NEW YORK, Aug. 22, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- With 2019's peak
hurricane season (which starts in August and ends in October)
underway, a new ValuePenguin.com survey has found that homeowner
attitudes do not reflect the real risk of storm damage. While 77%
of homeowners said that they felt prepared for hurricane season,
nearly one in four homeowners haven't made any hurricane safety
preparations.
More worryingly, the majority of surveyed homeowners severely
underestimate the potential cost of hurricane and flood damage.
When asked, over 50% of survey respondents estimated that the
average home would require less than $10,000 in damage repairs after a hurricane or
flood. Those estimates undershot the average claim amounts for wind
and hail damage ($10,200) as well as
for flood damage ($92,000).
Key Findings:
- Homeowners In High-Risk States Believe They're Prepared For
Hurricanes, Despite Taking No Action: Homeowners from the
riskiest coastal states demonstrated a lack of urgency in preparing
to deal with the consequences of a hurricane. Of the over 500
homeowners surveyed in the 19 states most at risk for a hurricane,
77% "felt prepared" for the 2019 hurricane season. However, about
48% of these respondents also revealed that they had not yet
started preparing for hurricane season, which lasts from June to
November every year.
- Homeowners Believe Weather Professionals Exaggerate the Risk
of Hurricanes: 43% of respondents who live in high risk states
said that weather professionals exaggerate the risk of hurricanes,
compared to the 30% of respondents who lived in the rest of the
country. A further 56% of the surveyed homeowners said they were
reluctant to evacuate their homes, and would only leave if
evacuation were mandatory (as opposed to recommended). Most
worryingly, 1 in 10 homeowners said they would not evacuate at
all.
- Homeowners Grossly Underestimate The Frequency Of
Hurricanes: As the peak of the 2019 hurricane season is
underway, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA) updated its forecast to predict five to nine hurricanes in
the Atlantic before the end of November. Data shows the majority of
hurricane seasons to date had an average of six hurricanes. Yet,
nearly half of all survey respondents predicted that the United States would experience no more
than three hurricanes in 2019.
- Homeowners Don't Realize How High The Cost of Hurricane
Damages Can Get: When asked how much money they thought it
would cost to repair the average home after a hurricane or flood,
52% of the surveyed homeowners guessed that the sum would be less
than $10,000. This figure is several
times smaller than the average claim filed during recent hurricanes
- which ranged from $30,000
(Hurricane Irene) to over $100,000
(Hurricane Harvey). More worryingly, in high-risk states, 45% of
homeowners said they didn't know how much hurricane-related
insurance they would need in order to be protected against the
financial fallout of a hurricane.
To understand homeowners attitudes towards the 2019 Atlantic
Hurricane Season, ValuePenguin analysts commissioned Qualtrics to
conduct an online survey of 1,050 homeowners in America, with the
sample base proportioned to represent the general population of
homeowners. The survey was fielded in early August 2019.
To view the full report, visit:
https://www.valuepenguin.com/hurricane-prone-homeowners-substitute-confidence-for-preparedness
About ValuePenguin.com: ValuePenguin.com, part of
LendingTree (NASDAQ: TREE), is a personal finance website that
conducts in-depth research and provides objective analysis to help
guide consumers to the best financial decisions. ValuePenguin
focuses on value, assessing whether the return of a particular
decision is worth the cost or risk of that option, and how this
stacks up with the other possible choices they may have. For more
information, please visit www.valuepenguin.com, like our Facebook
page or follow us on Twitter @ValuePenguin.
CONTACT: Press@ValuePenguin.com
View original content to download
multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/its-peak-hurricane-season-but-1-in-4-homeowners-have-made-no-hurricane-preparations-300905638.html
SOURCE ValuePenguin.com