(Tallahassee, FL – Insurance News 360) – In early January, the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation (FLOIR) announced that up to 71,500 personal residential and commercial residential policies may be removed from the Citizens Property Insurance Corporation. The two companies that will participate are Heritage Property & Casualty Insurance Company and Southern Oak Insurance Company. , Heritage Property & Casualty has approval to remove ?  up to 55,000 personal residential policies and up to 1,500 commercial residential policies. Southern Oak Insurance Company got the okay to remove up to 15,000 personal residential policies.

The take-out periods are March 22, 2016 for personal residential impacting both the Personal Lines/Coastal Account policies and March 15, 2016 for commercial residential impacting both the Commercial Lines/Coastal Account policies. This is part of the state’s ongoing depopulation effort to reduce the number of policies in the state-created Citizens and transfer them to the private insurance market.

This announcement means that up to 277,149 policies have been approved for take-outs so far this year.

Policyholders who receive a take-out offer may choose to remain covered by Citizens through the opt-out process.

Source: Florida Office of Insurance Regulation.