Insurance & Risk · Quorum Case Files Season 9 Companion · Limits and the Declarations Page
Per Occurrence or Aggregate: Reading the Declarations Page Instead of Asking the Broker
A forty-three-story oceanfront tower on Singer Island, Florida, took two hurricanes in September 2004. Its board asked its broker the one question that mattered, got an answer, and spent more than one hundred million dollars against it. The carrier read the same limit differently. No court ever ruled on which reading was right, and that silence is the lesson.
Educational notice. This information is educational in nature and should not be construed as legal or insurance advice. The facts recounted below are drawn from two court opinions resolving procedural questions in a broker-liability suit; the underlying policy-language dispute between the association and its carrier was settled, not adjudicated, and the final outcome of the broker suit is not confirmed in the sources used here. Consult qualified association counsel and a licensed insurance professional regarding your association's coverage and jurisdiction.
Two Storms, One Policy, One Word
Tiara Condominium is a single oceanfront high-rise on Singer Island, on Florida’s Atlantic coast. The court opinions that carry its story describe it as a forty-three-story condominium tower and say nothing more about it: no unit count, no year built, no board roster, no renewal history. In a season about declarations pages, the thinness of the record is part of the point. Nobody in the record quotes the declarations page. What the record preserves is what the board was told about it.
The association’s insurance broker was Marsh. Marsh had placed the association’s windstorm coverage with Citizens. The Supreme Court of Florida describes the limit in one phrase: “a loss limit in an amount close to $50 million.” The opinion does not give the exact figure, and this article will not either.
In September 2004, Hurricane Frances struck Florida. Weeks later, in the same month, Hurricane Jeanne struck. Two storms, one building, one policy period. The opinions name the storms and do not describe what they did to the building. They describe what the building cost afterward: the association ultimately spent “more than $100 million” on remediation.
Somewhere in the weeks that followed, on a day the record does not fix, the board asked its broker the question that any director reading this article would have asked. Was the limit close to fifty million dollars per occurrence, so that each hurricane carried its own limit? Or was it aggregate, one total for the policy period, however many storms? Marsh answered per occurrence. The Florida Supreme Court states what happened next in a single sentence: “Tiara proceeded with more expensive remediation efforts.”
Then Citizens took the position that the limit was approximately fifty million dollars in the aggregate. Fifty million, once. The association and Citizens eventually settled for approximately $89 million. The association had spent more than $100 million. It then sued its broker.
Nothing in the record suggests the board acted carelessly or in bad faith. It did what a reasonable group of volunteers does: it turned to the professional it paid and took the professional’s answer. The problem this article is about is narrower and more useful than fault. The board spent against a coverage figure it had not read in the policy, and when the carrier read the same figure differently, the only evidence of what the board had been promised was the broker’s word.
The Mechanism: How a Limit Applies
What follows is general insurance vocabulary, explained as general vocabulary. None of it is Tiara’s policy language, which no court quoted. It is the vocabulary a director needs in order to read a declarations page at all.
The declarations page
The declarations page is the front of a property policy, usually a page or two. It typically identifies the named insured, the policy period, the insured property, the premium, the forms and endorsements that make up the policy, and the limits. It is the one document in the transaction that the insured and the carrier both agree is the policy. Everything a board believes about its coverage either appears on that page and in the forms it references, or it is a belief about the policy rather than a fact of the policy.
Per occurrence
A limit stated as applying “per occurrence,” “each occurrence,” or “any one occurrence” is, in general usage, available for each separate covered event. If a building suffers two separate windstorm losses in one policy period, a per-occurrence limit applies to each one. Two storms, two limits.
Aggregate
A limit stated as an “aggregate,” an “annual aggregate,” or a “policy aggregate” is, in general usage, the most the policy pays in total during the policy period. The period is the bucket; every covered event draws from the same bucket; when the bucket is empty it is empty. Two storms, one limit. A limit stated once with no per-occurrence words beside it is, for a reader, a reason to keep reading rather than a reassurance.
Loss limit
A “loss limit” is a cap on what the policy pays for a loss. The phrase, standing alone, does not tell the reader whether the cap applies per event or in total. That is why the Tiara board had to ask the question. The opinion’s phrase, “a loss limit in an amount close to $50 million,” is exactly the kind of description that does not resolve the question that mattered most.
Why the same number is two different policies
On a single-loss year, the distinction never surfaces. A board files one claim against one limit and knows where it stands. The distinction surfaces when a policy period contains more than one covered event, and in a coastal hurricane season that is not an exotic scenario. In September 2004 it was a Tuesday. On a building that will cost more than one hundred million dollars to put right, “per occurrence” and “aggregate” are not two readings of the same policy. They are a one-hundred-million-dollar policy and a fifty-million-dollar policy that happen to share a declarations page.
The Declarations Page
Every episode in Season 9 stops once, after the loss and before the reckoning, to read the declarations page in three parts: what the board thought it had bought, what the policy actually provided, and what the distance cost. At Tiara, the second column is the honest one.
| Part | What the record shows | Source and posture |
|---|---|---|
| What the board thought it had bought | Windstorm coverage with a loss limit close to $50 million, per occurrence. Two hurricanes, two occurrences, roughly $100 million available. This was not a guess; it was the answer the board received from its broker when it asked directly. | Fla. Sup. Ct., No. SC10-1022 (Mar. 7, 2013), reciting the facts. Verified against the opinion. |
| What the policy actually said | Unknown in the record. Neither opinion quotes the declarations page or the limit clause. The broker said per occurrence; the carrier later took the position the limit was approximately $50 million aggregate. The association and the carrier settled before any court construed the language. No court ever ruled on which reading was correct. | Same opinion. The absence is the finding. |
| What the distance cost, and who paid | Spent on remediation: more than $100 million. Received from the carrier in settlement: approximately $89 million. The distance is at least $11 million; the opinion says “more than,” so the true figure is larger by an amount the record does not give. The record does not itemize how the association funded the shortfall. | Same opinion. The $11 million figure is arithmetic on the two reported figures, not a number stated in the opinion. |
One feature of that table deserves a sentence. The carrier that had taken the position that the limit was fifty million dollars aggregate paid approximately eighty-nine million dollars in settlement. The record does not explain the gap between the carrier’s stated position and its payment, and this article does not speculate. A settlement is a negotiated number. It can reflect the strength of the insured’s reading, the cost of the fight, or any of a dozen considerations that never reach an opinion. What a settlement is not is a ruling on what the policy said.
The Record
The association sued Marsh in federal court. The claims that matter for this article are negligence and breach of fiduciary duty. The theory, as the courts recite the facts, was that the broker told the board the coverage was per occurrence, the board relied on that answer, and the board spent accordingly.
The certified question
Marsh’s defense that reached the Florida Supreme Court was a doctrine called the economic loss rule. In general terms, the rule provides that in certain situations where two parties have a contract and the only harm is financial, the injured party sues on the contract and cannot also sue in tort. Applied to a broker relationship, the argument is that a dispute over coverage advice is a contract case, and negligence and fiduciary-duty claims are barred.
The case was in federal court, so the Eleventh Circuit had to apply Florida law, and Florida law on the reach of the economic loss rule was unsettled. The Eleventh Circuit did what a federal court does when it does not wish to guess at state law: it certified the question to the Supreme Court of Florida.
On March 7, 2013, in Tiara Condominium Association, Inc. v. Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc., No. SC10-1022, the Florida Supreme Court answered. The holding, as the court wrote it: “we hold that the application of the economic loss rule is limited to products liability cases.” The court stated that it was receding from its earlier decisions that had applied the rule more broadly. The economic loss rule therefore did not bar the association’s negligence and fiduciary-duty claims against its broker, and those claims went forward.
The decision is significant well beyond condominium governance. It narrowed a doctrine across Florida tort law, and it did so in a case whose vehicle was a condominium board on a barrier island arguing about one word on a policy. For boards, the relevance is narrower and practical: in Florida, after Tiara, a dispute of this kind with a broker is not confined to contract theories by the economic loss rule.
Summary judgment denied
On remand, the case returned to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. On January 13, 2014, in a decision reported at 991 F. Supp. 2d 1271, the court denied Marsh’s motion for summary judgment. In doing so it recognized an “enhanced duty of care” where a broker has a “special relationship” with its client.
The general shape of that ruling, stated only as far as the record goes: a broker owes its client a duty of care; where the relationship is more than arm’s length, that duty may be higher. Whether Marsh and Tiara had that kind of relationship was a question of fact for trial. That is what denial of summary judgment means. It is not a finding that the association won. It is a ruling that the association’s case could continue.
Where the record ends
The record used for this article ends there, in January 2014, roughly ten years after the storms, with the case alive. The sources consulted do not contain a trial, a verdict, a settlement, or a dismissal of the broker suit, and the final outcome is not confirmed. This article does not fill that silence. What the board ultimately recovered from its broker, if anything, is unknown here.
| Ledger line | Figure | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Windstorm loss limit | Close to $50 million | As recited by the Florida Supreme Court |
| What the board was told | Per occurrence (roughly $100 million for two storms) | As recited; broker’s answer |
| What the carrier said | Approximately $50 million, aggregate | As recited; carrier’s position, never adjudicated |
| What the carrier paid | Approximately $89 million | Settlement, as recited |
| What the association spent | More than $100 million | As recited |
| What the courts decided | Broker claims not barred by the economic loss rule; summary judgment denied; enhanced duty recognized where a special relationship exists | SC10-1022 (2013); 991 F. Supp. 2d 1271 (2014) |
| What the association recovered from the broker | Unknown | Not confirmed in the record |
The Florida footnote: the number behind the number
Because this is a Florida case, one statute belongs in the file. Fla. Stat. § 631.57 governs the Florida Insurance Guaranty Association, the fund that steps in when a property insurer becomes insolvent. For a policy covering a condominium or homeowners’ association that has a responsibility to insure residential units, § 631.57(1)(a)3.a provides that the fund’s obligation includes the amount of each covered property claim that is less than $200,000 multiplied by the number of units. That per-unit figure was $100,000 until July 1, 2020, when chapter 2020-54 doubled it. The fund never owes more than the insolvent insurer owed.
The guaranty fund did not figure at Tiara. Citizens paid; the fight was over how much, never whether. The statute is noted here because it is the limit behind the limit for every Florida association: whatever the declarations page says, if the carrier fails, § 631.57 is the number that governs, and it is a number a board reads once and records.
What a Board Does With This
The lesson at Tiara is not “do not trust the broker.” The board asked the right question of the right professional. The lesson is that asking was not finished. CICSC Standard FIN-006, Master Policy Insurance Adequacy Review, frames insurance adequacy as a recurring governance obligation performed on a calendar with a documented record, and it is explicit that the board does not select limits or construe coverage itself. Applied to the mechanism in this case, the standard’s practice looks like the following. It is a practice, not advice; what any policy provides is a question for the association’s licensed professional and counsel.
A director has read the limit, and the words beside it
Before any board spends against an insurance limit, someone on the board has read that limit on the declarations page itself, together with the qualifying words beside it, and has followed any reference to an endorsement or form that controls how the limit applies. That reading is recorded in the minutes as having occurred. The point is not that a director becomes an insurance expert. The point is that the board is spending against a number it can point to in a document the carrier also recognizes, rather than against a recollection of what it was told.
The basis question is one of the written questions
FIN-006 § 3.1 directs the board to put its questions to the insurance professional in writing at each review. For property and windstorm coverage, the basis on which each limit applies belongs on that list, stated plainly: is each limit per occurrence or aggregate, per building or blanket, and subject to what deductible. The answer comes back in writing and is attached to the record of the review. Where the answer rests on the carrier’s position rather than the broker’s reading, the board records that it asked for the carrier’s confirmation. At Tiara, the broker’s answer survived only as recited testimony in a lawsuit. A written answer attached to the minutes is a different kind of evidence, for the board and for everyone else.
The record distinguishes what was read from what was said
FIN-006 § 4.1 requires each review to be entered in the minutes with the professional consulted, the questions asked, the answers received, any gap identified, and the board’s decision on each gap. For the limit-basis question, a disciplined record distinguishes three things: what the declarations page states, what the broker advised, and what the carrier confirmed. Where those three agree, the board has a policy it understands. Where they do not, the board has identified a gap before a storm identifies it. See board resolutions in practice for how a decision of this kind is recorded so that a future board can find it.
Spending decisions after a loss cite the coverage basis
After a covered loss, a board authorizing remediation is spending against an expected recovery. The authorizing resolution typically states the coverage the board understands to be available and the document on which that understanding rests. “Tiara proceeded with more expensive remediation efforts” is the court’s description of a board that believed it had roughly one hundred million dollars behind it. A resolution that recited the limit, its stated basis, and the source of that statement would have shown exactly what the board knew and when. Whether it would have changed the outcome is unknowable; that it would have changed the record is not. See authorizing expenditures and spending limits.
The review recurs, and the triggers include a change of broker or carrier
FIN-006 § 2.1 calendars the adequacy review to each renewal with a named owner, and § 2.2 adds triggers that include a change in management company, agent, or broker and any loss, claim, or near-miss. A limit basis confirmed once is a fact about one policy period. Forms change at renewal. The confirmation is repeated each time, and the record shows that it was.
The guaranty fund figure is in the file
For a Florida association, the § 631.57 per-unit multiplier belongs in the insurance file beside the declarations page, with the date it was last confirmed. It is not a coverage decision. It is a fact about the floor beneath the policy, and FIN-006 § 4.3 contemplates an insurance file that holds exactly this kind of fact where a future board can find it.
When to Consult Counsel and the Insurance Professional
Boards typically bring the following to counsel and to their licensed insurance professional rather than resolving them at the table:
- What each limit on the association’s property and windstorm coverage is, and on what basis it applies: per occurrence or aggregate, per building or blanket, and subject to what deductible;
- Whether the carrier, and not only the broker, will confirm the basis of a limit in writing, and what form that confirmation takes;
- What the declaration and the applicable statute require the association to insure, and at what cadence the adequacy question recurs;
- How a post-loss remediation authorization should be documented where the board is spending against an expected insurance recovery;
- What the guaranty-fund provisions of the association’s state provide for an association policy if a carrier becomes insolvent, and how that figure is maintained in the insurance file;
- Whether, and on what theories, a dispute with a broker or carrier over coverage advice may be pursued in the association’s jurisdiction. In Florida, Tiara addressed one doctrinal barrier; it did not decide any association’s claim.
The Season 9 Companion Series
- The Liability Limit Is Sized to the Loss the Board Can Imagine — the liability limit vs. the loss
- Eighty Percent of What? The Flood Coinsurance Clause and the Warning in the Board’s Own File — the warning the board shelved
- Who Gets the Mail: Coverage That Lapses During a Management Change — the notice nobody forwarded
- Per Occurrence or Aggregate: Reading the Declarations Page Instead of Asking the Broker — the limit the board misread (this article)
- A Paid Claim Is Not a Funded Rebuild: Custody of Insurance Proceeds and the Sell-or-Assess Vote — the proceeds and the vote
- The Appraisal Clause, Both Ways: The Lowball a Board Fought and the Award a Board Poisoned — the appraisal clause, both ways
- Same Street, Two Policies: The Renewal Decision Is the Only One That Survives the Fire — two boards, one street, two renewals
- The Twenty Percent Building: A Policy Sized to Partial Damage in a Building That Burned Whole — the building the market would not insure
Related reading: Directors & Officers insurance on reading a policy’s limits and retention; how directors lose the business judgment shield on why an informed, documented process is the protection that operates before a claim; Florida special assessments on the instrument most often used when a recovery falls short of a rebuild. CICSC Standard FIN-006 is available in the Standards Center.
Disclaimer. This article is published by the Common Interest Community Standards Council for educational and informational purposes only. It is not legal, insurance, or financial advice and does not establish an attorney-client relationship. The facts and quotations concerning Tiara Condominium Association are drawn from Tiara Condominium Association, Inc. v. Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc., No. SC10-1022 (Fla. Mar. 7, 2013), decided on a question certified by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, and from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida’s order denying summary judgment, 991 F. Supp. 2d 1271 (S.D. Fla. Jan. 13, 2014). Neither opinion construes the association’s policy language; the coverage dispute with the carrier was settled, and the final disposition of the broker suit is not confirmed in the sources used. Statutory text is drawn from Fla. Stat. § 631.57 as published by the Florida Legislature and from chapter 2020-54, Laws of Florida. General explanations of per-occurrence and aggregate limits, declarations pages, the economic loss rule, and summary judgment are general and are not descriptions of any party’s policy or position. Nothing in this article characterizes the conduct of the association, its directors, its broker, or its carrier beyond what the cited opinions recite. Questions about a specific association’s coverage, claim, or exposure are questions for association counsel and a licensed insurance professional. CIC-SC, its authors, and its members assume no liability for actions taken in reliance on this content.
Published by the Common Interest Community Standards Council (CICSC). Companion to Quorum Case Files Season 9, Episode 4, and to CICSC Standard FIN-006, Master Policy Insurance Adequacy Review. Part of the CICSC Member Education Library. © 2026 CICSC. Educational use permitted with attribution.