The latest choice in Greenaker v. Common Property & Casualty Insurance coverage Firm, 1 is a transparent rebuke of a troubling development in property insurance coverage claims. Insurers are making inventive interpretations of precise money worth that go away policyholders receiving far lower than what they misplaced.
The policyholders suffered a lined loss and introduced an estimate reflecting each alternative value and precise money worth. The insurer partially paid, then moved in limine to exclude the entire policyholders’ harm proof. The insurer argued that as a result of the repairs had not been carried out, the insureds couldn’t get well alternative value. It additional argued that labor and different non-material prices couldn’t qualify as half of the particular money worth. The trial court docket agreed and excluded all harm proof.
The appellate court docket reversed. A very powerful a part of this opinion is the court docket’s rejection of the insurer’s try to redefine precise money worth into one thing unrecognizable. The court docket squarely addressed the insurer’s argument and didn’t mince phrases:
Common and the trial court docket advance an inordinately narrowed definition of precise money worth (ACV) that features solely the price of bodily supplies that have been broken and excludes all different intangible prices such because the labor required to put in such supplies. Common describes the Greenakers’ intangible prices—akin to labor—required to put in the bodily objects to exchange the broken property as ‘oblique, anticipated future restore prices,’ and Common contends that such prices ‘have been merely not ACV as a result of they weren’t precise, tangible bodily harm straight brought on by the storm (e.g., wind harm or inside water …..’
This definition is supported neither by the language of the alternative worth insurance coverage contract, the statute governing alternative worth insurance coverage contracts, nor the decisional authority elaborating on the that means of the time period precise money worth as contrasted with alternative value worth.
The development is for some insurers to scale back precise money worth to a stripped-down quantity representing solely the price of uncooked supplies, basically treating a house like a pile of depreciated lumber sitting on so much. Labor, overhead, and different mandatory prices to truly restore the harm are pushed apart and labeled as “future” or “replacement-only” bills. This can be a wrongful try to deprive policyholders of funds which can be inadequate to start any significant repairs.
The court docket rejected that method and returned to first ideas. Precise money worth isn’t a class of prices. It’s a technique of valuation. It consists of the complete scope of what’s required to restore the harm, however at a depreciated worth. Alternative value worth, in contrast, displays that very same scope of prices with out depreciation. The distinction between the 2 isn’t what’s included. It’s how these objects are valued.
The court docket additionally made clear that insurers can not import language from one a part of the coverage to distort one other. The phrase “direct bodily loss” determines whether or not protection is triggered. It doesn’t redefine how damages are calculated as soon as protection exists. Makes an attempt to make use of that phrase to exclude labor or different mandatory restore prices are, in impact, efforts to rewrite the coverage after the loss has occurred.
One other essential takeaway is the court docket’s recognition that policyholders don’t want to finish repairs earlier than they’ll show precise money worth. The estimate supplied by the insureds, exhibiting alternative value, depreciation, and ensuing ACV, was enough proof to current to a jury. In the actual world, many policyholders can not afford to finish repairs with out receiving insurance coverage proceeds first. Any rule requiring accomplished repairs as a prerequisite to proving damages would flip the claims course of right into a monetary impossibility for a lot of households.
This choice restores steadiness. It reminds courts and property claims adjusters that insurance coverage insurance policies have to be interpreted primarily based on their language, relevant statutes, and established precedent fairly than inventive theories designed to restrict funds. It additionally reinforces that procedural guidelines exist for a motive.
For these within the idea of precise money worth in Florida, I recommend studying “Glens Falls Revisited: Precise Money Worth, Matching, and the Measure of True Indemnity in Florida” and Precise Money Worth Damages and The Broad Proof Rule in Florida.
Thought For The Day
“The primary obligation of society is justice.”
— Alexander Hamilton
1 Greenaker v. Common Prop. & Cas. Ins. Co., No. 2d2024-1964 (Fla. 2nd DCA Could 8, 2026).