Roof under 15
On a homeowners policy, the insurer may not refuse to issue or renew solely because of roof age. Other lawful underwriting reasons can still apply.
The short answer
A Florida house sits under two systems. The Florida Building Code sets the construction rules for a permit. Section 627.7011 of the Florida Statutes sets what a homeowners insurer may do about roof age. A roofer, an inspector, and an insurance company each use a different one.
Roof 15 or older
The insurer must let you get an inspection, at your expense, before it can demand a new roof as a condition of coverage. Five years of useful life left blocks an age-only refusal.
You are reroofing
The permit follows the building code and section 553.844. Age of the shingles is not the test. The local building department is.
Section 627.7011 and section 553.844, 2026 Florida Statutes, read November 3, 2026.
The 15-year rule is an insurance protection
Section 627.7011(5) applies to homeowners insurance policies issued or renewed on or after July 1, 2022. It does not apply to mobile-home policies, and it does not apply to policies that are not homeowners policies.
- If the roof is less than 15 years old, an insurer may not refuse to issue or renew a homeowners policy insuring that house solely because of the age of the roof.
- If the roof is at least 15 years old, the insurer must allow a roof inspection by an authorized inspector, at the homeowner’s expense, before it requires replacement as a condition of issuing or renewing the policy.
- If that inspection says the roof has 5 years or more of useful life remaining, the insurer may not refuse to issue or renew solely because of roof age.
The inspection does not buy the policy. Section 627.7011(6) still lets an insurer reject or nonrenew an applicant because the house does not meet its underwriting rules for replacement-cost or law-and-ordinance coverage, or for another lawful reason. Ask for the reason in writing. “The roof is old” is not, by itself, enough when the statute says it is not.
Who may do the inspection
An authorized inspector is someone the insurer approves, and who is one of these:
- A home inspector licensed under section 468.8314
- A building code inspector certified under section 468.607
- A general, building, or residential contractor licensed under section 489.111, or a roofing contractor
- A professional engineer licensed under section 471.015
- A professional architect licensed under section 481.213
- Any other person or firm the insurer recognizes as qualified to inspect a house insured on a homeowners policy
Call the insurer before you pay anyone. Ask who it will accept, which form it wants, and whether photos or the old permit have to be attached. A wind-mitigation form is a different inspection. So is a four-point inspection.
How the statute counts roof age
Age runs from the last date when 100 percent of the roof surface was built or replaced in line with the building code in effect on that date.
There is a second clock. If the roof was replaced in pieces, and those later pieces finally covered 100 percent of the surface, the age runs from the date of the first of those partial replacements. It does not run from the last patch.
A repair that never brings the replaced area to 100 percent does not reset the age of the whole roof. Keep the permit, the final inspection, the invoice, and photos. Those papers are how you prove the date.
Section 627.7011(5)(d).
The 25 percent rule is a building-code exception
People use “the 25 percent rule” to mean “touch a quarter of the roof and the county will make you replace all of it.” That is not what section 553.844(5) says for a roof that already met a modern code.
Read this before you sign a contract that quotes a 25 percent rule. If the existing roofing system or roof section was built, repaired, or replaced in compliance with the 2007 Florida Building Code, or any later edition, and 25 percent or more of it is being repaired, replaced, or recovered, only the portion being worked on has to be built to the Florida Building Code in effect. A city or county may not pass an ordinance that changes this exception.
The exception has a condition. The roof has to have been done to the 2007 code or a later edition. A roof older than that is outside this sentence. Ask the building department, in writing, which code section applies to that permit and that address. Do not take the answer from a door hanger.
What a roof replacement can be required to include
Section 553.844 is the windstorm-mitigation statute for site-built, single-family houses. On a roof replacement, the statute requires the code techniques for a secondary water barrier and for strengthening the roof-deck attachment. It does not leave those two as optional upgrades.
| Item | What the statute says | What to ask |
|---|---|---|
| Secondary water barrier | Required as part of a roof replacement on a site-built single-family house. The code may not limit you to one method or one product. | Which approved method is on this permit? |
| Roof deck fasteners | Strengthening or correcting the deck attachment is also required on that replacement. | Will the deck be re-nailed, and to what pattern? |
| Roof-to-wall ties | Required on a replacement only in the wind-borne debris region, and only if the house is insured for $300,000 or more. If it is uninsured, or you do not show the insured value, the test is a just value of $300,000 or more for the structure. Even then, the work is not required unless the evaluation and the installation at the gable ends, or at all corners, can be done for 15 percent of the cost of the roof replacement. | Is this address in the wind-borne debris region the statute uses, and does the 15 percent cap stop the tie-down work? |
| Opening protection | A separate trigger. A permit applied for on or after July 1, 2008, with an estimated cost of $50,000 or more, can require opening protection in the wind-borne debris region when the insured value is $750,000 or more, or the just value is $750,000 or more if you cannot show insurance. Roof covering replacement, and repair work to stop the house from wearing out, does not count toward that $50,000. | Does this scope even count, or is it only a roof covering? |
| Product approval | The covering and the way it is fastened have to match the approval and the design pressures the permit lists. | What Florida product approval, or Miami-Dade notice of acceptance, is written on the permit? |
The wind-borne debris region in this statute is the one defined in section 1609.2 of the 2006 International Building Code. Your building department can say whether your address is in it. Do not guess from a sales map.
For houses with both hip and gable ends, the statute tells the commission’s retrofit rules to do the gable end first, unless the hip is more than 1.5 times as wide as the gable end.
Section 553.844(2) and (3). The $300,000, $750,000, 15 percent, and July 1, 2008 figures are the statute’s figures.
Which building code a permit uses
Florida has one statewide minimum code. Cities and counties enforce it. They also adopt local amendments in the ways section 553.73 allows. “Built to Florida code” is not one roof detail for every address. Wind speed, exposure, the roof shape, and whether the house is in the High-Velocity Hurricane Zone all change the permit.
The High-Velocity Hurricane Zone in the Florida Building Code is Broward County and Miami-Dade County. Those two counties use their own product approvals. Everywhere else, the statewide Florida Product Approval is the list the building department is working from.
The edition in effect for permits today is the 8th Edition (2023). The Florida Building Commission’s work plan set that edition’s effective date at December 31, 2023. State law says a code update takes effect no sooner than six months after the updated code is published. The Commission has published the 9th Edition (2026) and a volume-by-volume list of what changed. Your building department decides the day a complete application is reviewed under the 9th Edition. Miami-Dade County told its applicants that day is December 31, 2026, and that an application sent in after 4 p.m. on December 30 goes to the new edition. Another county can set a different cutoff. Ask, and keep the answer.
An incomplete application does not lock in the older code. If the department sends the plans back, ask whether the resubmittal is still on the edition you designed to.
Code editions 8th Edition work plan Section 553.73
Miami-Dade Regulatory and Economic Resources notice, October 7, 2026.
Wind-mitigation inspections and premium credits
A wind-mitigation inspection records how the house is built: roof shape, roof-deck attachment, roof-to-wall connection, secondary water resistance, and opening protection. It is not a roof-condition report, and it is not the 15-year useful-life inspection.
The form is OIR-B1-1802, the Uniform Mitigation Verification Inspection Form. The Florida Department of Financial Services says admitted insurers have had to accept a valid form, completed and signed by the licensees the law names, since July 1, 2008. The same department says those insurers must give you the Notice of Premium Discounts for Hurricane Loss Mitigation, form OIR-B1-1655, with a new residential policy and at each renewal.
Citizens Property Insurance says an inspection done on or after April 1, 2026 has to be on revision 04/26 of the form. A revision 01/12 form from before that date can still be used for up to five years from the inspection date when nothing material has changed. Your insurer can have its own file rules. Ask before you pay for a new inspection. Citizens also says the form is not proof that a roof was replaced or that the roof is in good shape.
The credit, if you get one, is on the wind portion of the premium. The dollar amount depends on the insurer and the house. This page does not quote a savings, because the state does not publish one number that fits every policy.
A separate roof deductible is not the 15-year rule
Section 627.701(10) lets an insurer put a separate roof deductible on a personal-lines residential policy. That deductible has limits:
- It may not be more than the lesser of 2 percent of the Coverage A limit, or 50 percent of the cost to replace the roof.
- The premium has to include an actuarially sound credit or discount for that deductible.
- It applies only to a claim paid on a replacement-cost basis.
- It does not apply to a total loss of the primary structure caused by a covered peril, to a roof loss from a hurricane, to a roof loss from a tree or other hazard that punctures the roof deck, or to a roof loss that needs repair of less than 50 percent of the roof.
A hurricane that takes the roof is outside that separate roof deductible. Read the declarations page. The percentage on that page is the one that matters, not a number from a contractor.
Before you hire anyone
Find the papers
The roof permit, the final inspection, the invoice, the warranty, any old wind-mitigation form, and any letter the insurer already sent about the roof.
Write the insurer
If age is the reason they gave, ask whether the decision is based solely on age, who counts as an authorized inspector, and which form they will accept. Keep the reply.
Call the building department before you sign
Ask which code edition, which wind design, which product approval, and which inspections apply to this address and this scope. Ask whether section 553.844’s 25 percent exception applies to the roof that is on the house now.
Make the contract name the work
Tear-off or overlay, deck repair, underlayment, flashing, ventilation, who pulls the permit, when you pay, and the warranty. The contract also has to say the contractor may not offer a gift or a waived deductible in exchange for a roof inspection or a roof claim.
Check the license, and walk away from a deductible deal
Look up the contractor on the Department of Business and Professional Regulation site. Section 489.147 says a contractor may not offer a rebate, gift, gift card, cash, coupon, waiver of any insurance deductible, or anything else of value in exchange for letting them inspect the roof or for your making an insurance claim for roof damage. You still owe the deductible.
Save the closeout packet
Permit, final inspection, product approval, paid invoices, photos, warranty, and, if you order one, the wind-mitigation form. Send the insurer the pages it asked for. For shutters, water, and what to do when a storm is already in the forecast, use Hurricane Prep.
You pay the deductible. An ad that pushes you to call a contractor or a public adjuster about a roof-damage claim has to say so, in type at least 12 points and at least half as large as the biggest type in the ad. The same ad has to say that knowingly paying, waiving, or rebating a deductible, with intent to injure, defraud, or deceive, is insurance fraud and a third-degree felony. Section 489.147.
Questions people ask
Does a 15-year-old roof have to come off?
No. Fifteen years is the insurance line in section 627.7011. It is not a replacement date in the building code.
The insurer nonrenewed me and blamed the roof. What can I do?
Ask whether the refusal is based solely on age. If the roof is under 15, the statute says that reason is not allowed on a homeowners policy. If it is 15 or older, ask for the inspection they have to allow, by an inspector they accept, at your expense. If the report shows 5 years of useful life left, age alone is not a reason to refuse or nonrenew. Other lawful underwriting reasons can still apply. The Florida Department of Financial Services takes insurance complaints.
Does a patch make the roof new?
Not by itself. The age resets when 100 percent of the surface has been built or replaced to the code then in effect. If that 100 percent happened in stages, the statute dates the roof from the first of those stages.
I have a mobile home. Does the 15-year rule cover me?
No. Section 627.7011(6) says the section does not apply to mobile-home policies.
Will a wind-mitigation inspection cut my premium by a set amount?
No set amount is in the statute. The form can qualify the house for a credit on the wind portion. The insurer calculates it. A completed form is not proof of roof condition.
Who decides the code on my street?
The local building official. The state writes the minimum. The city or county enforces it, including local amendments that section 553.73 allows. They may not locally repeal the 25 percent exception in section 553.844(5).
Sources
Official pages, read November 3, 2026.
- Insurance age rule. Section 627.7011, 2026 Florida Statutes. Subsections (5) and (6).
- Roof deductible. Section 627.701(10).
- Windstorm mitigation on the house. Section 553.844.
- Who enforces the code. Section 553.73. The six-month delay before a new edition takes effect is subsection (7)(e). The 8th Edition effective date of December 31, 2023 is on the Commission work plan.
- Both editions. Florida Building Commission code links, listing the 8th Edition (2023) and the 9th Edition (2026).
- Miami-Dade cutoff. Regulatory and Economic Resources notice, October 7, 2026: the 9th Edition takes effect December 31, 2026 for that county’s permit applications.
- Wind-mitigation form. Florida DFS, mitigation notices and forms. Citizens Property Insurance, Wind Loss Mitigation Guide for OIR-B1-1802 revision 04/26, on the April 1, 2026 inspection date.
- Contractor offers. Section 489.147. Department of Business and Professional Regulation fact sheet on prohibited property-insurance practices.
- License check. MyFloridaLicense.
- Insurance help. Florida DFS Consumer Services.
General information, not a permit and not insurance advice
This Is Florida does not issue permits, inspect roofs, or sell insurance. Codes, forms, and policy terms change. The building official for your address applies the code to the job. The insurer applies the policy. For a dispute about coverage, talk to the insurer and, if you need one, a Florida lawyer.