Moving Toward a More Insurable Louisiana and Giving Homeowners More Peace of Mind

By Dani Sheehan. 

After continued success in Alabama, this grant program hopes to strengthen Louisiana homes to be more storm resistant and mitigate the insurance crisis facing the state. 

On October 2, 2023, the Louisiana Department of Insurance opened its first round of applications for the Louisiana Fortify Homes Program granting up to $10,000 for homeowners to upgrade their roofs to standards set by the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety (IBHS). In an interview with Louisiana Commissioner of Insurance, Jim Donelon, he tells us just how successful the first application period was. “We opened it on Monday at noon and closed it two minutes and 12 seconds later with 500 applicants.” The second round opens at noon on October 16, 2023, offering an additional 1,000 grants to Louisiana Citizens policyholders. In the coming months, they will hold additional offerings that will be open to all homeowners across the state.  

We recently had the opportunity to discuss more details of this grant program in an interview with Chris Kutz from ARCANE Inspection Services, Inc. Chris is the owner and lead inspector of ARCANE Inspections, which performs FORTIFIED evaluations along with residential and commercial building inspections throughout Louisiana and Mississippi. His company is on the LA House advisory board for FORTIFIED by IBHS, and Chris has been encouraging the FORTIFIED construction method since becoming an evaluator in 2018. He is committed to teaching contractors the practical aspects of installing a FORTIFIED roof, and with this grant program, he believes FORTIFIED homes will take off in the state and improve the insurability of the homes. 

The goal is to improve the roofing standards across the state and build homes that are more insurable so that competition in the private insurance market will begin to take pressure off the Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Corporation. As Commissioner Donelon explains, “Louisiana Citizens is our market of last resort, and we have about 130,000 policies in that book of business as we speak, priced above the private sector by at least 10% higher than the highest private sector coverage in each individual parish. And we are trying to help those folks make their property more attractive to insurers to take them out of Citizens.” 

While Chris agrees that the grant program is good for the state as a whole, he is more interested in the benefits to the homeowners. He shares with us his time as an insurance adjuster after Hurricane Sally. “When you drove over there (Alabama), you could drive into those neighborhoods and tell which homes were FORTIFIED. So, there’s a value to that that’s difficult to calculate, the soft cost... What do you save by not having to come home to your ceiling on the floor? Or the black mold concerns, the mold in general, the water, all your belongings being destroyed or any of them being destroyed for that fact.” As a homeowner himself, Chris understands how valuable it is to have a roofing system he knows will still be there after a hurricane. 

The Louisiana Fortify Homes Program is not just a way to put FORTIFIED roofs on homes and remedy the insurance crisis throughout the state, it is a way to protect homeowners and give them peace of mind for one of their most valuable assets — to quite literally keep a roof over their heads. 

Read more about the Louisiana Fortify Homes Program, what it means for contractors and see how you can become a FORTIFIED certified contractor.