What if an EF3 Hits Bent Tree?

Remember the destruction of the October 2019 EF3 tornado in North Dallas? What if it hit us at Lakes of Bent Tree? How would that affect each of us financially?

The harsh reality is that modern HOA property insurance policies come with high deductibles and coverage limitations (caps) and that translates to individual owners being assessed anywhere from $1,500 to more than $50,000 following a loss.

Will your homeowner's policy pay $50,000 for you?

The answer is “yes”, but only if you purchased Loss Assessment Coverage (also known as special assessment coverage). This is an add-on that does not come standard with your HO-6 policy. You must request it and set the coverage amount ($50,000) or more and name Lakes of Bent Tree Condominium Association as an "additional insured". Owners report paying less than $125/year for this coverage.

For our community to recover from a significant storm, it is critically important that all LoBT owners have Loss Assessment Coverage. In 2025, the community voted to require this coverage for all owners by an overwhelming margin of 95% to 5%.

➡️ Please register your Loss Assessment Coverage (LAC) here.  

We are fortunate that Texas has a regulation requiring insurance companies to make this valuable coverage available to homeowners. Most states don't have this.

➡️ See other articles on this topic.  

What is my financial risk?

In the worst case, a tornado like the October 2019 EF3 in North Dallas passing through our community would result in a special assessment of $30,000 to $45,000 to each homeowner (depending on the floor plan).

If we suffered a freeze and power grid failure, such as we experienced in February 2022, we would each likely face a special assessment between $4,200 and $6,500.

If we experienced a hailstorm, as we did in April 2024, we would each face a special assessment in the $1,200 to $1,800 range.

How will Loss Assessment Coverage help me?
Your homeowner’s policy will reimburse a special assessment from the Association. It will reimburse up to the limit of your Loss Assessment Coverage (for example, $50,000). That money would be available quickly for you to send to the Association to start rebuilding.

Consider this scenario: Assume a major windstorm blows the roofs off some buildings in the community and the Association's deductible and uninsured portion comes to $1,350,000. This is a realistic example. Based on the table above, all owners living in a one-story unit will have an obligation of $16,216 (as shown in Column 2).

In this example, the Association would levy a special assessment, equally against all owners, regardless of who was and who wasn't affected. Each owner's share would be based on their floor plan/ownership percentage (as demonstrated in Column 2).

Owners with Loss Assessment Coverage would then submit a claim to their insurance company for reimbursement.

Owners would then pay their special assessment (in this example $16,216) and the Association would start re-roofing.

Please confirm that you have a policy in place, or advise if you decided against it. We want to be able to inform owners of how well we are protected, collectively.