Insurance
— Attorney’s fees — Award of fees to insureds following settlement of
coverage dispute with insurer — Trial court abused discretion by awarding a
multiplier where case was not a complicated case, and there was no evidence
that insureds had any difficulty obtaining counsel

FEDERATED NATIONAL INSURANCE COMPANY, Appellant, v. WILLIAM
JOYCE and JUDITH JOYCE, Appellees. 5th District. Case No. 5D15-1210. Opinion
filed November 20, 2015. Appeal from the Circuit Court for St. Johns County,
Howard M. Maltz, Judge. Counsel: Derek J. Angell, of O’Connor & O’Connor,
LLC, Winter Park, for Appellant. Tracy L. Markham, of Avolio and Hanlon P.C.,
St. Augustine, for Appellee.

(PER CURIAM.) Federated National Insurance Company
(“Federated”) appeals the award of $76,300 in attorney’s fees to William and
Judith Joyce (“the Joyces”), following settlement of the parties’ insurance
dispute. The action arose from a denial of coverage based on an alleged
material misrepresentation in the Joyces’ homeowners insurance application. In
denying the claim, Federated argued that the Joyces had failed to disclose two
previous insurance claims at the time of their application. However, early in
discovery, it came to light that the Joyces had actually disclosed the prior
claims.1

Federated acknowledged the error, and the parties executed a
settlement agreement for $23,500, exclusive of attorney’s fees. The trial court
awarded the Joyces over $38,000 in attorney’s fees based on the number of hours
their attorney worked multiplied by a reasonable hourly rate — the “lodestar
figure.” See Fla. Patient’s Comp. Fund v. Rowe, 472 So. 2d 1145,
1151-52 (Fla. 1985), modified by Standard Guar. Ins. Co. v. Quanstrom,
555 So. 2d 828, 829 (Fla. 1990). We affirm this portion of the award. However,
the trial court improperly awarded a “multiplier” of 2.0, which we reverse.

In Rowe, the Florida Supreme Court adopted the
federal lodestar approach, which includes “a ‘strong presumption’ that the
lodestar represents the ‘reasonable fee.’ ” Progressive Express Ins. Co. v.
Schultz, 948 So. 2d 1027, 1030 (Fla. 5th DCA 2007) (citing Pennsylvania
v. Del. Valley Citizens’ Council for Clean Air, 478 U.S. 546, 565 (1986)).
“The application of a multiplier is the exception, not the rule . . . and this
presumption is overcome only in ‘rare’ and ‘exceptional’ circumstances.” State
Farm Fla. Ins. Co. v. Alvarez, 175 So. 3d 352 (Fla. 3d DCA 2015) (citing Perdue
v. Kenny A. ex rel. Winn, 559 U.S. 542, 544 (2010)).

This was not a complicated case. Either the Joyces had
falsified their insurance application, or Federated had made an error. There
were no esoteric legal issues or complicated factual disputes to resolve. As
one would anticipate given today’s legal market, there was no evidence the
Joyces had any difficulty obtaining counsel to handle this matter. Indeed, it
took only one phone call for the Joyces to secure counsel. While we review the
trial court’s decision for an abuse of discretion, “we are not required to
abandon what we learned as lawyers or our common sense in evaluating the
reasonableness of an award.” Trumbull Ins. Co. v. Wolentarski, 2 So. 3d
1050, 1057 (Fla. 3d DCA 2009) (citation omitted). This was not one of those
rare or exceptional cases in which the award of a multiplier was appropriate.

AFFIRMED IN PART; REVERSED IN PART. (COHEN and LAMBERT, JJ.,
and JORDAN, J.E., Associate Judge, concur.)

__________________

1The Joyces produced a copy of their
original insurance application, which properly disclosed the prior claims.
However, Federated’s agent had incorrectly transmitted the application data to
Federated without the prior claims information.