Editorial: We ask the experts when property insurance bills will drop. The answer's bad.

Editorials from The Palm Beach Post Editorial Board are the opinions of the Board, not of the Post newsroom.

We asked the experts. In a meeting this week with leaders of the Insurance Information Institute, The Palm Beach Post Editorial Board asked how long before frustrated property owners in Florida might see reductions in their property insurance premiums — since, after all, the insurers got significant relief from state lawmakers. The answer wasn't encouraging.

"Years," Sean Kevelighan, the institute's president and CEO said after a brief silence and a bit of prodding.

The Insurance Information Institute consists of more than 60 firms and is the go-to organization for data, trends and other information to help consumers better understand the insurance industry. Climate risks and "legal system abuse," the group told The Post, remain two of the industry's biggest headaches in Florida.

Litigation, Kevelighan and his colleagues contend, remains the big problem, despite the fact that, after two special sessions of the Florida Legislature last year and again during the recent regular session, the industry pretty much got everything it said it needed to reduce the impact of lawsuits, which supposedly leads to lower rates.

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But 280,000 lawsuits have been filed by Florida homeowners rushing to beat the start of the Legislature's latest tort reform bill that Gov. DeSantis signed into law. Don't expect any rate cuts until that's over with, the industry group said. The new law largely eliminates the "one-way" attorney fees insurers pay to cover the costs of plantiffs' lawyers and cuts the four-year statute of limitation for filing negligence lawsuits in half.

Those changes, along with last year's "reform" that ended the "assignment of benefits," in which homeowners sign over claims to contractors who then pursued payments from insurers, were changes the insurance industry wanted. State lawmakers assured policyholders the changes would produce cheaper insurance — in due time.

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In the meantime, policyholders face soaring premiums and outright cancellations. The Institute has warned Florida homeowners they are likely to see their property insurance rates increase by 40 percent this year.

When consumers will see premium reductions is no longer the question. How long they can hold on and afford their mortgage payments and other expenses amid annual double-digit hikes in premiums is the better question.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Property insurance relief in Florida still far off, experts say