ORINDA — If you have home insurance from State Farm, you will soon be paying more. That’s after an administrative law judge in Oakland endorsed an emergency rate hike for the largest insurer in the state.

California’s insurance crisis is affecting all areas of the state, but if there are places where the full depth of the problem can be felt, it’s in towns like Orinda.

In many places there, the trees grow over the road and homes are nestled in the forested hillsides. People pay a lot for the beauty, but lately, there’s been something else on their minds.

“This is part of the discussion now, you know, it’s ‘location, location, location,” Tom Stack said. “So, now the ‘location’ part doesn’t mean you’re near the schools and the amenities and all…it means, can I get out if there’s a fire?”

Stack is a real estate agent in Orinda. He won’t even show a house unless the buyer shows some ability to insure it. He said just about every aspect of his business is now being driven by insurance — or rather, the lack of it.

“What we know on a micro level in this area is that all of Orinda has been cut off. Swaths of Lafayette have been cancelled,” he said. “And with State Farm having the largest footprint in town, if they were to leave, this would be a crisis beyond…beyond definition.”

Stack said one of his clients was recently ordered by his insurance company to put stairs and handrails on a hill behind his house based solely on satellite images.

“And all he did was say yes. It’s going to cost him 20 grand. He said yes. He did not want to lose his insurance over it. So we are at their mercy, right now,” Stack said.

Following the Los Angeles firestorms, State Farm requested and is now being granted a 17% rate hike for every policyholder in the state, and 15% for renters and 38% for rental dwellings. In his ruling, Judge Karl Seligman referred to the rate hike as a “rescue mission to stabilize State Farm and safeguard policyholders.” And almost immediately, Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara “adopted” the judge’s ruling, with the increase to begin on June 1.

In a statement, Lara said, “I am balancing all the facts. Protecting all State Farm customers and the integrity of our insurance market is an urgent matter.”

But Grace Regullano doesn’t feel protected at all.

“I’m frankly infuriated that Commissioner Lara is standing with the insurance companies who are profiting off our crisis,” she said.

Regullano lives in Pasadena near the Eaton fire. Her home survived but now has such toxic levels of asbestos and lead that she cannot move back. She said State Farm has dragged its feet in paying claims, claiming its California affiliate company is broke, while ignoring the assets of its massive parent company.

“Frankly, I feel furious,” Regullano said. “I’m furious because we cannot ‘rate hike’ our way out of this climate-change caused insurance crisis. I’m also an accountant and I’m shocked that there’s no explanation for why State Farm’s parent company, which has 194 billion–with a B–in surplus and reserves, needs this rate hike.”

It may simply be a matter of political leverage. State Farm has become too big to fail.

“We don’t know what they’re going to do,” Stack said. “They may wake up one day and say, ‘we’re out of California.’ And if that happens…I’ll be talking to you again. It will be awful beyond words.”

There will still be a hearing for State Farm to show evidence of its financial situation, but that is planned for some time later this year.

In the meantime, the rate hike will go into effect, starting in June. When other companies have already left the state, like a good neighbor, State Farm is still there. But the neighborhood is about to get a lot more expensive.