Cheaper homeowner insurance may be coming

Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance is considered the state’s last hope for homeowners insurance for residents in Vermilion Parish. When a homeowner purchases a homeowner’s policy from Citizens, it is at least 10 percent higher than other companies.
Well, Citizens recently announced that 10,000 more state homeowners insurance policies under Citizens will be transferred to other carriers by Dec. 1.
Citizens’ CEO John Wortman said the latest round of policy removals will leave Citizens with 100,000 policies on its books.
There are new insurance companies willing to do business in Louisiana. Companies that qualified for the latest round of transfers are American’s Underwriters Insurance, ASI Lloyds, Bankers Insurance Group, Imperial Insurance Group, GeoVera Specialty Insurance, Lighthouse Insurance, Occidental Insurance and Southern Fidelity Insurance Co. Five of these are participating in Louisiana’s Insurance Incentive Program that requires the companies write new policies for parishes in the “Go Zone.”
At least half of insurance policies these companies write must be in the “Go Zone” parishes that includes Vermilion Parish, along with Iberia, St. Martin and St. Mary.
Wortman said these companies will be contacting your agent and requesting to take over the policy. The agent will then contact the homeowner to see if they are interested in making the change. The deadline to contact the policy holder is by Dec. 1. Wortman advises policy holders to contract their agent to see if any insurance company has been contacted.
There are 6,218 locations insured by Citzens in Vermilion Parish. In Iberia Parish, 6,619 locations are insured, 1,195 in St. Martin Parish and 6,309 in St. Mary Parish are insured with Citizens.’
Wortman predicted another insurance transfer will not occur until after next year’s hurricane season.