Property Atlas

County hazard profile

Alameda, CA

California · pop. 1,678,284 · FIPS 06001

Very High
FEMA risk rating · RATING
Earthquake
dominant hazard
$1.9B
modeled expected annual loss/yr

Expected annual loss · all 3,232 U.S. counties

among the highest nationally

national median $15M/yr Alameda $1.9B

A real dollar distribution: most counties sit far below a handful of high-exposure ones. A FEMA model of annual loss, not a record of disasters.

FEMA national percentile scores

FEMA/CDC score each county 0–100 against all others — the score is the national rank (RATING). Higher risk and vulnerability are worse; higher resilience is better.

FEMA risk indexVery High 99.78/100
national median ~50 among the highest nationally
Social vulnerabilityRelatively Low 27.48/100
national median ~50 lower than most counties (27th percentile)
Community resilienceVery High 91.16/100
national median ~50 among the highest nationally

Recorded · NFIP flood claims RECORDED

Realized flood losses in Alameda

The National Flood Insurance Program has paid 568 flood-insurance claims totaling $4.5M in Alameda since 1978. The costliest year was 2022 ($1.2M paid).

Flood-insurance dollars paid by year of loss

1978: $46,732 paid 1979: $11,880 paid 1980: $58,329 paid 1981: $6,644 paid 1982: $60,150 paid 1983: $80,493 paid 1984: $0 paid 1985: $0 paid 1986: $151,508 paid 1987: $1,988 paid 1988: $631 paid 1989: $8,669 paid 1991: $0 paid 1992: $0 paid 1993: $13,686 paid 1994: $0 paid 1995: $366,441 paid 1996: $12,316 paid 1997: $91,919 paid 1998: $1,060,316 paid 1999: $58,148 paid 2000: $510 paid 2001: $2,133 paid 2002: $24,889 paid 2003: $10,396 paid 2004: $5,119 paid 2005: $40,387 paid 2006: $1,081 paid 2008: $29,078 paid 2009: $3,118 paid 2010: $6,615 paid 2011: $17,393 paid 2012: $3,447 paid 2013: $771 paid 2014: $37,465 paid 2015: $2,455 paid 2016: $53,848 paid 2017: $9,502 paid 2018: $0 paid 2019: $12,252 paid 2020: $0 paid 2021: $90,793 paid 2022: $1,172,576 paid 2023: $389,304 paid 2024: $500,000 paid 2025: $32,842 paid 2026: $5,697 paid 2022 · $1.2M 1978 2026
$4.5M
total paid
$7,890
average claim
$500K
largest single claim
31%
in high-risk flood zones (A/V)

RECORDED — these are actual paid NFIP claims (a redacted census from OpenFEMA), not a model. They are the realized counterpart to the FEMA risk score above: one is what happened and got paid, the other is what a model predicts.

Scope: these are flood-insurance claims, so they undercount flooding where owners were uninsured — read this as "what NFIP paid here," not "every flood." County-level totals, not a per-property or per-address verdict. Verify a specific address and buy coverage at FloodSmart.gov; the underlying data is OpenFEMA NFIP Redacted Claims.

What these figures mean

  • RATING — the FEMA risk score, expected loss, social vulnerability, and resilience are FEMA/CDC models, not records of disasters that happened. The 0–100 scores are already national percentiles.
  • MEASURED — population is a recorded census figure.
  • COMPUTED — the county's rank within the dollar-loss distribution is our placement over the 3,232 counties.
  • CONTEXT — the note below is framing, not a measurement.

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What this is — and is not

This is FEMA/CDC modeled hazard exposure for Alameda, CA and where it ranks among U.S. counties. It is not a verdict on whether Alameda is a good or bad place to live — hazard exposure is not place quality, and a county can't opt out of its geography. It is not a per-property or per-address risk assessment, not a prediction of any specific disaster, and not insurance advice. For site-specific risk use a per-property assessment; for the underlying model see FEMA National Risk Index.