Wind and Hail Deductibles in Houston

The percentage applies to the insured value of the building, not the size of the claim. Most owners find that out at claim time, which is the worst possible moment.

Most Houston commercial property owners meet their wind and hail deductible twice. Once as a number on a declarations page that nobody explained, and once at claim time, when the cheque comes back far smaller than the damage.

The gap between those two moments is almost always the same misunderstanding, and it is worth stating before anything else.

The arithmetic, first

A percentage deductible is calculated on the insured value of the building. Not on the size of the loss.

Take a building insured for $500,000 with a 2% wind and hail deductible:

Deductible	Applied to $500,000 insured value	You pay first
1%	$500,000 × 0.01	$5,000
2%	$500,000 × 0.02	$10,000
5%	$500,000 × 0.05	$25,000

Now put a hailstorm through it. The roof takes $12,000 of damage. At 2%, your deductible is $10,000, so you recover $2,000.

Not $11,760 — which is what you would get if the 2% came off the claim. The deductible was fixed by the building’s insured value before the storm arrived, and it does not shrink to fit a smaller loss. At 5% on the same building, that $12,000 hail claim pays nothing at all, because the deductible exceeds the loss.

Find your own building’s insured value on your declarations page, find the percentage next to wind and hail, and multiply. That number is what you are carrying, and it is worth knowing before a storm rather than after one.

Percentage versus flat, and why the market works this way

Ordinary property deductibles are flat dollar amounts. Wind and hail is usually a percentage, and the reason is structural rather than arbitrary.

A fire is one building. A hailstorm is every building in its path, on the same afternoon, across a carrier’s entire book. That correlation is what makes catastrophe exposure different from everything else a property policy covers, and a percentage deductible is how the carrier keeps the retained portion of a catastrophe loss proportional to the value at risk. A flat $5,000 deductible means something very different on a $200,000 building than on a $20 million one; 2% means the same thing on both.

What pushes a given building toward the higher end of the range on offer:

Roof age and roof type, which is the single biggest factor on most hail-exposed risks
Construction — frame, masonry, steel
Occupancy, and what is inside
Loss history on the building and in the area
Distance from the coast

We do not publish a typical band here, because the useful number is not a market average — it is the one on your declarations page, and it is printed there already.

Three different deductibles that people call one thing

A commercial property policy can carry all three of these at once, at three different amounts. Almost no owner knows that until a claim makes it matter.

All-other-perils deductible. Usually a flat dollar amount. This is the one that applies to fire, theft, water damage from a burst pipe, vandalism — the ordinary losses.

Wind and hail deductible. Usually a percentage. Applies to wind or hail damage generally, whether or not the event has a name.

Named-storm deductible. A percentage, applying only when the event has been named, and often set higher than the wind and hail figure.

The practical consequence: the same roof damage can carry three very different deductibles depending on how the event that caused it is classified. When a storm is named partway through its life, or when damage occurs on the edge of a named system, the classification is genuinely arguable — and that argument is worth real money. Knowing which lines are on your policy, and at what percentages, is what lets you have that conversation from a position rather than a surprise.

Where the wind coverage actually comes from in Harris County

This is where general Texas content tends to go vague, and where the detail is a statutory line rather than a general sense of “the coast.”

The Harris County communities inside the designated catastrophe area — the slice east of State Highway 146 — sit where TWIA can write wind and hail on part of the city. The rest of Harris County is outside it, and wind and hail stay inside the property policy.

Two things worth being precise about, because competitor pages routinely are not:

Fourteen first-tier coastal counties are written countywide. Harris is not one of them. Harris is a second-tier carve-out by Commissioner’s finding, which is why the boundary is a highway rather than a county line.
Which side of that line your building sits on changes where the wind coverage comes from, and therefore what your deductible structure looks like.

Moon Insurance is a registered TWIA agent and writes TWIA directly, and also writes surplus lines wind. That matters here in a specific way: the options described on this page are ones this office can actually place, rather than a survey of a market somebody else transacts in.

If your building is in TWIA territory and was constructed or substantially improved after 1988, the WPI-8 certificate requirement applies — the windstorm certification confirming the structure met the applicable building standard. Our windstorm insurance page covers that in full, including what happens when the certificate cannot be located.

Wind, flood and storm surge are three different questions

Short, but it is the second most common misunderstanding after the deductible arithmetic.

Flood is excluded from the commercial property policy and requires separate coverage.

Storm surge is flood, not wind — regardless of the hurricane that pushed it inland. A building with excellent wind coverage, a sensible named-storm deductible and no flood policy can be comprehensively exposed by a single event, and the owner will discover the split during the adjustment.

Our flood insurance page covers the separate policy and how it is written.

What changed going into 2026

Several years of heavy Texas storm losses have hardened commercial property rates, and the effect has not landed only on premium. Deductible structures have moved upward at the same time, which is why a renewal can arrive with both a higher price and a larger retained loss.

That combination feels like being charged more for less, and in a straightforward sense it is. It is also how a carrier continues to write in a market where catastrophe losses have run ahead of what the rates assumed. The useful response is not to argue with the market but to find out exactly what your renewal now retains — because a deductible that moved from 1% to 2% on a $1 million building has quietly transferred another $10,000 onto you.

What to check on your own policy before renewal

Go through the declarations page with this list beside it:

Which deductibles appear, and at what percentages. All three lines, not just the one you remember.
What value each percentage applies to. Usually the building’s insured value — but confirm whether it is per building, per occurrence, or applied to the total insured value across a schedule, because on a multi-building schedule that difference is enormous.
Whether a named-storm deductible exists separately from the wind and hail line.
Roof age and how the policy treats it — replacement cost versus actual cash value on the roof is a decision that can matter more than the deductible percentage.
Coinsurance, and whether your stated values would survive a coinsurance check at claim time.
Whether business interruption carries its own waiting period, which is a separate retention again and works on time rather than money. Our business interruption page covers how that is structured.

If your property is packaged inside a business owner’s policy, the same questions apply — a BOP carries wind and hail deductibles too, and packaging does not soften them.

The full coverage picture sits on our commercial property insurance page. This article is the deductible half of it, because that is the half that arrives as a surprise.

Before your renewal date

Bring the declarations page. Whether the building is in Houston proper, out toward League City and the first-tier coastal counties, or inland of State Highway 146, the questions are the same and the answers are not — and it is a considerably better conversation to have with a renewal in hand than with an adjuster on the roof.

Common questions

Is my 2% deductible 2% of the claim?

No, and this is the misunderstanding the whole article exists to correct. The percentage is calculated on the insured value of the building, not on the size of the loss. On a building insured for $500,000, a 2% wind and hail deductible is $10,000. If hail does $12,000 of damage, you recover $2,000 — because the deductible was fixed by the building's value before the storm arrived, and it does not shrink to fit a smaller claim.

What is the difference between a wind and hail deductible and a named-storm deductible?

A wind and hail deductible applies to any wind or hail event. A named-storm deductible applies only when the event has been named, and it usually sits at a higher percentage than the wind and hail figure. A policy can carry both, and which one applies to a given loss depends on how the event is classified — which is where a great many claim disputes begin.

Does my commercial property policy cover flood?

No. Flood is excluded from the property policy and needs separate coverage. Storm surge is flood, not wind, regardless of the storm that pushed it inland — so a coastal property with excellent wind coverage and no flood policy can be badly exposed by the same event.

Does TWIA write in Harris County?

Only part of it. The Harris County communities inside the designated catastrophe area — the slice east of State Highway 146 — sit where TWIA can write wind and hail. The rest of Harris County is outside it, and wind and hail stay inside the property policy. Moon is a registered TWIA agent and writes surplus lines wind as well.

Why did my deductible go up when my premium went up too?

They are two levers on the same problem, and carriers have been pulling both. Several years of heavy Texas storm losses have hardened commercial property rates and pushed deductible structures upward at the same time. A higher percentage transfers more of a catastrophe loss back to the owner, which is how a carrier keeps writing in a market it is losing money in.

Can I buy the percentage deductible down?

Sometimes, depending on the market and the risk — it is a question worth raising specifically at renewal rather than assuming the structure on your current declarations page is the only one available. Bring your renewal to us and we will tell you what the markets we access will actually do with your building.

Sources: TWIA — coverage and eligibility; TWIA — windstorm certification; TDI — windstorm insurance; TDI — commercial insurance. Verified 3 August 2026.

General information about Texas filing rules, not legal advice and not a quote. Requirements change; confirm your own through the Texas DPS License Eligibility system before acting. Published 3 August 2026.