After State Farm rate hike, legislators pressured to provide relief. Here's what could be on the table.

Chicago Tribune

4 days ago

Gov. JB Pritzker wasted no time in calling on state legislators to do something about rising insurance rates after State Farm announced it was hiking homeowners insurance by 27.2% beginning this month, citing rising costs due to extreme weather events and pricier repairs.
'Enact a legislative solution during the veto session that prevents insurance companies from taking advantage of consumers through severe and unnecessary rate hikes, such as those proposed by State Farm,' Pritzker said in a social media post.
The governor's angry words were met with a quick rebuttal from the Bloomington, Illinois-based insurer and state business interests, but other officials were just as quick to join in the politically popular call to hold down costs.
'I do agree with the governor that what State Farm did is wrong and they need to fix it,' House Speaker Emanuel 'Chris' Welch, a Democrat from Hillside, told the Tribune. 'If they don't, as a leader in this state, as a leader of one of our chambers, we're going to take a look at it because we have to protect our consumers.'
Right now in Illinois, there's no effective mechanism to prevent companies like State Farm from imposing rates for home and auto insurance that are deemed to be excessive, according to those familiar with Illinois insurance law.
'You basically are told what your insurance rate premium's going to be. You don't have the ability as a state to really help protect consumers,' state Rep. Bob Morgan, a Deerfield Democrat and the vice chair of the House Insurance Committee, said about homeowners and auto insurance rates.
Lawmakers are considering ways to address increased homeowners insurance costs including legislation championed by the Pritzker administration that would require a rate review process, compelling insurance companies to open their books so that state officials can assess whether the rate increases are too burdensome.
A bill with some of those elements was introduced during the spring legislative session, but went nowhere as legislators and industry lobbyists haggled over details.
Illinois is one of the only states that doesn't have a process in place for the state to take action if officials find that homeowners insurance rates were set inappropriately. Pritzker last year signed into law sweeping health care consumer protection legislation that ended unchecked rate hikes for large group insurance companies. Now, some proponents want to see this principle applied to homeowners insurance.
'With health care, now we can step in and can say, 'That is an unreasonable increase,'' Morgan said. 'These are the kinds of things that I think we're looking at.'
Abe Scarr, director of the Illinois Public Interest Research Group, said such a process is crucial for consumer protection. 'This isn't, like, setting caps,' he said. 'This is just creating a regulatory review process that doesn't just leave it up to the insurance industry to regulate itself, to set rates by itself.'
Scarr noted that State Farm and another insurance giant, Allstate, are both based in Illinois and have a powerful voice on policy.
'They're major employers,' Scarr said. 'They've long had significant influence in Springfield.'
In establishing a rate review process for homeowners, renters and auto insurance, the legislation would require businesses to be more transparent with government entities about any decisions they make to impose rate hikes.
The rate review bill was filed in January by state Sen. Michael Hastings of Frankfort and had six other Democratic co-sponsors in the Senate. State officials say an amendment filed in March is now the starting point for any debate on the issue when lawmakers reconvene in Springfield in October for the two-week veto session.
The purpose of the amended legislation is to regulate 'insurance rates in order that they will not be excessive, inadequate, or unfairly discriminatory.' The legislation defines excessive rates as those that are 'unreasonably high for the scope of coverage provided.' Insurers would be required to provide information on their rates to the state's Department of Insurance '60 days in advance of a proposed aggregate rate change of 5% or more.'
One top state official said that if such a bill was already in effect as a state law, State Farm would not have been in a position to announce its rate increase until the Insurance Department signed off on it.
'It would allow the department to say, if (it) felt that that rate increase was not justified by the data because it was too high, (it wouldn't) approve at 27%, however, 'We think you'd be able to justify, hypothetically, at 9%,' and so (the department) would approve it at 9,' said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak about the issue on the record.
In cases where intense market competition was driving down rates, the department could also determine an insurer's rates to be too low, creating a financial solvency issue for the company.
'A healthy industry is in everybody's best interest because without it, homeowners can't get insurance then,' the official said. 'So, keeping insurance companies solvent is also, I feel, that's also a consumer protection.'
Another bill filed by Hastings earlier this year would require homeowner and auto insurers operating in Illinois to maintain a website that showed a summary of each year's premium rate changes, as well as rate change data going back five years. The legislation would also require the insurer to provide 'a clear explanation of the primary factors contributing to the rate changes.'
Hastings said he's heard from people angry about State Farm's rates.
'Because of what's occurred now, I'm anticipating there being some collaborative effort between the industry and the General Assembly, understanding what's occurred, what was said and what should be done,' Hastings said. 'And I'm under the belief … that there will be some solution and some framework put in place for the industry to comply with and doesn't discourage business in Illinois. It protects the consumer and provides them notice.'
Without a new law, the Department of Insurance said it has little authority over rates.
The department said it can look into whether companies are properly refunding premiums or paying claims in a timely manner, and hears consumer complaints 'to determine whether actual rates comply with what the company filed.' But it does not have the authority to approve or reject rate changes, unlike many other states such as California. Illinois requires only that rates be filed with the department.
Pritzker spokesman Alex Gough said that 'special interests have protected the insurance industry instead of consumers, which is why the Governor has called for more regulatory and legislative action to hold powerful corporations accountable.'
State Farm says recent weather-related losses in other states have taken a toll on its business. As one example, the insurer said it has received nearly 13,000 claims and paid out more than $4.2 billion to California homeowners who suffered losses during the intense wildfires that spread across the Los Angeles area earlier this year.
But even going into 2025, the company said other claims were becoming too costly. State Farm said it paid out $1.26 in claims for every $1 premium collected from Illinois homeowners last year, including $638 million in hail damage claims, second to only Texas.
In a statement on Friday, State Farm spokesperson Gina Morss-Fischer said the insurer welcomes 'the opportunity for ongoing discussion with the Department of Insurance, lawmakers, and consumers about the challenges facing the home insurance market' and that the company's recent rate filing in Illinois 'reflects the risk we see in this state.'
'The core promise of homeowners' insurance, that your insurer pays your claim according to your policy, only works if the policy's rates match the underlying risk,' Morss-Fischer said. 'Over-regulation and refusal to allow companies like ours the ability to charge accurate rates leads to a less competitive market and fewer choices for consumers.'
Industry officials and some legislators echoed the argument additional regulation of Illinois' insurance market would lead to higher costs.
State Rep. Jeff Keicher of Sycamore, a ranking Republican member of the House Insurance Committee, said Illinois has lower insurance rates than other markets because of its 'open and competitive marketplace.' More insurers offering coverage means more competition, which keeps costs lower. Keicher is a 30-year State Farm agent but said he was speaking as a legislator and not a company representative.
If Illinois tries to control insurance rates, providers could threaten to pull out of Illinois, Keicher said, similar to what has happened in California.
'The worst thing we can do is force insurers to underprice and go out of business and leave homeowners without a way to get their home fixed if the worst happens,' Keicher said.
The Illinois Insurance Association, a trade group for property and casualty insurers, also opposes further regulation. Kevin Martin, executive director of the association, said that insurance markets ebb and flow between 'hard and soft' markets. For the last six to eight years, Martin said, due to increased storms, Illinois has experienced a hard market, meaning that homeowners insurance costs keep climbing.
'It's just a cycle that happens and has happened consistently over the last 40 years, which is reflected in what people have to pay in premium,' Martin said. 'We are hoping we come out of this hard market and costs soften, and people will be able to reduce costs for homeowners insurance.'
Martin said his group has talked with legislators in Springfield and the state insurance department about why insurance rates are skyrocketing and how insurers can be more transparent. His group recommends that homeowners shop around for alternative policies annually or biannually from the more than 200 insurance providers in Illinois.
Keicher said legislators are also considering a 'state-recognized mitigation plan' for how homes are built and repaired to minimize rebuilding costs as the number of billion-dollar disasters from climate change-related events goes up. Keicher said he thinks the insurance industry would get behind that kind of proposal.
State Rep. Thaddeus Jones, a Democrat from Calumet City who chairs the House Insurance Committee, called the insurance rate issue 'complicated' and said the insurance committee has had other priorities.
Jones told the Tribune in June that he will now focus on burgeoning homeowners insurance costs and would call hearings soon, inviting residents to testify. Keicher said he supports Jones' calls for hearings.
Jones also said he hopes more communities will participate in the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Community Rating System, which allows local municipalities to mitigate their flood insurance costs by meeting certain reduced flood risk requirements. Calumet City has been able to lower some of its homeowners insurance costs by participating, said Jones, who also serves as mayor of the south suburb.
'We don't want people choosing between their (home) insurance or prescription drugs or food,' Jones said. 'We want them to be able to live comfortably in their house, but at the same time not feel like they are being forced out of their house and scared to get insurance and make sure it is affordable to them so that families are safe and take that worry off their plate.'
'I think insurance companies are willing to work with us. Let's identify the issues first so we can all talk the same language to help homeowners stay in their houses,' Jones said.