Bad weather question?

I don’t think that house insurance is affected by tornadoes in my neck of the woods (upper midwest) just because they’re so infrequent and so random, the odds are next to nil. Unless you live in a floodplain around here, weather doesn’t really affect house insurance.

In California, earthquake insurance is not mandatory but it’s recommended. Floods are another matter. It definitely pays to check out the flood zoning for a house before you buy it, because out here we get a lot of flash flooding and hillside slip, especially after a big fire has gone through the summer before. Not to mention the fact that developers in California (especially SoCal) are prone to sudden storms of terminal stupidity, like the time they put in a big housing development right under an old dam with a big lake behind it. As in, right in the primary flood plain and hemmed in on both sides by tall fold mountains. One good quake, give that dam a crack, and whoopee! All those houses are gonna be headed downstream in an awful hurry.

The setup was so bad that insurance companies refused to insure those houses against floods. That was when people finally woke up and took a look at what was up the canyon from their new neighborhood . . . and boy did it hit the fan. Naturally the developers were long gone, and the people who had bought those homes were left holding the bag.

Things like that don’t make me think much of developers out here. :negative: