It is whether the limits on your declarations page can rebuild a coastal home, to current code, in a market where everyone is rebuilding at once. Those are different questions, and most policies were written to answer the first one.
WJB Services, Inc. dba Bollinsure Insurance Services · CA DOI Lic. #0D94699 · independent broker, Westlake Village
The Palisades Fire was among the most destructive in California history, and its effect on this market runs well past the burn footprint. Carriers re-underwrite by exposure zone, so homes in Malibu, Topanga and the canyons that never saw flame are being scored against rebuilt models. Non-renewals, brush-clearance requirements and higher wildfire deductibles are reaching households that did not file a claim.
If your home was lost, the questions in front of you are limits, Ordinance and Law, and how long your Additional Living Expense runs. If your home survived, the questions are smoke and ash damage, and whether your renewal will look like your last one. Both are covered below.
One thing is worth being precise about, because it is still repeated in the present tense and is no longer true. Insurance Code section 675.1 protected homes inside and adjacent to the fire perimeter from cancellation and non-renewal based on wildfire risk, for one year running from the Governor's emergency proclamation. That clock started on 7 January 2025 and ran out on 7 January 2026. Legislation to lengthen it has been introduced in Sacramento and has not been enacted, so there is no statutory pause left to wait out.
What may still be running is a different and stronger protection, and it is the one to check first. If your home was a total loss in the declared disaster, Insurance Code section 675(c) requires your insurer to offer to renew the policy for at least two annual renewal periods after the loss. That right attaches to the loss rather than to the ZIP code, and it is longer than the moratorium ever was.
The single most common finding on a coastal declarations page is a dwelling limit set against a rebuild cost that no longer exists. Coastal construction is not average construction: fire-hardened assemblies, engineered foundations on slope, restricted access for materials and equipment, and in a mass-loss event a contractor market where every trade is spoken for.
Permitting is the variable most people are still bracing for the wrong version of. Executive orders issued after the January 2025 fires suspended California Environmental Quality Act and Coastal Act permitting requirements for the rebuilding of property destroyed or substantially damaged in those fires, provided the rebuild does not exceed 110 percent of the original structure's footprint and height. Inside that envelope, coastal review is precisely what was taken out of the path. Outside it — if you build back larger than you had — it is back, along with local review. That makes the envelope a schedule decision as much as a design one, and your Additional Living Expense clock is what pays for the difference.
Three things determine whether your limit survives contact with that reality.
The dwelling limit itself should reflect current local rebuild cost, not the purchase price and not the loan. In the Palisades and Malibu the land is frequently the larger share of value, so a rebuild figure well below market value is normal and correct — the danger is a figure set years ago and inflation-adjusted by a percentage that never matched what building here actually costs.
Extended or guaranteed replacement cost is the headroom above that limit. Carriers differ enormously in how much they offer and under what conditions. This is the provision that decides whether a limit that turns out to be twenty percent short is a survivable problem or a catastrophic one.
Ordinance and Law pays the difference between the home you had and the home the code now requires. On this coast that can mean fire-resistant exterior assemblies, ember-resistant venting, sprinklers, defensible space, and in some locations updated seismic and coastal requirements. Carried at ten percent of Coverage A — a very common default — it does not come close on an older coastal home.
A large share of post-fire claims in this area are not total losses. Smoke and ash intrusion damages contents, HVAC systems, insulation and soft finishes, and the disputes that follow are about scope rather than coverage: what needs cleaning, what needs replacing, and who decides.
Two practical points. Document before you clean — photographs and an inventory taken before remediation are worth more than any argument made afterwards. And read what your policy says about contents valuation: replacement cost and actual cash value produce very different outcomes on a wardrobe, an electronics inventory or a decade of furniture, and the difference is usually a single line on the declarations page.
Admitted carriers remain the best outcome where you qualify: rate-regulated and backed by the California Insurance Guarantee Association. Appetite along this coast has narrowed sharply, and qualification increasingly depends on documented mitigation rather than on the property alone.
High-value and surplus lines markets are where a large share of Palisades and Malibu homes are now placed. These carriers underwrite the specific property rather than a rating territory, which cuts both ways: mitigation you have actually done can change the answer, and they will ask for evidence of it. Non-admitted placements go through a licensed surplus line broker and are not CIGA-backed.
FAIR Plan plus DIC is the last-resort structure. The FAIR Plan is a basic fire form — not a homeowners policy, and on its own no liability, no theft, and no water damage other than the water used to fight the fire. The Difference in Conditions policy is what turns it back into something resembling complete coverage. Holding the FAIR Plan without a DIC is the most serious and most common gap we find here.
For owner-occupied homeowners work specifically, we publish BestHO3.com; for rental and non-owner-occupied property, BestDwellingFire.com. For the wider county — and for how this coast compares with the foothills and the Valley — see our Los Angeles County overview.
Usually, yes — though the market may be a surplus lines carrier or a FAIR Plan and DIC pairing rather than the admitted carrier you had. What changes the answer most is documented mitigation: Class A roof, ember-resistant venting, current brush clearance, and photographs of it. Send your declarations page and we will tell you honestly which market you are in.
More than the ten percent of Coverage A that most policies default to. A destroyed home must be rebuilt to current code, and on this coast that can include fire-resistant assemblies, ember-resistant venting, sprinklers and defensible-space requirements that did not exist when the house was built. The right figure depends on the age of the home and the jurisdiction, which is exactly what a review works out.
Often yes, despite what the exclusion appears to say. The earth-movement exclusion does list mudslide and debris flow, and the burn scars above this coastline make that a live exposure every rainy season, including for homes that came through the fire untouched. But Insurance Code section 530.5 and the efficient proximate cause doctrine provide that where the wildfire is the efficient proximate cause of the debris flow, coverage is provided — the holding in Howell v. State Farm in 1990, on this exact sequence. The Insurance Commissioner issued a bulletin in February 2025 and a further notice in September 2025 reminding insurers of that duty after the January 2025 fires. If you have been denied on an earth-movement exclusion after a burn-scar debris flow, have the denial read before you accept it. Flood insurance separately covers mudflow and a Difference in Conditions policy can reach landslide, so both remain worth carrying.
Frequently, yes. Smoke and ash intrusion damages contents, HVAC, insulation and finishes, and it is a covered peril under most homeowners forms. Document the condition photographically before any remediation begins, and check whether your contents are insured on a replacement cost or actual cash value basis — that single line changes the outcome substantially.
Shake damage, no. Every California homeowners policy excludes it from the base form, and it has to be bought — either as an endorsement onto the homeowners policy or as a separate policy, through the California Earthquake Authority or a private carrier, with a deductible expressed as a percentage of the dwelling limit rather than a flat sum. One carve-back matters: fire following an earthquake is covered by your homeowners policy whether or not you carry earthquake coverage. Given the Malibu Coast and Santa Monica fault systems, this is worth making as a decision rather than leaving as an omission.
No fee, no obligation. A licensed broker reads your declarations page and tells you what it actually does — including the parts that do not apply to you.