Florida has experienced unprecedented public adjusterinvolvement in first-party property insurance claims over the lastseveral years. Public adjusters are demanding appraisals on windlosses that are several years old, reporting chipped tile claims,sinkhole claims, plumbing leaks, new claims on old damage — thelist goes on. Two changes to insurance statutes can be at leastpartially credited with the increased involvement of publicadjusters and an associated increase in insurance fraud.

One of the reasons public adjusters have involved themselves inall types of first-party property damage claims is the change thatoccurred in 2006 to the Replacement Cost Statute 627.7011. Thelanguage added to this statute requires homeowners' policy claimswith replacement cost coverage to be paid on a replacement costbasis at the time of the loss. Previously (per policy losssettlement provisions), the claim was paid at actual cash value(ACV) until repairs were completed, and the actualrepair/replacement cost of the loss was no longer an estimate. Thischange was brought about after the 2004 wind losses when someinsureds complained that they could not get a contractor to effectrepairs until they (the contractors) were paid the full replacementcost of the loss. The statute was further changed to includelanguage to the effect that the replacement cost was owed whetherthe repairs were completed or not.

The Matching Statute 626.9744 also has had far reachingunintended consequences, albeit to a lesser extent. This statuterequires homeowners' policies to pay for reasonable repairs orreplacement of items in adjoining areas if the damaged items cannotbe matched.