Mulberry · Polk County · Insurance
This is the Mulberry page for hurricane damage roof claim. The short version: you want to get a hurricane claim approved and understand the hurricane deductible, and you can have it without a salesperson at the door.
Get a written quoteSummer thunderstorms, not hurricanes, cause most of the roof damage here: straight-line wind, lightning strikes, and the occasional tornado embedded in a squall line. Inland homes miss the surge but not the wind — tropical systems shed speed slowly over Florida's flat terrain. Additions from later decades were often tied into the original roof without proper flashing; those seams are where the leaks live.
What it costs in Mulberry: the hurricane deductible is a percentage of dwelling coverage — often 2% to 5% — not a flat amount, so a claim needs to clear a much higher bar than a regular wind claim.
Florida's 2022 insurance reforms ended assignment-of-benefits agreements for new policies and shortened claim filing windows, so the order you do things in matters more than it used to.
How it works
Not automatically, but the carrier will argue pre-existing wear. An inspection report from before the storm, or good documentation of storm-specific damage patterns (creased shingles, lifted tabs on the windward side), makes the difference.
The hurricane deductible applies only during a named storm declared by the National Hurricane Center and is a percentage of your dwelling coverage. On a home insured for a mid-six-figure amount, that can be five figures. Every other wind event uses the regular flat deductible.
Florida's 2022 insurance reforms ended assignment-of-benefits agreements for new policies and shortened claim filing windows, so the order you do things in matters more than it used to. Mulberry is inside the everyday service radius, so there's no travel surcharge and no "we'll be in the area next month."