Texas homeowners battle rising insurance rates, lawmakers offer no help
The Brief
Over the past few years, Texas homeowners have seen their insurance premiums increase anywhere from 20%-60% year over year.
Severe weather events and rising repair costs are key drivers of these increases, making homeownership more challenging for many.
Despite the problem, Texas lawmakers have provided little to no help.
DALLAS - Texas homeowners pay some of the highest insurance premiums in the country, and rates are increasing by double digits year over year. And there's not much relief in sight from the Texas Legislature.
Big picture view
The biggest challenge for homeowners and those who want to be homeowners is often not the price of the home. It's the property taxes and the cost of homeowners' insurance, which is required by mortgage companies.
Severe weather in Texas – from hailstorms and tornadoes to pipe-bursting freezes – leads to billions of dollars in insurance claims each year. Then there's inflation driving up the cost to repair or replace property.
While the Texas Legislature is providing property tax relief in the form of higher homestead exemptions, none of the bills filed this year that focused on homeowners' insurance will reach the governor's desk.
Meanwhile, appraisal values have spiked, and insurance companies continue to raise rates.
Local perspective
Single dad Miguel Castro has been looking to buy a home for a few years now.
"Yeah, I mean, they've doubled. I first started looking back in 2022, right after COVID. And back then it was going to be, I think, $1,000 to $1,200 for the year," he said. "Now it's looking like maybe $2,200 for the year. So that's double."
Doreen Diego moved to Texas in 2019. Then after buying a home in a Denton neighborhood in 2021, her rates started going up.
"We started at $1,200 a year. The next year, which would have been 2020, not much of an increase at all, very minimal," she said. "And I realized we went from $1,200 to $1,700. Still within reason. The next year we went to $2,700. The next year we went to $3,700. And our renewal just came up this month. We just paid it at $4,700."
Diego said it's something people everywhere are talking about, but no one seems to be taking any action.
What they're saying
Realtor Ashley Gentry said the issue comes up often in conversations with prospective home buyers.
"How about let's get the insurance checked on before we do any other due diligence on the home. That's the first thing during your option period that I'm telling my buyers to do. Just make sure they can actually afford the insurance premiums and it doesn't price them out of the home before they can even close on it," she said.
Gentry said people who already own homes are seeing premiums increase anywhere from 20% to 60% year over year.
She thinks it might take several legislative sessions before any meaningful changes are made.
"I think that even more so than understanding why we're in this predicament, there needs to be a recalibration all together of what the insurance companies are doing," Diego added.
The Source
FOX 4 reporter Shaun Rabb talked to Realtor Ashley Gentry, homeowner Doreen Diego and potential homeowner Miguel Castro to gather information for this story. Some of the details also come from past news coverage of the Texas Legislature.
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