Earthquake Insurance Issuance during the Crazy California Insurance Year

Can You Even Get Earthquake insurance in California in 2024?

Earthquake Issuance during Crazy Insurance Times

Who is writing Quake Insurance right now?

The Background of the Crazy California Insurance Situation:

The insurance market in California in 2024 is in a very crazy state. Numerous property insurers, including State Farm are not accepting new home insurance policies. Numerous property insurers are leaving the state including Guard and Kemper. Does this situation pertain to Earthquake Insurance is the real question though.

The chaos though is not just in the property insurance market as Auto insurers as well are limiting insurance policy issuance. According to Yahoo Finance / Fortune “private passenger vehicles [insurance], increased 20.6% over the past year.”

Home/Property insurrers are increasingly either leaving the state, issuing nonrenewals, or pausing new property insurance issuance. With all of these admitted insurers sitting on the sideline, more and more business is heading to the California FAIR plan or nonadmitted insurers.

A Problem for the CEA:

In order to procure a CEA policy the home insurer must be partnered with the them. The California FAIR plan, the insurer of last resort does partner with the CEA, but numerous uinsurers typically do not. This means that many of the consumers that used to have say State Farm and are now with Lloyds may NOT have access to the California Earthquake Authority options.

Other Earthquake Options Still Open for Business in 2024:

The good news to this article is that there is still a vibrant market for earthquake insurance in California. Geovera and Palomar are still writing property policies. They write them as standalone policies in direct contrast to the CEA. Policies are purchased by themselves. Therefore in answering the question Can You Even Get Earthquake insurance in California in 2024? – the answer is typically Yes most folks can still purchase Earthquake Insurance in CA in 2024.

There is a Vibrant Market for Earthquake Insurance in 2024.

QuakeCov.com

There are of course more specifics. Sometimes – older non reinforced homes may struggle to get one of the indepedent insurer to write it. Or the premium might be higher. Other complications can arise as well.

Earthquake Insurance – Together or Separate- the CEA vs Independents:

The California Earthquake Authority sells insurance policies through their partners. IE State Farm, Farmers, Etc. If you do NOT have a partner insurer, than you cannot get a CEA policy. The CA Fair plan DOES partner with the CEA. This is good news if you have the FAIR plan. However if you have a FAIR plan you do NOT need to purchase your EQ insurance through the CEA. You may want to, for pricing or other reasons, but you still will have other options.

So called Independent EQ Insurers do NOT partner with home insurers. They write standalone policies. Typically the EQ policy has to be written for as much coverage A as the home/property policy. If you buy your home insurance through an insurer that does NOT work with the CEA, you cannot get your Earthquake policy through them. However that insurer may have a different partner. Or of course you may be able to purchase a policy through an independent earthquake vendor.

Independent Quake insurers work differrently and have a different pricing model. Often, but not always the independent earthquake vendors have better pricing than the CEA. However this does always dependent on your situation.

California FAIR Plan = CEA Partner

Nonadmitted Insurers = [typically] do NOT partner with the CEA

California Earthquake Policies in 2024:

The property and auto insurance market may be crazy right now – but the market for earthquake insurance in California remains calm. Issuance of new standalone policies have mostly not been hit. Premiums do not seem to have increased nearly as much as fire policies. The outlook for Earthquake insurance is bright. There are still lots of earthquake insurance options in California in 2024.