HUD seeks feedback on climate resilience, home insurance
Last week (HUD) published a new (RFI) in the Federal Register as it seeks to learn more about the domestic market's property stability, coverage reductions and turbulence caused by the removal of some players from the home insurance field.
Last summer, HUD convened a summit to discuss these issues, which led to premiums paid by policyholders, prompting an effort by carriers to control costs.
According to a Federal Register note, the summit “emphasized the need to increase property resilience against natural hazards and clarify the relationship between resilience measures and property owner costs, including insurance costs.”
Through a request for public comment, the department is trying to determine “how best to evaluate measures to increase the resilience of residential properties to natural hazards and extreme weather conditions.” This can help HUD as it aims to “develop policies that better support HUD program participants in building resilience against natural hazards, including extreme weather, and in obtaining affordable insurance for their properties.”
Extreme weather has accelerated in recent years, resulting in frequent temperature changes, floods and other natural disasters. Problems caused by extreme weather have exposed volatility in the home insurance market as carriers grapple with rising premiums.
HUD specifically, single-family, public housing, tribal housing, and .
The department aims to determine what kinds of cost savings are possible based on information on home modifications designed to make existing properties more climate-resilient, revised sustainability standards for new construction, and “additional time or financial costs, if any.” Code refactoring or above after a disaster instead of abandoning requirements.
HUD also wants to see if any local or state policies could help reduce costs in these areas, including insurance premiums, and what information might be useful for insurers or reinsurers to reduce catastrophe risks.
Final comments on this request are due on February 28. In two weeks, the newly elected president will be sworn in, and it is expected that Senate Confirmation hearings for Trump's nominee for HUD secretary are expected to begin soon.
The previous full-time HUD secretary, Marcia Fudge, was about two months after President Joe Biden took office. Ben Carson was HUD secretary for Trump's first term.
