Property Atlas

County hazard profile

Watauga, NC

North Carolina · pop. 54,000 · FIPS 37189

Relatively Low
FEMA risk rating · RATING
Landslide
dominant hazard
$26M
modeled expected annual loss/yr

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

among the lowest nationally

national median $15M/yr Watauga $26M

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 Low 71.85/100
national median ~50 near the national middle (72nd percentile)
Social vulnerabilityRelatively High 61.51/100
national median ~50 near the national middle (62nd percentile)
Community resilienceRelatively High 68.35/100
national median ~50 near the national middle (68th percentile)

Recorded · NFIP flood claims RECORDED

Realized flood losses in Watauga

The National Flood Insurance Program has paid 462 flood-insurance claims totaling $16.3M in Watauga since 1978. The costliest year was 2024 ($13.0M paid).

Flood-insurance dollars paid by year of loss

1978: $0 paid 1979: $8,032 paid 1980: $963 paid 1983: $0 paid 1985: $5,995 paid 1987: $2,893 paid 1989: $114,306 paid 1990: $467 paid 1991: $635 paid 1992: $5,534 paid 1993: $0 paid 1994: $266,703 paid 1995: $171,708 paid 1996: $1,453 paid 1997: $529 paid 1998: $106,594 paid 1999: $0 paid 2000: $0 paid 2003: $219,000 paid 2004: $595,356 paid 2009: $6,316 paid 2010: $2,168 paid 2011: $260,034 paid 2012: $2,445 paid 2013: $555,617 paid 2016: $4,195 paid 2017: $559,253 paid 2018: $47,977 paid 2019: $14,156 paid 2020: $79,604 paid 2021: $39,613 paid 2023: $75,653 paid 2024: $13,014,996 paid 2025: $117,306 paid 2024 · $13.0M 1978 2025
$16.3M
total paid
$35,237
average claim
$656K
largest single claim
71%
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 Watauga, NC and where it ranks among U.S. counties. It is not a verdict on whether Watauga 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.