BOISE, Idaho — Idaho had a devastating wildfire season in 2024. According to the Idaho Department of Insurance nearly one million acres burned, around 200 structures were destroyed and that included around 40 people losing their home because of wildfires.

“It was difficult and it was challenging, it is always hard to see people who have lost everything,” said Dean Cameron, the Director of the Idaho Department of Insurance.

Now homeowners in the Wildland Urban Interface may find it tougher to renew home insurance or get insurance and the rest of us could face an average rate increase of 30 percent because of wildfires and disasters that have been happening all over the country.

According to data released by the U.S. Senate Budget Committee Boise County ranked 87th and Blaine County ranked 93rd out of all of the counties in the country in non-renewal rates between 2018 and 2023.

Since 2023, Idaho lost 22 insurance carriers out of 91 that were offering insurance and a number of remaining insurance companies stopped writing new policies, according to the Idaho Department of Insurance.

“That number is growing, based on the fires of this last year we anticipate that number will be even higher,” said Cameron. “They are looking at it saying we have this much exposure and we can’t go any higher and that is what insurance is about risk and exposure.”

This problem stems from a much bigger puzzle as hurricanes in the southeast, tornadoes in the midwest, and recent wildfires in Hawaii and California have been devastating. Inflation on building homes has also hit insurance companies hard and customers are having to bear the brunt of it.

“The insurance industry uses models to determine the appropriate rating for a property and those models are changing as we see more and more storms,” said Cameron. “They can’t raise our rates or make their decisions based on what happened in California, they can say what happened in California makes us nervous because it could happen in the foothills outside of Boise.”

The Idaho Department of Insurance has been working on solutions to some of these problems for three years some of their ideas include trying to stabilize the market by providing reassurance to insurance companies on the front end, they are in the process of doing a data call with having the insurance industry report losses and what they are doing with rates and also a deductible buy-down.

However, the Idaho Department of Insurance believes mitigation is the best answer and they have a wildlife mitigation fund proposed in two different house bills in the legislature. This would provide grants to to have new homes built with fire-resistant material while moving communities towards fire-wise communities.

It’s based on a program that started in Alabama to not only protect single structures, but harden entire communities. The Idaho Department of Insurance believes that would dramatically impact in Idaho’s overall rating for home insurance.

“Their rates are going down 25 percent even though they still had hurricanes, they still had traumatic storms, but because they have hardened people’s property they were able to lower rates,” said Cameron. “We believe if we do that in Idaho it would lower rates here for everybody.”

There’s no doubt that without the heroic efforts of wildland firefighters many more than 40 homes would have burned last year. If you do live in the Wildland Urban Interface and you lose your insurance. You are advised to contact your agent, but also the Idaho Department of Insurance because it helps them gather information and they can fight on your behalf.

“We then will reach out to the company and say what are you doing? Why are you dropping them, why are you giving them a 50-percent rate increase, what is the justification?” said Cameron.

There are some simple steps you can do to protect your property from wildfires. Trimming landscaping and keeping it green is one way, removing wood or other flammable materials away from your home is another. It’s also a good idea to clean out gutters and you can reduce the chances of a flying ember from sparking by installing webbing in eves and attics.