Mapping the Residential Exposure and Coverage of California's FAIR Plan
Californians are increasingly relying on the FAIR Plan for wildfire insurance
Since its inception in 1968 the California FAIR Plan has served as the “insurer of last resort” for wildfire risk in the state, intended as a “temporary safety net” for homeowners until other coverage from insurers became available. Reliance on the program has grown drastically in the last several years–exposure for residential dwellings under the FAIR plan has increased from $160 to $558 Billion between 2021-20251. In 2009, just 7% of California ZIP codes had FAIR Plan policies accounting for more than 10% of the combined total of FAIR and admitted insurer policies. By 2022, that share had more than doubled to 22%, reflecting the expansion of the residual market as private insurers have continued to retreat.2
An increase in FAIR Plan reliance in an area indicates that private insurers may not be offering policies due to elevated wildfire risk and state limits on policy rates. Additionally, increasing enrollment in FAIR increases the expected liability for private insurers and costs for all homeowners, as FAIR can bill private insurers to make up for shortfalls, and insurers can pass these costs along to homeowners. See our previous post here for a deeper dive.
Here, in the interest of advancing public awareness, we provide several interactive maps exploring the spatial distribution of the FAIR Plan’s residential exposure ($) and its coverage in California relative to other home insurance claims, using data from the FAIR Plan3 and California Dept. of Insurance.4 For each map, we also provide corresponding tables showing the 20 most relevant ZIP codes sorted by their residential exposure, recent increase in exposure, and percentage of residential units covered by FAIR.
Map 1 shows FAIR Plan residential exposure ($) in 2024 by ZIP code. Map 2 shows residential exposure between 2020-2024, calculated by simply subtracting the 2020 exposure from the 2024 exposure for each ZIP code. In Map 3, we plot the percentage of total insurance exposure in each zip code that are under the FAIR plan. Insurance coverage in a given ZIP code is defined in terms of residential exposure units, defined as a single residential unit with insurance coverage for a year. For example, a duplex insured for an entire year would be two exposure-year units. A single family home insured for half of a year would be 0.5 exposure-year units. We map the residential exposure units covered by FAIR as a percentage of total exposure units (the FAIR plan’s exposure units + all other admitted line policies). This map provides a sense of which regions are particularly reliant on FAIR plan for wildfire insurance and may correlate to areas where private insurance is difficult to obtain. Data for Map 3 comes from the California Department of Insurance via PRA request (#PRA-2024-00508). We do not include surplus coverage (those sold from outside the state, or outside of admitted lines) data in Map 3. One concern is due to the risk of double-counting. For example, many FAIR Plan policyholders also purchase supplemental coverage through the surplus lines market.
Map 1
Table 1
Map 2
Table 2
Map 3
Table 3
Key Statistics and Data, California FAIR Plan, 2025. https://www.cfpnet.com/key-statistics-data/
Based on calculations using data from PRA request #PRA-2024-00508 to the California Department of Insurance.
Residential Exposure by ZIP Code, Key Statistics and Data, California FAIR Plan, 2025. https://www.cfpnet.com/key-statistics-data/
See (2)
Avery Bick joined the Climate and Energy Policy Program as the Sustainable and Humane Food Systems Research Fellow in January 2025. He is a socio-environmental geospatial analyst working at the intersection of air and water pollution, natural disasters, and public health in California.
Nam Nguyen joined the Climate and Energy Policy Program as a Stanford Postdoctoral Scholar in June 2024. As an economist, his work focuses on wildfire policy challenges in California and the western US that inform interventions that support improved availability of homeowner insurance.