Action News Now’s Bella Barbosa reports from Paradise on how fire risk scores are impacting home insurance for some on the ridge.
PARADISE, Calif. – The future of home and business insurance remains uncertain in California due to wildfire risk. The use of fire risk scores by insurance companies is influencing both cost and renewal decisions.
Bryan Bickley moved to Paradise from Magalia two and a half years ago. He and his wife built their home, but struggled to find insurance.
“My gosh, there’s going to be a lot of people affected by this,” Bickley said.
Bickley shared his experience searching for home insurance.
“Heard stories from other people that they were paying a tremendous amount of money, in fact, the lowest rate I could find at the time was about $5,000 a year, which was a real shocker,” he said.
Nearly two years after securing insurance, Bickley received a cancellation notice, citing his fire risk score as the reason.
“Because I had a wildfire assessment score of three, but when I got the insurance, my wildfire assessment score was three when they approved the insurance,” Bickley said. “Not sure what the discrepancy is.”
Bickley was confused by the cancellation because of all the work he had done to protect his home from a fire.
“We have a sprinkler system with an alarm system on the side of the house,” Bickley said. “We also, as I said, we have a fire hydrant right on the corner, my fire department is 0.9 miles away, I added the five-foot barrier around the whole house with gravel.”
Fire scores, used by insurance companies to assess a home’s fire risk, are becoming more common. Bickley’s insurer, Horace Mann, uses FireLine, a tool by data analytics company Verisk. Scores range from zero to 30 based on vegetative fuels, slope, and road access.
Action News Now reached out to Horace Mann asking what FireLine scores they will insure a home for.
They responded with a statement that reads:
“While we do not comment on individual policies, insurability decisions are guided by a combination of property characteristics, risk evaluation, and broader insurance market conditions, using underwriting guidelines that are filed with and approved by the California. Department of Insurance.”
Bickley has since secured insurance with another company, at a higher cost.
He said he was initially unaware of what a FireLine score was and had a hard time getting a hold of the assessment for his home, so he wants to inform others.
“I just really want to be aware of what I’ve gone through and double-check their insurance policies, because you might get a call saying they’re canceling,” Bickley said. “You might want to have plan B in place.”
Bickley disagrees with the score assigned to his home, saying the slope near his home is 0.3% over 300 feet, his home is surrounded by gravel with little vegetation, and on a corner of two paved roads.
Last year, the California Department of Insurance began requiring insurers using catastrophe modeling or considering reinsurance costs in their rate filings to write at least 85% of their statewide market share in wildfire-distressed areas. Butte County is one of nearly 30 counties in this category.
Alice J. Roden started working for Trending Insurance News at the end of 2021. Alice grew up in Salt Lake City, UT. A writer with a vast insurance industry background Alice has help with several of the biggest insurance companies. Before joining Trending Insurance News, Alice briefly worked as a freelance journalist for several radio stations. She covers home, renters and other property insurance stories.