Property Atlas

County hazard profile

Kern, CA

California · pop. 908,530 · FIPS 06029

Relatively High
FEMA risk rating · RATING
Wildfire
dominant hazard
$417M
modeled expected annual loss/yr

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

among the highest nationally

national median $15M/yr Kern $417M

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 indexRelatively High 98.89/100
national median ~50 among the highest nationally
Social vulnerabilityRelatively High 61.07/100
national median ~50 near the national middle (61st percentile)
Community resilienceVery Low 6.52/100
national median ~50 among the lowest nationally

Recorded · NFIP flood claims RECORDED

Realized flood losses in Kern

The National Flood Insurance Program has paid 280 flood-insurance claims totaling $1.5M in Kern since 1978. The costliest year was 1998 ($392K paid).

Flood-insurance dollars paid by year of loss

1978: $3,009 paid 1979: $0 paid 1980: $1,188 paid 1982: $18,935 paid 1983: $121,401 paid 1984: $137,012 paid 1988: $1,978 paid 1989: $495 paid 1991: $0 paid 1992: $4,553 paid 1993: $452 paid 1994: $0 paid 1995: $12,603 paid 1996: $0 paid 1997: $66,276 paid 1998: $391,931 paid 1999: $5,817 paid 2000: $0 paid 2001: $1,030 paid 2002: $4,514 paid 2003: $0 paid 2004: $6,890 paid 2005: $147,274 paid 2006: $5,320 paid 2007: $0 paid 2008: $0 paid 2009: $0 paid 2010: $19,259 paid 2011: $0 paid 2012: $0 paid 2013: $0 paid 2014: $1,083 paid 2015: $82,905 paid 2016: $0 paid 2017: $136,187 paid 2018: $0 paid 2019: $64,831 paid 2020: $45,866 paid 2021: $0 paid 2022: $48,511 paid 2023: $152,457 paid 2024: $10,494 paid 2025: $23,203 paid 1998 · $392K 1978 2025
$1.5M
total paid
$5,412
average claim
$83K
largest single claim
56%
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 Kern, CA and where it ranks among U.S. counties. It is not a verdict on whether Kern 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.