What A Week! | Insurance Requirements: The Hidden Design Driver

This episode explores a frequently overlooked factor in building design: the influence of property insurance requirements on construction documents and specifications. The conversation was sparked by a real project situation where FM Global entered the process late and issued extensive design comments after specifications were already underway. Steve Gantner, Elias Saltz and Dave Stutzman discuss how insurers often impose performance standards that exceed building codes, affecting materials, assemblies, and system design. When those requirements are discovered too late, the result can be costly redesign, coordination issues, and project delays. 

The key takeaway is simple but critical: identify the owner’s insurer early and communicate those requirements to the entire project team. Doing so helps prevent late-stage redesign, protects document coordination, and allows the building to be designed for risk performance from the start rather than corrected later.

Learning Points

• Industry insight: Building codes establish minimum life-safety requirements, but property insurers often require higher standards to reduce loss risk from fire, wind, flood, or structural failure.
  
• Practice takeaway: Design teams should ask early in the project who the building’s insurer will be and obtain any applicable guidelines or requirements before design decisions are finalized.
• Process lesson: Insurance requirements affect multiple disciplines, including roofing systems, exterior wall assemblies, fire protection, and structural design. Communicating these requirements across the entire design team is critical.
• Risk or opportunity: Late discovery of insurance requirements can trigger redesign and coordination problems. Addressing them early can reduce project risk and potentially lower insurance premiums for the owner over the life of the building.