The Docket | Cascading Effects

Showing the Math

Louisville Rebuilt Harder. Colorado's New Insurance Law May Not Know It.

By Maya Jiménez— May 6, 2026

Feature image for article: Louisville Rebuilt Harder. Colorado's New Insurance Law May Not Know It.

The houses on Via Appia Drive in Louisville, Colorado, have Class A metal roofs, fiber cement siding, ember-resistant vents screened to one-eighth of an inch. They replaced homes that a 100-mph grassfire took on December 30, 2021. The families who rebuilt them were 74 percent underinsured and did it anyway. On July 1, Colorado becomes the first state to require insurers to show homeowners the wildfire risk score driving their premiums. Louisville's rebuilders will finally see the number. The number may not see what they built.

Showing the Math

Louisville Rebuilt Harder. Colorado's New Insurance Law May Not Know It.

By Maya Jiménez— May 6, 2026

The houses on Via Appia Drive in Louisville, Colorado, have Class A metal roofs, fiber cement siding, ember-resistant vents screened to one-eighth of an inch. They replaced homes that a 100-mph grassfire took on December 30, 2021. The families who rebuilt them were 74 percent underinsured and did it anyway. On July 1, Colorado becomes the first state to require insurers to show homeowners the wildfire risk score driving their premiums. Louisville's rebuilders will finally see the number. The number may not see what they built.

The Pullback

Zillow Pulled Climate Risk Scores From Listings. Connecticut Published Them for Free.

In September 2024, Zillow added First Street climate risk scores to every for-sale listing in the country. The company's chief economist praised the move, saying "healthy markets are ones where buyers and sellers have access to all relevant data." Fourteen months later, after sustained complaints from the real estate industry that the scores were suppressing sales, Zillow stripped them from its platform entirely.

Around the same time, Connecticut's Insurance Department published the same First Street data at even greater granularity through a free public tool. Same vendor. Same science. Opposite conclusions about what to do with it. The difference comes down to a simple question: does the entity controlling the data make money when homes sell, or when consumers understand what they're buying?

The Pullback

Zillow Pulled Climate Risk Scores From Listings. Connecticut Published Them for Free.

In September 2024, Zillow added First Street climate risk scores to every for-sale listing in the country. The company's chief economist praised the move, saying "healthy markets are ones where buyers and sellers have access to all relevant data." Fourteen months later, after sustained complaints from the real estate industry that the scores were suppressing sales, Zillow stripped them from its platform entirely.

Around the same time, Connecticut's Insurance Department published the same First Street data at even greater granularity through a free public tool. Same vendor. Same science. Opposite conclusions about what to do with it. The difference comes down to a simple question: does the entity controlling the data make money when homes sell, or when consumers understand what they're buying?

Chilling effect:

Zillow's own analysis showed high-risk properties sold less often; a Redfin experiment found flagged homes selling roughly 1% below market

Blanket removal:

Zillow pulled scores nationwide, not just in California, where the loudest industry pushback originated from agents and sellers

Institutional-grade access:

Connecticut's tool gives the public street-level projected flood losses, data typically locked behind insurer and investor paywalls

Mandatory disclosure:

Starting July 1, 2026, Connecticut sellers must disclose flood risk, FEMA zone status, and damage history under Public Act 25-33

Catalyst event:

The tool traces back to August 2024 floods in the Naugatuck Valley that killed three people, many without flood insurance

The Reform Map

Your insurance company knows exactly how risky your property is. Until this year, it had no obligation to share that assessment with you. You could be dropped, repriced, or quietly non-renewed based on a catastrophe model you've never seen and can't challenge.

Now 18 states are pushing legislation to crack open that black box. The bills vary. Some demand model disclosure. Some mandate premium credits for mitigation. Hawaii's were written with Lahaina survivors in the room. But they share a core premise: the growing distance between what insurers know about your home and what you're allowed to know is no longer a market quirk. It's a policy failure.

Here's where the most significant efforts stand.

The Reform Map

Your insurance company knows exactly how risky your property is. Until this year, it had no obligation to share that assessment with you. You could be dropped, repriced, or quietly non-renewed based on a catastrophe model you've never seen and can't challenge.

Now 18 states are pushing legislation to crack open that black box. The bills vary. Some demand model disclosure. Some mandate premium credits for mitigation. Hawaii's were written with Lahaina survivors in the room. But they share a core premise: the growing distance between what insurers know about your home and what you're allowed to know is no longer a market quirk. It's a policy failure.

Here's where the most significant efforts stand.

The Wave

Eighteen States Want Insurers to Show Their Math

At least 18 states introduced insurance reform bills in 2026, most borrowing from Colorado's playbook. The shared logic: if insurers use catastrophe models to cancel your policy, you should see the score and have a shot at improving it. Seven states copied Colorado's framework nearly verbatim. The push is bipartisan, driven less by ideology than by constituents calling their legislators after getting dropped.

The Template

Colorado Wrote the Bill Everyone Else Copied

HB25-1182 took effect January 2026. Insurers must disclose wildfire risk models and reduce premiums when homeowners harden their properties. Companies without a property-specific model must offer manual mitigation discounts anyway. It's the first law that treats the information gap between insurer and homeowner as a regulatory problem worth fixing. Seven states have introduced near-copies.

Near Unanimous

Washington's Senate Voted 48–1 for Transparency

SB 5928 requires insurers to disclose wildfire risk scores, explain the factors behind them, and update scores within 30 days of completed mitigation work. A companion bill funds voluntary mitigation grants. The 48–1 Senate vote suggests something unusual in climate-adjacent legislation: almost nobody wanted to be on record defending the information asymmetry.

Survivor Driven

Lahaina Survivors Shaped Hawaii's Reform Bills Directly

SB 2947 and SB 802 emerged from testimony by Maui wildfire survivors who learned they were underinsured only after losing everything. The bills require mitigation premium credits, mandate rate reviews, and prohibit insurer retaliation against policyholders who file complaints. The retaliation provision is distinctive. It acknowledges what other states' bills don't: that filing a complaint can itself become a risk factor.

FAIR Overhaul

California Goes Further Than Transparency Alone Can

Nine consumer protection laws took effect January 1, including wildfire safety grants for fire-safe roofs. Now AB 1680, the Make It FAIR Act, targets the FAIR Plan itself after documented failures handling LA wildfire claims. California's approach goes well beyond the Colorado model. It's trying to fix the insurer of last resort, not just the information flow.

Data Mandate

New York Wants Zip-Code-Level Cancellation Data Published

S.8583 would force insurers to submit zip-code-level data on nonrenewals, cancellations, claim rates, and premiums. That granularity could expose "bluelining," the quiet withdrawal of coverage from entire neighborhoods. The bill adds Colorado-style mitigation credits too. Still in committee, but the data provision alone would be unprecedented if it passes.

Further Reading

As Climate Crisis Upended Homeowners Insurance, the Industry Resisted RegulationCapital & Main obtained documents showing how industry groups lobbied to gut climate disclosure standards between 2022 and 2024. Essential reading for understanding why the data yo...

Colorado Homeowners Will See Their Wildfire Risk Scores Starting July 1. Here's What That Means.Colorado's HB25-1182 is the closest thing to a working model for what mandated risk transparency looks like in practice. This piece walks through what insurers will actually have t...

Quick links

Risk and Resilience: How States Are Approaching Insurance and Climate Risk in 2026

Major U.S. Insurers Make Progress on Climate Disclosures, but Significant Gaps Remain

The Growing Void in the U.S. Homeowners Insurance Market

Corporate Climate Risk Disclosure Landscape in 2026

What You Can Find

You've probably done the thing. Sat down one evening, typed your address into three different websites, and tried to figure out what climate change actually means for your house. Six browser tabs. Three contradicting each other. None answering the question you came with.

The information landscape for property-level climate risk is genuinely fragmented, and the fragmentation isn't random. Government maps miss entire categories of flooding. The most comprehensive insurance dataset ever collected won't be public until 2027, and even then, the property-level detail stays locked behind confidentiality provisions. Private platforms fill gaps but can't agree with each other. One state has built a free risk tool for residents. Forty-nine haven't.

We mapped what homeowners can actually access right now, what's coming, and where the blind spots sit.

What You Can Find

You've probably done the thing. Sat down one evening, typed your address into three different websites, and tried to figure out what climate change actually means for your house. Six browser tabs. Three contradicting each other. None answering the question you came with.

The information landscape for property-level climate risk is genuinely fragmented, and the fragmentation isn't random. Government maps miss entire categories of flooding. The most comprehensive insurance dataset ever collected won't be public until 2027, and even then, the property-level detail stays locked behind confidentiality provisions. Private platforms fill gaps but can't agree with each other. One state has built a free risk tool for residents. Forty-nine haven't.

We mapped what homeowners can actually access right now, what's coming, and where the blind spots sit.

Flood Maps

The Maps Miss the Rain That Floods You

FEMA flood maps track rivers and coasts. They largely ignore pluvial flooding, where rainfall simply overwhelms drainage. Nearly 10 million high-risk properties sit outside mapped zones. During Harvey, 70% of flooded Houston homes were in areas the maps considered safe. The fastest-growing flood category is the one nobody's required to show you.

Insurance Data

The Biggest Insurance Data Haul Isn't Yours

The NAIC's 2026 nationwide data call pulls ZIP-level homeowners insurance data from 2018 through 2025: premiums, cancellations, losses by peril. The public report lands early 2027. But individual property risk scores and insurer underwriting models stay confidential. Regulators will see the picture. You'll get a summary.

Private Platforms

Private Risk Scores Exist but Can't Agree

First Street and ClimateCheck offer forward-looking, property-level climate risk scores that FEMA doesn't. They're genuinely useful. They also disagree with each other more than half the time on which properties face extreme risk, according to Bloomberg's analysis. No regulated standard governs the models. No meaningful appeals process exists if a score tanks your home's value.

State Experiment

Connecticut Built a Tool. No One Followed.

Connecticut became the first state to offer residents free, address-level climate risk assessments covering floods, fire, wind, and heat. Starting July 2026, sellers must disclose flood history at closing. Real estate agents worry the scores will scare off buyers, which tells you something about what the scores show. No other state has replicated the tool.

Lender Asymmetry

Your Lender's Risk Model Doesn't Face You

Mortgage lenders increasingly run proprietary climate risk models on properties before approving loans. Nothing requires them to share those scores with borrowers. Research from Duke shows local lenders quietly offload climate-risky mortgages to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac at prices that ignore flood exposure. The lender prices the risk, acts on it, and keeps the analysis to itself.

Disclosure Gaps

No Federal Law Makes Sellers Tell You

There is no federal requirement for sellers to disclose flood risk or damage history. Over half of states lack meaningful disclosure legislation. Where disclosure forms do exist, they reference the same incomplete FEMA maps that miss pluvial flooding entirely. Only eleven states require landlords to tell renters anything at all. The gap compounds at every level.

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