Safer from Wildfires is the name of the mitigation framework the California Department of Insurance adopted in October 2022 and has updated since. If you have heard an insurance broker, a carrier representative, or a local fire official mention it, and you are not quite sure what it actually is, this article walks through it in plain English.

The short version: it is the first state regulation in the country that requires property insurers to put specific, published discounts on specific wildfire mitigations, and to tell policyholders which ones they qualify for. The official Department of Insurance page, with current carrier filings, is at insurance.ca.gov.

What the regulation actually is

The legal instrument is California Code of Regulations Title 10, Section 2644.9. It was adopted by the Department of Insurance under its authority to regulate rate-making under the California Insurance Code.

Separately, Senate Bill 824 (Dodd, 2018 and subsequent amendments) requires insurers to disclose mitigation information and, in the event of a wildfire emergency, imposes certain moratorium and renewal requirements.

Together, these instruments do four things:

  1. Define the list of specific wildfire mitigations that carriers must account for.
  2. Require every admitted homeowners insurer to file a rate plan showing how those mitigations flow into the premium.
  3. Require carriers to disclose to the policyholder which mitigations their property has, which it doesn't, and what discount is available for completing the missing ones.
  4. Give the homeowner the right to request re-inspection or re-rating if the carrier's determination is wrong.

The practical consequence: there is now a shared vocabulary between insurers, regulators, and homeowners for what "wildfire mitigation" means.

The three tiers

Safer from Wildfires organizes mitigations into three tiers. A homeowner generally needs items from each tier to qualify for the full discount structure.

Tier 1 — The Structure

These are the mitigations on the house itself:

  • Class A fire-rated roof. The roof is the single highest-leverage mitigation. Asphalt composition shingle (Class A assembly), metal, concrete tile, and clay tile all qualify. Wood shake roofs do not.
  • Ember-resistant vents. Either 1/8-inch noncombustible metal mesh or purpose-built vents tested to ASTM E2886. This blocks the easiest path for embers to enter the attic or crawl space.
  • Enclosed eaves. Open eaves create a heat trap and an ember catch. Soffited (enclosed) eaves perform far better.
  • Upgraded windows. Dual-pane windows with at least one tempered pane. Single-pane windows under radiant heat load are a well-known failure mode.
  • Cleared rain gutters. No accumulated leaves and debris.
  • A noncombustible five-foot zone at the base of the structure. No bark mulch, combustible vegetation, wood piles, or combustible fencing within five feet of the siding. This is Zone 0.

If you recognize this list, it is because it maps closely to the hardening items we cover in What Is Home Hardening, and Why It Matters.

Tier 2 — The Immediate Surroundings

These are the defensible space items:

  • No combustible items under decks. No stored firewood, no lawn furniture cushions, no cardboard, no combustible debris under an elevated deck.
  • Clear defensible space to 30 feet (Zone 1) and reduced fuels from 30 to 100 feet (Zone 2).
  • No combustible materials on top of decks or against the structure. Door mats, storage bins, patio furniture with flammable cushions — all treated as potential ignition points during fire weather.
  • Trimmed and separated vegetation. Branches not overhanging the roof, trees limbed up, shrubs separated.

Tier 2 is where a homeowner can accumulate real discount credit without spending large sums, because most of it is labor and vigilance rather than capital improvement.

Tier 3 — The Community

This tier is about the context around your property:

  • Firewise USA recognition. The property lies within a Firewise USA recognized community that has an approved Community Wildfire Protection Plan and an annual investment of volunteer or funded mitigation work. Firewise is administered by the National Fire Protection Association; you can look up recognized sites at firewise.org.
  • Fire Risk Reduction Community designation. A designation administered by the California Board of Forestry and Fire Protection recognizing communities that meet the state's standards for wildfire preparedness.

Tier 3 is the one homeowners sometimes underestimate. A house in an otherwise unprepared neighborhood sits in a different risk context than an identical house in a Firewise community, and the regulation treats them differently.

How insurers apply the tiers

Every admitted California homeowners carrier has filed with the Department of Insurance a description of how Safer from Wildfires mitigations flow into their rates. The filings are public. The mechanics vary:

  • Discount schedule approach. The carrier publishes a percentage discount on the wildfire portion of the premium for each qualifying mitigation tier. Common in straightforward rate filings.
  • Risk score adjustment approach. The carrier runs a proprietary wildfire risk model, and the mitigations feed into that model as input variables that reduce the modeled loss expectation.
  • Threshold approach. The carrier requires a minimum set of mitigations to write or renew a policy at all. Below the threshold, the policy is declined regardless of price.

In practice most carriers use some combination. The disclosure the policyholder receives should make clear, for the specific policy, which items generate credit and how much.

What the disclosure should show

Under SB 824 and Regulation 2644.9, your insurer's disclosure — which should arrive at renewal, and which you can also request at any time — should include:

  • The wildfire risk score or rating factor applied to your property.
  • The list of Safer from Wildfires mitigations the carrier has recorded for your property.
  • The discount or rate impact applied for each.
  • The discount available if missing mitigations were completed.
  • Your right to request reinspection or a rating review.

If your carrier has not provided this, or the information looks wrong, you can request it in writing. If the carrier does not respond adequately, the Department of Insurance complaint process at insurance.ca.gov is the backstop.

Where the framework works and where it doesn't

It is worth being honest about both sides.

Where Safer from Wildfires works. For a motivated homeowner with a hardened house in a reasonably priced carrier, the framework generates real, documented discounts, and it gives the homeowner standing to challenge incorrect information. It has created a shared vocabulary that did not exist before 2022.

Where it falls short. The framework cannot force a carrier to write a policy it doesn't want to write. It cannot overcome a carrier-wide decision to exit a geography. Discounts on the wildfire portion of a high-risk policy sometimes amount to a few hundred dollars against premiums that have risen by thousands. And carrier implementation is inconsistent — two homeowners with identical houses can experience very different outcomes depending on which carrier they are with.

For homeowners who have been non-renewed entirely, the framework offers only partial relief. Our article on the California FAIR Plan and home hardening walks through that situation.

How Safer from Wildfires interacts with IBHS Wildfire Prepared Home

The IBHS Wildfire Prepared Home program (wildfireprepared.org) is a separate, third-party certification run by the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety. It has two levels — Base and Plus — and requires an in-person inspection.

The overlap with Safer from Wildfires is substantial but not identical. In general:

  • Wildfire Prepared Home Base covers approximately the Tier 1 structure items plus Tier 2 immediate surroundings.
  • Wildfire Prepared Home Plus adds upgraded windows, noncombustible siding, and more rigorous defensible-space requirements.

A growing number of California carriers treat Wildfire Prepared Home certification as the basis for their deepest mitigation discount under the Safer from Wildfires rate filings, and some carriers have built new-business programs specifically around certified properties. The certification is not required by the regulation, but it is increasingly the cleanest way to demonstrate to a carrier that the mitigations are actually in place and verified.

What to do with this as a homeowner

If you are trying to put the framework to work for your own property, the practical sequence is:

  1. Request your carrier's mitigation disclosure. See what they currently credit you for and what is missing.
  2. Walk the property against the tier checklists. Note the gaps.
  3. Address the high-impact gaps first — Class A roof if needed, ember-resistant vents, Zone 0 cleared, combustible materials out from under the deck.
  4. Pursue Firewise USA if your neighborhood does not already have it. It is often easier than it looks; it mostly requires a core of motivated neighbors and an annual work plan.
  5. Consider Wildfire Prepared Home certification if your carrier recognizes it or you are trying to return to the voluntary market from the FAIR Plan.
  6. Document everything, which we cover in Documenting Your Home Hardening for Your Insurer.
  7. Submit the documentation to your carrier with a request to re-rate or reinspect.

Each step is independent. None requires the next to be useful. The homeowner who does only one or two still ends up meaningfully better off than the homeowner who does none.

The bottom line

Safer from Wildfires is not a silver bullet. It is a framework — a shared, enforceable, disclosure-required vocabulary that the California Department of Insurance has built into the rate-making process. For a homeowner willing to harden, document, and engage the framework, it is a real lever. For a homeowner who ignores it, it does nothing at all. The regulation exists; using it is up to you.

This article is informational and not a substitute for licensed professional advice. Insurance regulations and carrier practices vary, change frequently, and depend on your specific policy and jurisdiction. Before relying on any discount or coverage assumption, consult your insurance broker, your carrier directly, and where relevant the California Department of Insurance.