But community is still no closer to landing ‘full replacement value’ coverage

By Sam Richards

Staff writer

Wednesday, February 18 (4:00 p.m.): The good news about Rossmoor’s property insurance situation: Premium rates, for the second consecutive year, are going down.

The bad news is that Rossmoor still can’t get as much coverage as it needs, whatever the price.

“We still are not going to be in any place where we’re going to have full replacement value,” Rossmoor General Manager Jeff Matheson told the RWC Finance Committee on Jan. 27. He estimated that Rossmoor’s master property insurance policy, with coverage from various providers assembled by Arthur J. Gallagher insurance brokers, will continue to cover between 40% and 45% of what it would cost to completely rebuild Rossmoor in the event of a catastrophic worst-case wildfire event. That current insurance level is still sufficient to cover almost any conceivable disaster, he has said before.

“But rates are in a good position right now,” Matheson said.

Matheson’s comments came during a Finance Committee presentation led by Ken Johnson, area senior vice president with Gallagher, who works regularly with that committee, as well as the long-running RWC Insurance Task Force. Johnson made a similar presentation to the RWC Board two days later.

He said the change in RWC’s annual insurance renewal date from Jan. 1 each year to June 1 allowed for negotiating lower rates on several counts. Because other senior developments similar to RWC across the United States already had a June 1 renewal date, certain economy-of-scale benefits can be achieved by joining with those other properties to negotiate, Johnson said.

He also noted that May is simply a less hectic time to negotiate price deals than the holiday season, with less competition from other potential pressures on insurers, including wildfire season.

Johnson said Rossmoor’s 2025 valuation by Kroll, a company specializing in determining such valuations, showed a 6.75% increase for 2025, which would mean, all else being equal, a corresponding increase in insurance costs.

But Johnson also said the above-mentioned rate reductions (totaling 11.75%) more than cancel out any increase, and that Rossmoor’s master policy premiums through May 31, 2027 will be about 5% less than they were at the end of 2025. The premium cost from May 31, 2026 through May 31, 2027 will be about $3.75 million.

All Rossmoor Mutuals, except for 58 (The Waterford) and 61, participate in the master insurance policy.

Johnson said Rossmoor has paid relatively little into workers’ compensation, a state insurance program covering costs when employees suffer job-related injuries or illnesses. Rossmoor can expect to pay about $289,000 in workers’ comp premiums in 2026, down from $313,000 last year.

Rossmoor, Johnson told the Finance Committee, has “among the best” safety records among California “master-planned” communities. In addition, RWC is employing a new carrier for workers’ comp insurance, he said.

Also helping out Rossmoor has been the efforts of the Firewise Committee to harden the community from wildfire through a series of safety precautions. This committee started up in 2023; in October, the National Fire Protection Association formally recognized Rossmoor as a Firewise USA community.

“Property underwriters love looking at Rossmoor because so many things are going in the right direction,” Johnson said. “They love the detail associated with your appraisal, and the different safety mechanisms you’ve implemented.”

The significant world-wide global property insurance capacity crisis, this state’s high wildfire risk, and limited appeal to insurers to underwrite Rossmoor’s aging infrastructure all have contributed to Rossmoor’s inability to fully insure itself for the past few years, and Matheson told the Finance Committee that situation hasn’t changed.