Florida’s residual market insurer, Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, has provided a modelled estimate of its ultimate losses from recent hurricane Nicole, pegging the total at $62.5 million.
The sum is a modelled estimate of indemnity losses plus loss adjustment expenses (LAE), though does not include any increase for either litigation or inflationary effects.
Florida Citizens notes that as of 2pm local time on November 16th, it had received 1,679 claims after hurricane Nicole. The insurer estimates the claims burden could reach as many as 5000, so there’s a chance the estimate may rise over time if that number is reached.
Nicole made landfall in Florida on November 10th near Vero Beach, Florida, with Category 1 hurricane winds and storm surge.
Catastrophe risk modeller RMS has pegged total private market U.S. insured losses from Hurricane Nicole at less than $2 billion, with a best estimate of $1.6 billion.
Hurricane Nicole’s claims following at the heels of hurricane Ian’s impacts may complicate the claims process in certain cases for Citizens, but overall the storm won’t be particularly significant and is expected to be well-manageable within the insurers’ capital arrangements and surplus.
On a related note, Citizens recently released a revised projection of $3.8 billion of direct losses and loss adjustment expenses from Hurricane Ian, of which it expects $1.4 billion to be ceded to private reinsurers and the Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund (FHCF).
However, it does not expect any of its in-force catastrophe bond transactions to be triggered by Hurricane Ian, with these attaching higher up its reinsurance tower.
