A Florida homeowner’s dispute over a water-damage payment has clarified when a state law requiring notice before suing a property insurer applies. On October 22, 2026, the Florida Supreme Court ruled that the presuit-notice requirement introduced in 2021 cannot be applied retroactively to property insurance policies issued before the law took effect. The case involved Rebecca Hughes, whose homeowners policy with Universal Property & Casualty Insurance Company ran from April 24, 2019, to April 24, 2020. After disputing the insurer’s payment for water damage, Hughes sued in August 2021 without giving the notice required under the new law. The trial court dismissed her complaint, but the Sixth District Court of Appeal reversed. In Universal Property & Casualty Insurance Company v. Rebecca Hughes, No. SC2024-0025 (Fla. Oct. 22, 2026), the Supreme Court approved the Sixth District’s decision and rejected a conflicting ruling from the Fourth District. All 7 justices agreed with the outcome, with Justice Tanenbaum writing a separate concurring opinion.
Florida water-damage claim dispute: How the Rebecca Hughes case reached the Supreme Court
Hughes held a homeowners insurance policy with Universal from April 24, 2019, to April 24, 2020. On May 29, 2019, she filed a claim for water damage. Universal reviewed the claim and made a payment, but Hughes considered the amount insufficient. She obtained 3 repair bids and sought additional payment from the insurer, according to the Florida Supreme Court’s opinion. On July 1, 2021, section 627.70152 of the Florida Statutes took effect as part of a broader overhaul of property insurance law. The statute covers lawsuits arising under residential or commercial property insurance policies, subject to its terms and exceptions. It introduced a requirement for claimants to give the Florida Department of Financial Services written notice of their intention to sue at least 10 business days before filing a lawsuit. Under subsection (5), a court must dismiss without prejudice a suit involving a claim for which the required notice was not given. A dismissal without prejudice does not, by itself, prevent the claimant from bringing the case again.On August 4, 2021, Hughes sued Universal over the disputed payment without submitting the new notice. Universal asked the trial court to dismiss her complaint, arguing that the notice requirement applied. The trial court agreed and dismissed the case without prejudice. Hughes appealed, and Florida’s Sixth District Court of Appeal reversed the dismissal. The dispute reached the state’s highest court to resolve a conflict among the district appeals courts over whether the new requirement applied to policies issued before July 1, 2021.In Cole v. Universal Property & Casualty Insurance Co., 363 So. 3d 1089 (Fla. 4th DCA 2023), the Fourth District had concluded that the notice requirement applied retroactively to existing policies. The Third District later adopted that interpretation in a separate case, while the First, Second, Fifth and Sixth Districts concluded that the statute did not apply retroactively. The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Hughes’s case on February 5, 2025. The recording is available through The Florida Channel.
Why the Florida Supreme Court rejected retroactive application
Chief Justice Couriel authored the majority opinion. The court examined whether the Florida Legislature had clearly stated that section 627.70152 should apply to policies issued before July 1, 2021. Under the court’s established two-step test, it first looks for a clear legislative intention to make a law retroactive. Only if that intention is established does it consider whether retroactive application would violate constitutional principles. The court found no clear command in the statute. It considered the phrase “all suits” in section 627.70152(1), which describes the lawsuits covered by the provision, but concluded that the wording did not establish that the law extended to suits involving policies issued before its effective date.The court also rejected the Fourth District’s reasoning that the Legislature would have expressly excluded older policies if it intended the law to apply only to newer ones. According to the Supreme Court, the absence of language limiting a statute to future policies does not amount to clear evidence that lawmakers intended it to apply retroactively. The statute’s stated effective date also weighed against applying it to earlier policies. Universal argued that the notice requirement was procedural rather than substantive. The court disagreed after considering the law as a whole. The provision did more than establish a filing procedure: it delayed an insured’s ability to sue and gave insurers an additional opportunity to evaluate and pay claims before litigation. It also prescribed dismissal for noncompliance and, under subsection (8)(b), restricted recovery of attorney fees incurred before dismissal. That fee provision was subsequently repealed in 2022. The court concluded that these effects altered the rights and obligations of policyholders and insurers under property insurance contracts. It therefore declined to apply the notice requirement to Hughes’s 2019 policy.
What the ruling means for Florida property insurance policyholders
The key date is when the policy was issued, rather than simply when the damage occurred or when a lawsuit was filed. The Supreme Court held that section 627.70152’s presuit-notice requirement does not apply retroactively to policies issued before the provision took effect on July 1, 2021. Because Hughes’s policy was issued in April 2019, her lawsuit could not be dismissed for failing to comply with that later requirement. The ruling does not eliminate the pre-suit notice requirement for all property insurance lawsuits. The requirement remains applicable to policies issued on or after July 1, 2021, subject to the statute’s terms and exceptions. The decision addresses policies issued before that date and does not resolve the underlying dispute over whether Universal paid Hughes the correct amount for her water damage.Justice Tanenbaum wrote separately, concurring with the outcome but offering a different legal rationale. He pointed to section 624.21 of the Florida Statutes, which provides that amendments to the Insurance Code operate prospectively unless a contrary legislative intention is specified. In his view, that provision independently supported applying the notice requirement only prospectively because the Legislature had not expressly directed retroactive application.The Supreme Court approved the Sixth District’s decision in Hughes to the extent it was consistent with the opinion and disapproved the Fourth District’s contrary decision in Cole. That resolved the conflict among Florida’s district appeals courts over the reach of the 2021 notice requirement. The opinion states that it is not final until the period for filing a motion for rehearing expires and any timely motion is decided. The ruling does not determine whether Hughes is ultimately entitled to a larger insurance payment; it establishes that the 2021 pre-suit notice requirement cannot be used retroactively to dismiss her lawsuit over a policy issued in 2019.
