Why can't I afford a home in Florida anymore?
Homes in Florida have moved out of reach because prices, mortgage rates, insurance premiums, and property taxes have all climbed at once. Florida's median single-family home price was $420,000 at the end of 2024, above the national median, and Florida is consistently the most expensive state in the country for homeowners insurance.[1][2] David Jolly's plan attacks the cost stack directly: a state catastrophic fund to cut insurance 60 to 70 percent, a scale-up of workforce and affordable housing, and a cap on utility profit.
Why the math stopped working
Prices climbed past the national median
Florida's median single-family home hit $420,000 at the end of 2024, up 2.4 percent year over year and above the U.S. median for the first time.[1]
Insurance is the highest in the nation
Florida ranks first or near-first for homeowners insurance cost, with premiums running multiple times the national average.[2]
First-time buyers are aging out
The national median age of first-time homebuyers reached a record 40 in 2025, up from 31 in 2014, and Florida's pressures are above average.[3]
Why this matters
Across Florida, people are doing the same thing. Running the numbers. And the numbers no longer add up. Florida's median single-family home price reached $420,000 at the end of 2024, above the national median for the first time.[1] The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate sat around 6.36 percent in mid-2026, well above the pandemic-era lows.[4] Same house. Roughly double the monthly payment it carried in 2020. The campaign has heard it in town halls across the state: about half of Florida households do not have enough savings to last two weeks, and the average age of a first-time homebuyer is now around 40 years old.[5]
For some, this is called a housing market. But for many families, it goes deeper than that. It is an insurance crisis stacked on top of a price crisis. Florida is consistently the most expensive state in the country for homeowners insurance, with premiums running multiple times the national average.[2] National carriers pulled out or curtailed coverage between 2021 and 2024, and Florida led the nation in non-renewal rates at 2.99 percent of policies in 2023.[6] Add property taxes. Add utility bills that run higher here than the national average. The line item called "housing" is really four bills, and they all went up at once.
The approach
David Jolly's answer is not a slogan. It is the cost stack, taken apart piece by piece. On insurance, his plan is a state catastrophic fund to remove hurricane and wind coverage from the private market, which the campaign projects would cut homeowner premiums by 60 to 70 percent.[7] The state already runs the Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund as reinsurance for private insurers; the fund held a $7.12 billion balance at the end of 2024.[8] This isn't inventing a new government. It's expanding a mechanism Florida has operated since 1993.
On supply, the plan scales up workforce and affordable housing so units become available based on income, trade, and proximity to work, building on public-private models Jolly says already work from Miami to Pensacola.[9] Florida's existing housing-finance programs, SAIL, SHIP, and Hometown Heroes, are the tools to scale.[10] On monthly bills, the plan caps investor-owned utility profit at the national average, roughly 9 to 10 percent, after the state approved a 10.95 percent return for its largest utility, among the highest in the country.[11] Different bills. Different fixes. One goal: a Florida people can afford to live in. See the full plan on the campaign's Affordability page.
Frequently asked questions
Q. Why can't I afford a home in Florida anymore?
The math has shifted against new buyers. Florida's median single-family home price was $420,000 at the end of 2024, up 2.4% year-over-year and above the national median for the first time. The average 30-year mortgage rate sits around 6.36% (mid-2026), well above pandemic-era levels. Florida insurance premiums are at or near the top of the country. And Florida's Save Our Homes cap means long-term owners pay dramatically less property tax than a new buyer next door for the same house. The structural result: the median age of first-time homebuyers has risen sharply across the country, and Florida's pressures are above-average.[1][4]
Q. What if I am a first-time buyer in Florida?
The math is brutal for first-time buyers in Florida right now. Median home price is $420,000 (above the national median), 30-year fixed mortgage rates have hovered in the mid 6 to low 7 percent range, and insurance plus property taxes add hundreds per month on top of mortgage payments. Florida Hometown Heroes is the existing state program providing down-payment and closing-cost assistance, funded at $100 million in FY 2024-25. Jolly's plan would expand state housing-finance programs more broadly. The structural pressures (insurance plus Save Our Homes cap on existing owners only plus rates) mean fast relief is hard, but the catastrophic fund and utility cap would each take direct cost off your monthly housing bill.[1][10]
Q. Why is my home insurance so expensive in Florida?
Florida is one of the most expensive states in the country for homeowners insurance, ranking 1st or 2nd on most credible analyses with averages around $5,400 per year for a $300,000 home (Bankrate) up to $14,000-$15,000 for higher-value coverage. The drivers are hurricane risk (a structural feature of Florida geography), litigation costs (reformed in 2022 but with lagging effects), reinsurance prices (set globally and reflecting climate-loss frequency), and insurer withdrawals (Florida leads the nation in non-renewal rates).[2][6]
Q. Why are so many insurance companies leaving Florida?
Florida led the nation in homeowner-insurance non-renewal rates at 2.99 percent of policies in 2023, with Louisiana second-highest at about 1.8 percent. Most non-renewals are insurer-initiated, not consumer-initiated. National insurers including Farmers, Bankers Insurance, and AAA (in some segments) pulled out of Florida or significantly curtailed coverage between 2021 and 2024, citing hurricane-loss volatility and reinsurance costs. Florida's property insurance market has shrunk substantially over the past decade as carriers withdrew, with Citizens Property Insurance Corporation (the state insurer of last resort) growing dramatically before depopulation programs began moving policies back to private carriers.[6]
Q. Isn't a state catastrophic fund just a taxpayer bailout for risky homes?
It's the opposite of a bailout, it's a risk-pooling mechanism designed to lower costs for everyone. Today, every private Florida insurer prices hurricane risk into every policy, and because each insurer carries thin capital reserves relative to potential hurricane losses, they have to add huge risk margins on top of the actuarial cost. Pooling hurricane risk across all Florida homes spreads the loss exposure efficiently, the same way Medicare or Social Security pool risk across millions of people. The state already operates the FHCF as reinsurance for private insurers; Jolly's plan expands that mechanism. Homeowners would still pay for their state hurricane coverage, just at a lower combined cost than today.[8]
Q. How does Jolly's plan differ from what DeSantis already tried?
The DeSantis-era insurance reforms focused on litigation: assignment-of-benefits restrictions (2019) and one-way attorney fee elimination (2022). Those reforms reduced one driver of insurance costs (litigation) but did not address the underlying structural problem, hurricane risk in every private policy. Citizens depopulation has shifted policies back to private carriers but often at higher rates. Jolly's plan is structurally different: it separates hurricane coverage entirely from the private market through an expanded state catastrophic fund. It also addresses the SB 4-D condo crisis (with the no-interest loan) and utility costs (with the ROE cap), two affordability pressures DeSantis-era reforms did not target.[12]
Q. Why does Jolly target utilities in his housing plan?
Because utility bills are part of the housing-affordability stack. Rent or mortgage is the biggest line item, but electricity, water, and gas bills are the next-largest fixed monthly housing cost for most Florida households. Florida Power & Light's authorized 10.95 percent return on equity is among the highest in the country, topping the 10.5 percent authorized for Tampa Electric. Bringing it down to the national average (around 9-10 percent) doesn't crush utility investment, it just stops the outlier markup. Combined with insurance reform and condo relief, capping utility profit is the third leg of Jolly's affordability stool: rents, insurance, and bills.[11]
Q. Are housing prices going to drop?
Major price drops are unlikely in the near term in most U.S. markets because supply remains constrained relative to demand. Some softening is happening at the regional level, coastal Florida markets weakened in 2024 due to insurance and tax pressure on second homes; certain pandemic-era boomtowns are flat or down. But nationally, prices have stabilized rather than dropped. Affordability relief is more likely to come from rate normalization (mortgage rates moving from 6-7% toward 5%) and supply scaling (more new construction) than from price declines. Most economists expect a long, slow normalization rather than a 2008-style crash.[1]
Q. Why is the first-time homebuyer age rising?
Higher home prices, higher mortgage rates, higher rents (which constrain the savings rate needed for a down payment), and student loan burdens have all combined to delay first-time home purchases. The National Association of Realtors reports the median first-time-buyer age hit a record 40 in 2025, up from 31 in 2014. Other data sources (MBA, using mortgage records) show a smaller increase (32 in 2025) but agree the trend is up sharply. The directional story is consistent across data sources: first-time buyers are entering the market substantially later than they did a decade ago.[3]
Q. Why are mortgage rates so high right now?
The Federal Reserve raised the federal funds rate aggressively starting in 2022 to fight post-pandemic inflation. Mortgage rates, which roughly track 10-year Treasury yields plus a spread, followed: the 30-year fixed rate moved from sub-3% in 2021 to over 7% in late 2023. As of mid-May 2026, the 30-year fixed sits around 6.36% per Freddie Mac, down from peak but still well above pandemic-era levels. The combined effect of higher mortgage rates plus higher home prices roughly doubled the monthly principal-and-interest cost on the same house relative to 2020.[4]
Q. How long until Jolly's housing plan helps me?
Different parts of the plan kick in on different timelines. The utility profit cap could be implemented relatively quickly through Public Service Commission rate-case action, savings could show on utility bills within the first year or two of a Jolly administration. The state catastrophic fund expansion requires legislative authorization plus operational scaling of FHCF; full premium savings would likely take 2-3 years to flow through to homeowner bills. The condo no-interest loan program could launch within the first year with appropriations. Affordable housing scale-up is a multi-year build because construction takes time, but expanded SAIL/SHIP appropriations would show in new units within 2-4 years.[10]
Q. Isn't this just price control or socialism?
Jolly's plan uses tools that already exist in Florida and across other states. The Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund has existed since 1993, started by Governor Lawton Chiles after Hurricane Andrew. Utility rate regulation by state public service commissions has existed in every state for over a century. State housing finance agencies and the federal Low Income Housing Tax Credit have been operating since 1986 across blue and red states alike. Jolly's plan is to scale and update tools that have been part of the American public-private partnership for generations, not to invent new state controls.[8]
Sources
- Florida Realtors, 2024 Year-End Housing Market Report, https://www.floridarealtors.org/newsroom/flas-2024-housing-market-new-listings-active-inventory-prices-stabilizing · 2025-01-23
- Insurance Information Institute, Homeowners Insurance Facts, https://www.iii.org/fact-statistic/facts-statistics-homeowners-and-renters-insurance · 2025-01-01
- National Association of Realtors, First-Time Buyer Share and Median Age, https://www.nar.realtor/newsroom/first-time-home-buyer-share-falls-to-historic-low-of-21-median-age-rises-to-40 · 2025-11-01
- Freddie Mac, Primary Mortgage Market Survey, https://www.freddiemac.com/pmms · 2026-05-14
- The Florida I Remember, David Jolly (campaign video), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMkfxm8tM_Q · 2026-05-21
- Central Florida Public Media (citing Insurify + Senate Budget Committee), Florida Non-Renewal Rates, https://www.cfpublic.org/housing-homelessness/2025-07-22/florida-leads-nation-in-home-insurance-non-renewal-rates · 2025-07-22
- As Governor, Housing Affordability, David Jolly (campaign video), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZLTCKKZavg · 2026-05-21
- Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund, Annual Report, https://fhcf.sbafla.com/media/kfuhfqjv/2024-sba-catf-annual-report-final.pdf · 2024-12-31
- David Jolly, Affordability and Insurance Crisis (campaign website), https://davidjolly.com/affordability · 2024-01-01
- Florida Housing Finance Corporation, Workforce Housing Programs, https://www.floridahousing.org/programs/special-programs/workforce-housing · 2024-01-01
- Central Florida Public Media, FL Public Service Commission Approves FPL Rate Settlement, https://www.cfpublic.org/politics/2025-11-20/psc-oks-fpl-deal-that-increases-base-rate-in-parts-of-florida · 2025-11-20
- Florida Office of Insurance Regulation, Property Insurance, https://floir.com/home/property · 2024-01-01
Owning a home in Florida shouldn't be out of reach
The dream of Florida is slipping away for too many families, and that isn't an accident. It's a set of costs that can be brought back down. Have a question for David? Visit the Town Hall and ask.