So here’s the deal. I live in Florida, St. Petersburg to be exact, and I bought a condo in May 2005. As with most condos, I pay a monthly assesment to cover building costs, property insurance, and maintenance. When I bought the condo, the monthly assesment fee was $169, of which approximately $100 a month goes to property insurance. Incidentally, my mortgage/tax/PMI payment is about 980 a month. I can’t get rid of the PMI yet.
I’m sure the Floridians know where I’m going with this.
I just got a letter from the management company that due to property insurance costs, the monthly assesment is going to INCREASE by $580 a MONTH! :eek: :eek:
From what I understand, all of the private/commercial insurers have ceased doing business in Florida. The state runs an insurance company, called Citizens, which is intended to be a “last resort” for people who NEED to have property insurance. This agency is designed to be intentionally high-priced so that private insurers will be able to compete. The problem is that there are no private insurers and the state-sponsored rates are still sky-high (to “encourage competitive rates”.)
I quite simply can’t afford this. I make decent money in a professional job, but I have very little in savings (read:none). I have a paid off car and minimal monthly expenses.
If I refuse to pay, the management company can/will take out a lien on my condo. If I pay it, well, I’ll be completely destitute for the next year. I can’t sell the condo, because no one in their right mind would buy the property with an assesment this high.
So, Dopers, I beg of you–is there anything I can do? Or am I destined to eat ramen for the next year? I guess I can get my sustenance from fishing…
I’m thinking Ramen… but you might want to talk to someone who understands legal mumbo-jumbo first.
BTW, I work in Pinellas Park, so if you ever want to get together over ramen and commiserate I’m your man. My home is in Tampa, and our insurance went up recently, but nowhere near the amount yours (or my sister, 60% hike) did. Are you waterfront by any chance?
None of the recommendations include a rebate for premiums already paid. I’m with ShibbOleth. Pick a favorite brand of Ramen and wait for a sale. Sorry.
I’m not waterfront (I wish!). This isn’t a particularly expensive piece of property (for the area), either, I bought it for $118k. It has increased somewhat in value, so I suppose a HELOC or other loan could be an option. Not exactly what I’d like to mortage my property for.
I’m on Gandy near Derby Lane, and my area went from a “B” flood rating to an “A” (higher risk) from 2005-2006. Of course, the “age 55+” trailer parks on either side stayed rated as “B”, even though a hard sneeze would knock them down.
**ShibbOleth ** my GF lives in “da park”. We’ll have to hang out sometime. Guess I’ll be learning how to fish after all…
And Gfactor, thanks for the links. I’ll be doing a lot of reading this morning. I’m new to FL, so while I knew that insurance was insane in this state, I had no idea it could be this bad.
I’m not worried about the money already paid, (there was already an $860 additional insurance assesment that I had to cough up just in time for Xmas this year.)
They can’t raise their rates… those people vote in droves!
We’re in that confluence of Largo, Seminole, Pinellas Park and St Pete. I think my house is still flood rated C or D, although that does tend to bounce around a lot. I hope to never find out how accurate they are. What year did you buy?
I closed in April 2005, moved into the place May 2005. It was a condo conversion, and other than this mess with the insurance, I’ve been really happy with it.
Also, if anyone is interested, there is a public hearing tonight (Dec 19th) in Largo to “ensure that the public has input into Citizens’ operations”. Information at this site:
I live in Tampa and work “suspiciously close” to where you live. Our property insurance made our mortgage payment go up $300 a month. The recent governors race had this as a hot topic and I hear many, many people complain. Because you are not in a single family home, you may not have much choice, but I would imagine that many folks in your community have a problem with it also. See if the homeowners association or whatever is fighting this.
The changing of your flood zone is probably the reason for the sizable hike. I am in what has always been flood zone A, so my thinking is that you got the usual hike everyone else got nailed with plus the hike indicated by the change in zoning.
In May of 2005 it should have been apparent that your flood zone was up for reconsideration. Someone should have known. Check your sales documents and condo docs to see if they say anything about it. Usually they do have to notify you of anything that will materially affect the value of your home. (If they knew the property was in the way of a new interstate, for example) You may have a case of negligence against either the condo association, the realtor or the seller.
I was in real estate briefly and it is a common complaint of realtors who do NOT want to put the property tax info in the listings because so many houses in this area have been under the Save Our Homes 3% tax protection for neigh on 30-40 years, so even listing what the current taxes are are a huge joke. The number of folks that get suckered by that are too numerous to mention. When we bought our house, we could have been given a family home, except the transfer of title would have brought it out from under the Save Our Homes umbrella and the property taxes would have been more than a mortgage on a lesser house. Now throw in property insurance…
I have a feeling that this crisis with homeowners insurance will bring about a change. How soon, I don’t know. I do know I pay more a month for property insurance than I do for my mortgage and I’m not alone. What good is a paid off house or a small mortgage if an insurance company can come in and price you out of it.
They need to make it so insurance companies who come in here to write policies are required to write ALL types of their policies in the state or they can’t write any. Those same companies that are nailing you for auto insurance are not required to provide homeowners insurance.
We need insurance reform in the worst sort of way.
FWIW, I have never made a claim on my homeowners policy or flood policy, or auto policy.
On the other side of the bay, we had 3000 people come out in protest of a law being passed and 5 people speak in favor of it. Since it was a politicians launch pad to being the Mayor, they passed it anyway. They had to move the city commission meeting to the convention center to handle the crowds. I stayed up until 3am to watch the travesty.
Bob Buckhorn wanted to be mayor, so we have a 6 foot rule in regard to lap dances. He didn’t get to be mayor, he lost the race and he couldn’t even get a decent lap dance to console himself. (what forum am I in? crap, can I call Buckhorn a fucktwit here?)
Well, I ended up skipping the meeting (got stuck at work, but that’s a Pit thread).
I have to check the docs, but I’m pretty sure the builders/sellers never disclosed that our flood zone was up for review. Thank you for this information!
Regarding your protests, politics in this area are more screwed up that I could have possibly imagined. Should I keep a bribe fund handy if I continue to live here?
Read up on the Sunshine Laws. Laws passed because this area is more crooked than Miami.
They basically say government has to operate in the open. Which, of course, we know doesn’t happen at all, but at least the books say they gotta.
Feel fortunate you are neither in Tampa or Clearwater. Tampa has snobs, prudes and crooks and Clearwater is filled with Scientologists. St. Pete is actually becoming pretty cool.
I’m not so sure about Tampa being filled with prudes. That recent referrendum was Hillsborough County, which extends out past Plant City, north to Lutz and south to almost Bradenton. A lot of god’s country in them there parts.
Also, downtown Clearwater has a lot of Scientologists, but Clearwater as a whole is heavily Mexican and older folks these days. Very heavily Mexican. I don’t think that many of them are Scientologists.
