, but later settled for a 4% increase.

In April of this year, the bureau had proposed an 18.7% average increase in dwelling insurance, for rental and investment properties, but settled for a 7.6% rise after negotiating with the department.

If the two sides do not reach a compromise on homeowners insurance rates, the hearing on the latest proposed increase will be Jan. 3 at 10 a.m. in the Albemarle Building, 325 N. Salisbury St., in Raleigh.

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