As Insurance Crisis Deepens, Home Resilience Retrofit Grants Provide Fortification Against Climate Impacts
New policymaker guide on retrofit grants offers best practices for states seeking to help homeowners combat climate-related costs
WASHINGTON, D.C. — As state policymakers face increasing pressure to stabilize insurance markets and help communities prepare for the worst impacts of climate change, a new legislative guide released today seeks to provide clarity and best practices for lawmakers considering home resilience retrofit grant programs to help homeowners cover the costs of home improvements intended to protect against disaster.
The guide, Resilient States Start with Resilient Homes, investigates state property-level resilience retrofit programs that fund fortified roof replacements and wildfire home hardening across the country to protect homes from hurricanes, wildfires, and severe convective storms.
As states consider designing these programs, the guide encourages lawmakers to set key priorities, including:
- Establishing robust retrofit grant programs that meet local needs with adequate funding from the insurers that benefit from resilience retrofit investments;
- Targeting grants toward the communities in greatest need of financial assistance for physical risk mitigation;
- Ensuring resilience retrofit investments result in cost savings and other benefits for policyholders;
- Building toward a system of whole-home retrofit programs that include of energy efficiency and climate pollution reduction projects; and
- Targeting long-term success through comprehensive resilience and climate pollution reduction strategies.
“To stabilize property insurance markets and protect households and communities from climate change impacts, states must ramp up investments in climate resilience and mitigation,” said Elyse Schupak, climate policy advocate for Public Citizen and co-author of the report. “Establishing property-level resilience grant programs funded by the insurance industry is one solution states can adopt to tackle the growing costs households face from climate change. States should adopt best practices from existing grant programs to ensure they are accessible to low-income households, result in cost savings, and are responsive to the scale of the resilience needs states face.”
“All across the U.S., families are getting pummeled with rising insurance costs, non-renewals, and costly bills when a climate catastrophe strikes,” said Jordan Haedtler, climate finance policy lead at Climate Cabinet Education. “Lawmakers who are asking how they can help their constituents should know that effective policy solutions exist. These policies will lower families’ bills and create more resilient communities at the same time.”
Read the full report here: Resilient States Start with Resilient Homes: A legislative guide to bolstering resilience and promotion affordability through state resilient home retrofit grant programs.