I live in Pioneer California, basically between Sacramento and Lake Tahoe. I've lived here 5 years and have evacuated 2 times and been ready to several others.
We could get into politics easily here, but most of us know where the problem lies......as for insurance, in fire zones you haven't been able to get "Fire" insurance since before 2020. This part is not new to Northern California. It breaks down like this.........you get Fire insurance from the California Fair Act plan - ours is roughly $4500 a year. You then get standard Homeowners insurance from various insurance groups as normal. California, (and most states I assume) have fire zones much like Hawaii has lava zones. Prices are set by that.....yes, it all sucks.
The difference now is that people in far less rural areas are now being forced to buy from the FAIR Plan b/c the standard and even surplus-lines carriers have either left the state or enacted moratoriums in huge swaths of the state that previously were not considered high-brush/high-fire hazard areas.
Some of that is related to their new mapping tools (similar to what happened when they finished re-mapping the state's flood zones) but the bottom line is that carriers have been denied rate increases that would have allowed them to stay in the market, granted with higher premiums to consumers.
Granted that sucks but now consumers are still paying higher premiums and many more have lost access to homeowners coverage on top of it so they're spending more money for less coverage.
As for the FAIR Plan, it's had to become the insurer of first-resort in some areas and take on financial stresses it wasn't built for. I shudder to think what the losses from these fires are going to do the market once they're factored in.
