Condo insurance in Miami Beach, FL, for a barrier island of old buildings and new towers.

An island where most homes are in large buildings

Miami Beach sits between the Atlantic and Biscayne Bay. The 2020–2024 Census estimates count about 63,200 housing units. About 49% are in buildings with 50 or more units. About 79% are in buildings with 10 or more. Detached houses are about 9%. Of the occupied homes, only about 41% are owner-occupied. About 13,400 units, roughly 21% of the stock, were vacant for seasonal or occasional use. About 53% of residents were born outside the United States. Census table C16001 counts about 1,300 people age 5 and older who speak Russian, Polish or another Slavic language at home, about 1.7% of that age group. The line is not a count of Russian alone. About 52% of that age group speaks Spanish at home.

The median year built is 1969, and that average hides two cities. About 9% of units were built in 1939 or earlier, and about 8% in the 1940s: the pre-war and Art Deco streets of South Beach, plus older blocks farther north. About 23% were built in the 1960s. About 52% of all units date from before 1970. The 2000s added about 11%. A policy for a 1930s walk-up, a 1960s condominium and a 2000s tower on the same island are not the same form, even when all three are called condos in conversation.

Miami-Dade is in the High-Velocity Hurricane Zone. Florida Building Code section 1620 sets design wind speeds by risk category: 165 mph for Category I, 175 mph for Category II, 186 mph for Category III and 195 mph for Category IV. Windows, doors and shutters used here need an approved HVHZ product, such as a Miami-Dade Notice of Acceptance. Most of this island’s buildings were standing long before that rule. There are houses, on the Sunset Islands and on scattered lots, but the page most owners need is the unit policy, not a single-family HO-3.

Your policy starts where the association’s stops

Florida Statute 718.111(11) requires the condominium association to insure the building and to exclude what is inside the unit: floor, wall and ceiling coverings, electrical fixtures, appliances, water heaters, built-in cabinets and countertops, window treatments and personal property. That interior is an HO-6. It should also include your liability and loss of use. Statute 627.714 requires at least $2,000 of loss-assessment coverage for assessments charged to an owner for a loss to property the association insures. Two thousand dollars is a floor. A hurricane deductible on a tower, divided across the owners, is often larger. Read the form. Do not stop at the statutory minimum because the statute uses the word minimum.

A special assessment to fund reserves, or to pay for repairs a milestone inspection required, is generally not that kind of loss. Loss-assessment coverage is for a covered property loss and, depending on the form, the association’s deductible. Residential condominiums and co-ops of three or more habitable stories need a milestone inspection, generally at 30 years and every 10 years after, or at 25 if the local building official requires the earlier date, plus a structural integrity reserve study at least every 10 years. The certificate of occupancy is the clock, not the year you bought. On an island where about half the units were built before 1970, a large share of buildings is decades past the first inspection. Send the notice, the association’s certificate and your declarations page. We will tell you which document the policy might respond to. We will not tell you that you are covered until the form says so.

Wilma’s glass, and Irma’s water at the beach

Hurricane Wilma, in October 2005, is the wind event people in these towers still describe. The National Hurricane Center found that upper floors in South Florida saw stronger wind than the street-level measurement. Glazing that predated impact tests was a known weak point. If the association replaced openings after Wilma, that paperwork is part of the building’s wind story. A single-family wind-mitigation form usually does not apply to a unit in a tower. Insurers must still give credit for wind-resistant features a form actually documents, on the buildings where that form is the right one.

Hurricane Irma, in September 2017, was a different lesson on this island. The National Weather Service reported that sustained winds in coastal Miami-Dade from downtown northward, including Miami Beach, likely peaked around 65 to 70 mph, with Category 1 gusts across nearly the whole county. Along the Atlantic beachfront, inundation was generally about 2 to 3 feet and largely confined to the immediate beachfront. Bay-side flooding elsewhere in the county was deeper. Two to three feet is enough to enter a ground-floor lobby, a storage room and a garage, and it is not what an HO-6 pays. No homeowners policy and no HO-6 covers flood, including storm surge. Miami-Dade’s effective flood maps date from September 11, 2009. Preliminary maps published in 2021 are not in force, so they are not the maps an insurer uses today. The county’s storm-surge planning zones describe where an evacuation may be ordered. An island can take water from the ocean and from the bay. An NFIP policy usually takes 30 days to start unless it is tied to a loan closing. The program caps are $250,000 for the building and $100,000 for contents. Those caps are not a promise that a unit’s interior will be rebuilt for that amount.

Old buildings and the code they were not built to

Law and ordinance coverage is the part of a policy that can pay to bring a repair up to the current code. On a pre-war South Beach building, or a 1960s condominium, the gap between “replace what was there” and “rebuild the opening to today’s HVHZ standard” can be the expensive part of the claim. Check the limit. Hurricane deductibles on a house policy are offered at $500 or at 2%, 5% or 10% of the dwelling limit and apply once per calendar year. On a condo, the deductible that surprises people is often the association’s. For a roof on the uncommon house, insurers cannot refuse a policy issued or renewed since July 1, 2022 only because the roof is under 15 years old. Property claims have a clock: notice of a new claim is generally due within one year, and a hurricane’s date of loss is landfall. Supplemental claims generally have 18 months. A loss-assessment claim has its own deadline, tied to when the association assesses you. M&K Agency is family-owned, with a team of 12 and more than 5,000 clients across Florida. Send us your policy and we’ll check your coverage.

More for this area

• Car insurance in Miami Beach, FL
• Home and condo insurance in Miami-Dade
• Guide: if someone gets hurt at your home (liability and umbrella)
• Florida hurricane deductible, explained

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