Data Sources and Versions

What data does this site use?

Four kinds. Each page lists its own sources at the bottom, so you can check any figure you read.

1. State rules. Minimum coverage, penalties, fees and deadlines come from state statutes and from insurance, motor vehicle and public safety agencies. We read the legislature’s own site first. Our rule notes for all 50 states and Washington, D.C. were last checked on October 8 and 9, 2026.
2. Price estimates. We never create prices. Cost pages quote estimates that other publishers released, with the date, the driver profile and the unit.
3. Hazard and crash data. These come from FEMA and NHTSA, and appear where a page covers storms, floods, hail or road risk in your area.
4. Population. The Census Bureau supplies the counts we use to turn raw totals into rates.

Which versions do we use?

Here are the editions behind our figures. If you want to compare them with the originals, the publisher links are in each page’s sources list.

Commercial sites own the copyright in their articles. We cite one or two figures per source, with a link, and never copy a table.

How do we handle hazard and crash data?

Both datasets are county-level in our use, so every city in a county shares the same rating. A county rating describes the county. It does not describe your street, and it says little about your own house or your own driving.

Some numbers you will see on our pages are our own math, not an agency’s. FEMA publishes no state-level overall risk score, so we average county scores for a state, weighting each county by its 2020 population. Crash rates are average yearly deaths per 100,000 residents, using the Census county estimates. The drinking figure counts crashes where police recorded a drinking driver. It is not the same as the 0.08 blood-alcohol statistic NHTSA reports.

NHTSA released its 2024 file for the first time on April 1, 2026. We treat 2024 as preliminary and will refresh after a final file appears.

What credits do the agencies require?

FEMA’s terms ask anyone who uses its data to say clearly that FEMA does not endorse the product. This product uses FEMA’s National Risk Index data and is not endorsed by FEMA. FEMA adds a second warning:

“The Federal Government or FEMA cannot vouch for the data or analyses derived from these data after the data have been retrieved from the Agency’s website(s).”

State home insurance pages that use these figures carry a notice to this effect. Source: FEMA National Risk Index, version 1.20 (December 2025), county table, accessed October 8, 2026. For planning purposes only. These are county-level ratings. We do not use FEMA or Department of Homeland Security logos, and we do not republish FEMA’s raw table.

The Census Bureau asks users to credit it only for the original data and says the analyst owns any conclusions. We credit NHTSA the same way. Federal government works are generally not covered by U.S. copyright, but we credit the agencies anyway and imply no endorsement.

How often do we update?

There is no fixed calendar. We refresh a dataset when its publisher releases a new version, and we re-check each page at least once a year. We move a review date only after we have rechecked the facts. Two updates are pending: NAIC’s full 2023-2024 report, due later in 2026, and the final NHTSA 2024 crash file.

How can you cite or check our data?

If you cite us, give the page title, the “last reviewed” date and the address. For a specific number, also name the original publisher from the page’s source list. If you need the underlying data, you can get it from FEMA’s OpenFEMA site, the Census Bureau or NHTSA directly. We do not offer copies for reuse.

Did you spot a wrong figure or an old version? Email [email protected] with the page and the official source. Confirmed errors appear on the corrections page. Our methodology explains how estimates are compared, and the editorial policy covers how pages are checked.

Bottom line

Use our pages as a starting point, and open the linked agency source for anything that affects your decision. If a figure looks wrong or out of date, tell us and we will check it against the publisher.