Personal umbrella vs. business GL in Florida: which excess actually sits over what

A personal umbrella is excess. It wants underlying auto and homeowners (or HO-6) at stated minimums — often $250,000 or $300,000 auto and $300,000 home. If the underlying is Florida’s thin auto minimum, the umbrella will not attach, or it will make you raise the auto first. That is the first fix, not a luxury.

It can also cover certain rentals, boats, and personal injury claims the home policy handles badly. Every umbrella is a manuscript of exclusions. Teen drivers, boats over a certain horsepower, and some dogs get listed or kicked out. We disclose them.

If the crash happened in the company van, or the slip happened in the shop, the personal umbrella will point at the business exclusion. You need GL, commercial auto, and often a commercial umbrella. Forming an LLC does not create those policies. It also does not make a personal umbrella follow the LLC.

Doral owners who “just run it out of the house” still have a premises and an operations exposure. Homeowners liability is not a store policy. We will say that until it sticks.

$1 million personal umbrella is the starting adult number for a household with a house, cars, and teen drivers. $2 million is common when there is a pool, a rental, or a visible asset base. Jury verdicts in South Florida are not shy. The premium on a $1 million umbrella is often less than people guess once the underlying is in order.

Commercial umbrellas follow the contracts you sign. If GCs want $5 million, we quote $5 million. Bidding $1 million into a $5 million spec is not a negotiation. It is a lost bid.

A boat on a Palmetto Bay canal, an Airbnb room, a golf cart in a gated community — each one can fall out of the home policy and out of the umbrella unless scheduled. Tell us. The application will ask. “I forgot the boat” is a claim fact pattern we have already seen.

Umbrella companies will ask for the underlying declarations. Have them ready. We bind umbrellas after the auto and home are real, not in a vacuum.

Start with auto and home if those are thin. Then liability. Then umbrella. You can begin on the quote flow by picking liability, auto, and home together. An advisor will look at the underlying limits before selling excess on top of air.