Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumIn Counties In Top 20% For Climate Risks, Home Insurance Premiums Rose 22% In 3 Years
Concern over the climate crisis may evaporate in the White House from January, but its financial costs are now starkly apparent to Americans in the form of soaring home insurance premiums with those in the riskiest areas for floods, storms and wildfires suffering the steepest rises of all. A mounting toll of severe hurricanes, floods, fires and other extreme events has caused average premiums to leap since 2020, with parts of the US most prone to disasters bearing the brunt. A climate crisis is starting to stir an insurance crisis.
Across all US counties, those in the top fifth for climate-driven disaster risk saw home premiums leap by 22% in just three years to 2023, compared to an overall average of a 13% rise in real terms, research of mortgage payment data has found. The Guardian has analyzed the studys data to illustrate the places in the US at highest risk from disasters and insurance hikes.
This has been the canary in the climate coalmine, and its now hitting households pocketbooks, said Ben Keys, an economist at the University of Pennsylvanias Wharton School and co-author of the research. You can deny climate change for whatever motivations you have but when insurance is going up because you live in a risky area, thats hard to deny. Keys said there is a tight correlation between premium rises and counties deemed most at risk from a metric drawn from past disasters combined with modeling of future events exacerbated by the climate crisis.
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If there is an epicenter of disaster risk and ballooning insurance in the US, its to be found along the Gulf of Mexico coast and, in particular, Florida, the state where home insurance costs more than $11,000 a year on average, surging by 42% just in 2023. Florida is a creature unto itself, said Keys. It has had so many waves of storms and insurers going bust that the risk exposure is kind of staggering. More than a dozen insurers have left Florida in the past seven years amid a stampede of disasters, placing strain upon a state-supported backstop insurance system that is now not solvent according to Ron DeSantis, Floridas governor. DeSantis has opted to pretend a key driver of this problem doesnt exist, deleting mention of climate change from state law in May. Donald Trump is similarly expected to remove climate considerations from US government agencies and federally-backed projects that face higher risks because of climate change.
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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/dec/05/climate-crisis-insurance-premiums
VGNonly
(7,755 posts)elevation about 12'. Their property values are dropping, while insurance rates are increasing. They should sell now, but claim that water levels are seasonal. They are diehard RWers.
hatrack
(61,068 posts)"Experience keeps a dear school, but fools will learn in no other."
Caribbeans
(1,014 posts)Just wondering....
Obama Waterfront: This photo really shows off the 30 acres of land where the mansion overlooks the ocean.
Quite obviously the person that bought these 30 acres - NEXT TO THE OCEAN - doesn't expect the ocean is going to flood this property for at least 20 years. Or maybe he knows that the oceans will rise everywhere except Martha's Vineyard. Or maybe there's a special O barrier or something.
Just another day in the United States of Confusion!
"Make yourselves sheep, and the wolves will eat you."
Ben Franklin, Letter to Thomas Cushing, 1773
A Nation of Sheep!
VGNonly
(7,755 posts)My BIL was a general operating officer/accountant of a local manufacturing plant. My sister was a former 2nd grade teacher. She was basically moderate but drank way too much kool-aide the older she got.
The hurricane in 2016 caused many thousands$ of damage to their property. I've only visited them once, Hilton Head is white bread central 10x.