The 2014 Home Insurance is an annual publication of the Mass. Division of Insurance
The Massachusetts Division of Insurance has issued its annual Home Insurance Report for 2014, the last year for which complete data is available. This year’s report cites a 2.1% increase in the overall number of home insurance policies between the years 2013 to 2014. The increase is a reverse of previous years, in particular from 2012 to 2013, which saw slight decreases in the overall number.
Since 1996, the DOI has been required to produce a home insurance report pursuant to M.G.L. c. 175 Sec. 4A & 4B. Unlike private passenger auto insurance, in Massachusetts, there are no laws requiring that a property owner have home insurance. With that said, however, homeowner’s insurance continues to be the second largest line of property and casualty coverage in the Commonwealth (after private passenger auto insurance) with insurers collecting approximately $2 billion in written premium for home insurance policies.
According to the DOI, as of 2014, there were 1,901,864 home insurance policies in force in the Commonwealth. In Massachusetts, the home insurance market covers non-commercial property, which includes risks of damage to structural and personal property, as well as for risks involving personal property claims. Compare this with a total of 1,863,049 in 2013 and a total of 1,895,349 in 2012. The following chart from the DOI better visualizes these fluctuations in numbers.
The Massachusetts Home Insurance Market Make-up
The home insurance market in Massachusetts is composed of three major types of home insurance: condominium, traditional homeowners and rental insurance offer by a total of 70 licensed insurance companies offering home insurance products here. The 70 licensed insurers do not represent the total number of insurers licensed in the Commonwealth, rather only those who have written ten or more HO-3 or similar type policies in a Massachusetts county between July 1st – December 31st, 2014.
As of 2014, all three of the major types of home insurance saw an increase in the total amount of policies written as compared to 2013. In 2014, there were 217,183 condominium policies in force, 1,451,027 traditional homeowner’s policies in force, and 233,654 tenant or rental insurance policies in force.
The following graph charts the three-year trend in the total policies by type of coverage for each of these three types of home insurance.
More to come on the Annual Home Insurance Report in the coming weeks
With so much information packed into this report, Agency Checklists has decided to break the report up into a four-part series. The coming weeks will see further articles on the state of FAIR Plan, home insurance coverage by counties, the impact of auto insurance and flood insurance on this market as well as financial results from the report.
