NerdWallet's Smart Money Podcast
Disaster-Resistant Finances: What to Do Before and After Catastrophes
15 Jan 2025
Learn how to prepare financially for natural disasters with practical tips on planning, saving, and post-disaster recovery. How can you financially prepare for a natural disaster? What should you do to recover financially afterward? Host Sean Pyles and NerdWallet insurance writer Caitlin Constantine discuss the financial impact of climate change and share actionable strategies to prepare for and recover from natural disasters. They begin with practical tips for disaster preparedness, including creating a home inventory, saving for emergencies, and understanding insurance coverage. Then, Kate Bulger, senior director of business development for nonprofit financial counseling agency Money Management International, joins Caitlin to discuss post-disaster recovery strategies. They explore how to work with insurance companies, access FEMA and other financial assistance programs, and avoid common scams in the aftermath of disasters. Where to turn when a natural disaster upends your finances: https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/finance/where-to-turn-when-a-natural-disaster-upends-your-finances What is FEMA and what can it do for you? https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/finance/what-is-fema To stay informed about how the Los Angeles fires and other developing news events could impact your wallet, follow NerdWallet’s financial news hub: https://www.nerdwallet.com/h/news/financial-news In this episode, the Nerds discuss: disaster preparedness, financial disaster recovery, home inventory checklist, how to prepare for natural disasters, emergency savings tips, disaster insurance, FEMA disaster assistance, post-disaster financial aid, saving for emergencies, how to avoid disaster scams, natural disaster financial planning, insurance coverage for disasters, disaster loans, flood insurance tips, tornado financial preparation, wildfire emergency planning, disaster recovery strategies, financial counseling after disasters, emergency cash reserve, how to protect finances in disasters, Small Business Administration disaster loans, keeping financial records safe, Project Porchlight, natural disaster credit card tips, budgeting for disasters, disaster financial checklist, avoiding insurance scams, rebuilding finances after disasters, climate change financial impacts, emergency financial preparedness, disaster recovery centers, handling financial trauma, managing finances after a flood, and disaster readiness tips. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Full Episode
Hi listeners, this is Sean. We've all been watching over the past week as another cataclysmic natural disaster has fallen upon our fellow citizens. The fires engulfing Los Angeles are incomprehensible to those of us who have never experienced that kind of tragedy.
but it's all too familiar to wide swaths of the country that have experienced mass flooding, hurricanes, tornadoes, and other calamities just over the last year. From everyone on the Smart Money team, our hearts go out to those affected by these disasters. In spring of 2023, Smart Money put together a special series about the effect of climate change on all of our finances.
My co-host was Caitlin Constantine, who oversees home insurance coverage here at NerdWallet. As part of that series, we did an episode about preparing your finances for the possibility that a natural disaster could impact your life. So today, we're reprising that episode for those of you who are asking themselves what you can do now in case the worst were to happen. And beyond this episode,
NerdWallet has a lot of content about how to prepare for and manage your finances in an emergency. Check out this episode's show notes for a few links, including an article on where to turn when a natural disaster upends your finances. Welcome to the NerdWallet Smart Money Podcast. I'm Sean Piles. And I'm Caitlin Constantine.
We're back with the final episode of our nerdy deep dive into the broad effects of climate change on our financial lives. Caitlin, we've covered mental health, housing, banking, investing, and all the changes that have been wrought by what's happening to the planet. What's next?
Well, Sean, early in this series, we pointed out that when people hear news about climate change, it's often in the context of some catastrophic natural disaster, like a tornado, a hurricane, wildfire, flooding.
Right. And we pointed out that climate change and its effects on our finances are much broader than those disasters, although they do seem to be more powerful and frequent these days.
Yes, they seem that way because they actually are. In fact, the World Meteorological Organization, which is an arm of the UN, released a report back in 2021 that showed that climate change has caused an increase in weather-related disasters by fivefold over the last 50 years. And so today, we're going to address that directly.
Jeez, fivefold. That's enormous. And honestly, it's something that I just cannot fathom, dealing with that kind of event. I know you've been through hurricanes, so it's probably a little bit more real for you, but it's just inconceivable to those of us who haven't lived through losing everything.
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