Greener Living
Older Homes for Sale in California Now Come With Wildfire Warnings
The state is the first to require sellers in high-risk areas to disclose what they’ve done to protect houses.
A home destroyed by the Eaton Fire in Altadena, California, on Jan. 22.
Photographer: Kyle Grillot/BloombergMost California homes were built long before the state required that they be constructed to withstand wildfires. Now, sellers of older homes in high-risk areas must disclose to potential buyers not only a dwelling’s susceptibility to fire but what they’ve done to address those vulnerabilities.
As climate change intensifies natural disasters, states across the US have been mandating that home sellers disclose risks such as flooding. But the California disclosure is the first to zero in on a property’s ability to survive a catastrophe.