Increased premiums due to owner recent claim

Unless your CCRs specificially state you can do what you're asking, any increase in preminums is a shared expense amongst all.

everyone pays.

I agree.

I recently had a homeowner that had flood damage from their next door neighbor, which is in a condo. The CCRs do not provide for HOA coverage and this was a neighbor to neighbor issue and their respective insurers. The insurance agent did say that an owner has every right to avail themselves of the right to file a claim against the association policy. In this case the insurance company denied the affected owner's claim. The Board stayed out of the mix.

My question is why are they filing with the HOA insurance? That's not how it's supposed to happen. They file with their insurance first. The HOA insurance is not necessarily their insurance it's all the members for what they are responsible for. Their insurance may contact the HOA's insurance for their part. It is the board that should be involved in contacting the insurance and interacting with them.

There is a huge deductible usually with HOA insurance policies. So you don't just jump into this lightly and let an owner make claims. It may be a fix that would not even make the deductible limits. Ours was 20K. That meant it had to be over 20K before insurance paid out the claimant. Plus there are only certain areas the HOA is responsible for.

And you know this because? That's right, it's just FREE advice!

I know this because we had a tree fall on a house in our HOA. My last 2 weeks in office. The tree was located in the neighbor's yard. The tree fell across the back of their neighbor's house and across a fence. The damaged owner had to make a claim on their insurance first. Their insurance company then went after the neighbor's insurance. It turned out the neighbor was uninsured.

The tree that fell was on common property the HOA owned. The tree had an infestation of pine beetles. When the weather changed the tree unfroze breaking it. That means our HOA insurance was NOT responsible for the houses/fence damages. It was responsible for the clean up of the tree and the damages to the common property around the houses.

I got chewed out by the members of the HOA over this when they found out I paid out $1500 to do just that. Our deductible was 20K. The cost of clean up was only $1500. Not enough to meet the deductible to make a claim. So we had to pay out of our operating budget. (We did not have aa reserve as not necessary). We owned the common area and the tree NOT the houses or the lots they sat on.

So don't go assuming that anything that happens to a home or unit is on the HOA. A broken pipe in a unit does not automatically equal HOA insurance claim. It also involves the homeowner's insurance as well.

Well the OP did not state the owner took this approach first. They went straight for the HOA's insurance. You have no idea how many people are under the FALSE impression that they don't need insurance because they live in a HOA/COA. They think that insurance covers them. It doesn't. That is why people are posting the process is homeowner's first then HOA. No one said did not have a right not to. Just their insurance should be doing it.

Why do you think the neighbor in my situation did not have insurance? I would bump into people in my own HOA who thought the HOA had "insurance". I had to enlighten them it was not THIER insurance. You had to have your own policy. It's not like "renter's insurance" living in a HOA.

You can't assume the person making the claim against the HOA is not under that impression. It happens. Best to ask before assuming..