Texas Homeowners Still Paying Highest Taxes and Insurance Proportionately in the Nation!
Texas Homeowners Still Paying Highest Taxes and Insurance Proportionately in the Nation! One simple question:
Two years ago with Gov. Perry, then Texas Department of Insurance (TDI) Commissioner Jose Montemayor, and legislators “looking the other way,” lax insurance legislation permitted the industry to double the premiums paid by Texas homeowners.
At that time and during the previous several years the insurance industry had been experiencing a “hard market” and was losing revenue. It had called upon the state informally to help with correcting the market, but few listened to industry pleas.
As in many previous years of “hard markets” the insurance industry elected to act on the problem without waiting any longer for government interaction on its behalf. It then “over-corrected” the market by the overnight doubling of homeowner insurance premiums.
In some instances, the industry decreased the coverage and still increased the premiums significantly.
The reactions by homeowners was disbelief and then anger. They contacted the offices of the Governor, TDI, and various legislators. They were told publicly by Gov. Perry and TDI Comm. Montemayor that by the next year the insurance industry would refund up to 14-percent of the increased premiums.
To date, that has NEVER occurred.
I reported the insurance incident/revolution two years ago and stated that homeowners would never see $1 of that money and that home insurance premiums forever would remain doubled. As the Bible frequently states, “So, it came to pass…”!
Currently we are nearing the end of the 1st business quarter of Year 2007 and are in a “softer market”, and the industry is reaping substantial profits. Still there is no sign of legislators or the insurance industry decreasing the premiums of home insurance to a more reasonable figure.
Periodically Gov. Perry gives the issue some lip service and leaves it up to the Legislature to consider, but no one seriously is acting on behalf of overburdened Texas homeowners.
Unless Texans pound on the gubernatorial and legislative doors and communicate via phone and letters that home insurance relief is needed NOW, no one will do anything about it and Texas homeowners will continue to pay the highest premium costs anywhere in the nation.
We either can remain the docile sheep officials want us to be, or we can move on correcting this unacceptable series of insurance events.
Peter Stern of Driftwood, Texas, <pstern@austin.rr.com>, a former Director of Information Services, university professor and public school administrator, is a political writer well-known and published frequently throughout the Texas community and nationwide. He is a Disabled Vietnam Veteran and holds three post-graduate degrees.
