The cost of insuring a home has climbed so steeply that, for many owners, the annual premium now rivals the mortgage itself. A first-of-its-kind national report released this month found that inflation-adjusted homeowners premiums rose sharply across every region between 2018 and 2024, while the rate at which insurers refuse to renew policies climbed even faster. A separate spring survey found that 44% of homeowners say their premium is now large enough to compete with the monthly loan payment, a squeeze that lands hardest on retirees whose housing costs were supposed to be settled.
What the NAIC’s first national report found
The National Association of Insurance Commissioners drew on seven years of Market Conduct Annual Statement filings to build the first comprehensive national picture of the homeowners market. The analysis found that inflation-adjusted premiums per policy rose between 18.3% and 43.3% across regions from 2018 through 2024.
The report’s more striking finding was on non-renewals. Company-initiated non-renewal rates rose between 96% and 216% depending on the region, with the Southeast posting the sharpest climb over the seven-year span. A non-renewal differs from a rate hike: it drops the policyholder entirely, forcing a scramble for replacement coverage that is often costlier and thinner.
Because the data ends in 2024, the figures describe a trend a report finds rather than a change happening this week, but the direction is unmistakable. Coverage reporting on the release noted that insurers are dropping more customers even as premiums rise, a combination that leaves homeowners paying more for coverage that is harder to keep.
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When the premium rivals the mortgage
A survey of 520 homeowners conducted in April put a number on how the increases feel. It found that 44% of respondents say their premium has grown large enough to rival the monthly mortgage payment, with the share reaching 62% in the West and dropping to 34% in the Midwest.
The same survey found that nearly two in five owners saw a premium jump of more than 20% at a single renewal. For a household that budgeted around a fixed loan payment, an escrow account absorbing a double-digit insurance increase can raise the total monthly housing cost without any change to the loan itself.
Not everyone is caught equally. Roughly half of those surveyed reported stable premiums and no cancellation over the prior three years, a reminder that the pain concentrates by geography and risk exposure rather than spreading evenly across the map.
The scale of the market underscores how many households are exposed: roughly 103 million homeowners policies were in force nationwide as of 2024, so even a regional wave of non-renewals reaches into the millions. And the survey captured a moment, not the ceiling, since the NAIC’s underlying data runs only through 2024 and premiums have kept climbing since. That lag means the squeeze described here is, if anything, understated today.
What is pushing insurers to retreat
The pullback is not arbitrary. A U.S. Treasury analysis of the homeowners market tied the rising costs and shrinking availability to a sharp increase in severe weather, finding that the number of billion-dollar weather disasters rose more than fivefold from 2018 through 2022 compared with the 1980s, after adjusting for inflation. In 2024 alone the country absorbed more than two dozen separate weather events causing at least $1 billion in damage each.
Those losses flow through the whole system. Insurers buy their own coverage, called reinsurance, to backstop catastrophic years, and as disaster costs climb so does the price of that protection, which carriers pass on through higher premiums or by declining to renew policies in the riskiest areas. In the hardest-hit states, some national insurers have stopped writing new policies altogether, thinning the number of companies still competing for a homeowner’s business. The result is the pattern the NAIC documented: premiums and non-renewals rising together, concentrated where storms, wildfire and flooding strike most often.
The squeeze on a fixed-income homeowner
For retirees who paid off a mortgage years ago, a soaring premium can be the single largest and least predictable line in the household budget. Unlike a fixed loan payment, insurance resets every year, and a non-renewal can force a search for a new policy at a moment when age of roof, location or claims history all push the price up.
When the private market pulls back, owners in the hardest-hit regions may be left with a state-run insurer of last resort, often the FAIR plan, which typically costs more and covers less than a standard policy. Some homeowners respond by raising deductibles or trimming coverage limits, a move that lowers the monthly bill but shifts far more risk onto the household in a disaster.
Dropping coverage entirely is rarely an option for anyone still carrying a mortgage, since lenders require it, and going without on a paid-off home gambles the largest asset most retirees own. The more durable defenses are unglamorous: shopping the policy well before renewal, asking about discounts for a new roof or storm shutters, and confirming that the dwelling limit still reflects rebuilding cost rather than market value, so a claim does not fall short when it matters most.
This article was researched and drafted with the assistance of AI and reviewed by The Money Overview editorial team.
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