Wildfire Insurance Crisis for California Homeowners
Homeowners in fire-prone areas of California may soon find there’s no one to insure their properties.
Last year, the state barred insurance companies from canceling policies on about 800,000 homes in or near areas with a high risk of wildfires. That ban is set to expire soon and there’s no way to renew it, according to the New York Times.
Insurance companies, which have been financially battered by huge payouts in high-risk areas, are expected to continue pulling out of them unless California officials allow them to raise rates.
“The marketplace has largely collapsed” in those high-risk areas, Graham Knaus, executive director of the California State Association of Counties, which has lobbied state lawmakers on the matter, told the Times. “It’s a very large geographic area of the state that is facing this.”
California wildfires have killed
