Reports & Research

From Costly Water Losses to Millions in Savings

Non-weather water claims are a leading cause of property insurance losses, costing insurers over $20 billion annually. 

Join us for a FREE live webinar where our experts will discuss the latest trends, challenges, and insights to help you mitigate non-weather water risk.

What We'll Cover

Our experts Rob Silva, ACAS (Director of Customer Success) & Sam Fetchero (Head of Marketing) will present:

• Current Trends: Understand the rise in severity and total loss costs of non-weather water claims.
• Risk Assessment Challenges: Learn why traditional methods fall short in assessing non-weather water vulnerability.
• Key Risk Factors: Identify the main drivers of non-weather water damage.
• Strategic Insights: Discover strategies to improve your management of non-weather water claims.
• Z-WATER in Action: Experience our new AI-powered model that predicts non-weather water risk with unparalleled accuracy.
• Interactive Q&A: Get your questions answered by our experts.

Who Should Attend

This webinar is ideal for Executives, Product Managers, Actuaries, Underwriters, and CAT Modelers committed to enhancing their understanding and management of non-weather water risks. 

Bonus Content

As a bonus, you'll receive our exclusive infographic, "Below the Surface: Research Reveals Knowledge Gap in Homeowner Water Loss Prevention and Coverage."

This research gives key insights into water loss experiences, coverage details, homeowner protection measures, and information on water shutoff devices and heater conditions.

Register Now

It’s hard to overstate how important the roof is from an insurability standpoint. The roof represents significant risks and potential opportunities, making it a critical focus area for insurers. This has become even more important in recent years as the impact of severe convective storms is often reflected in roof losses. Understanding this, ZestyAI has released new research for property insurers called The Insurers Guide to Roof Risk.

Download The Insurers Guide to Roof Risk

In an era where the severity and frequency of roof-related claims are on the rise, particularly due to the increasing impact of severe convective storms, innovative tools and strategies are essential. The Insurers Guide to Roof Risk provides actionable insights to improve risk assessment, underwriting processes, and overall business strategy.

What’s Inside the Guide?

The Insurers Guide to Roof Risk includes:

• Roof Failure Factors: Learn the underlying contributing factors behind why older roofs fail more often.
• Beyond Roof Age: Discover why roof complexity, condition, and climate are more important than roof age alone.
• Identifying Missing Risk Factors: Understand the key factors to roof risk that most traditional models miss.
• Advanced Risk Segmentation: See how using machine learning and new data sources can split risk more than 60 times better than traditional models.
• Portfolio Optimization: Access a comprehensive toolbox to optimize your portfolio and new business selection to generate exponential lift versus traditional models.

Download Now

Annual Wildfire Season Overview provides insights to assist insurers in effectively managing wildfire risk.

ZestyAI has released its annual Wildfire Season Overview for 2024. This year’s guide provides critical insights carriers need to stay ahead of the rapidly evolving wildfire landscape. Offering more than just data, this year’s guide is designed to help insurers make informed risk decisions in some of the country’s most volatile states. 

Download ZestyAI's 2024 Wildfire Season Overview 

This year’s guide includes: 

• Countrywide Wildfire Impact Analysis: Understand how wildfires are affecting regions beyond traditional hotspots like CA, including significant events in TX & NM.
• Future Wildfire Trends: Explore predictions for the 2024 wildfire season and understand the long-term implications of current conditions on wildfire risks.
• Regulatory Insights: Stay updated on the latest regulations affecting wildfire risk assessment insurance practices.
• AI-driven Risk Models: Learn how ZestyAI's Z-FIRE model accurately predicts wildfire risks and assists insurers in making informed decisions.
• Property-Level Risk Assessments: Discover the importance of granular, property-specific risk evaluations to improve underwriting accuracy and transparency for consumers.

Download Now

Costing insurers approximately $19 billion every year, roof claims stand as the primary driver of property insurance losses.

Traditional methods of obtaining roof age information are deeply flawed. Most carriers depend on policyholder or agent-reported data, which is often inaccurate, leading to blind spots in assessing property risk. In a recent ZestyAI survey, 63 percent of homeowners reported not knowing the age of their roof if they were not in their homes the last time it was replaced.

Join our expert panel for a deep dive into leveraging roof age analytics for a cutting-edge underwriting process and gain insider knowledge on:

• The Leading Cause of Claims: unveil the hidden truths behind roof-related claims and the costly consequences of outdated assessment methods.
• A New Era of Data: Learn about ZestyAI’s pioneering approach to roof age analytics, incorporating building permits, historical imagery, and AI for a comprehensive view
• Precision at Scale: See how to apply precise, AI-driven roof age data across your entire portfolio for consistent and reliable underwriting and claims decisions
• Technical Decision Making: Empower your actuaries and underwriters with the insights needed to enhance risk selection and optimize pricing strategies
• Efficiency in Operations: Streamline inspections and operations, focusing resources where they’re needed most, improving time-to-quote, and enriching the customer experience
• Best Practices: Learn how leading carriers are using roof age, roof condition, and peril-specific models to improve risk selection and lower combined ratios 

This transformative session is available on demand. Learn how to enhance accuracy, efficiency, and profitability in property insurance.

Save Your Spot

In an ever-evolving regulatory environment, staying informed and adaptable is crucial. Our latest interactive guide, "When Innovation and Regulation Meet", offers a comprehensive toolkit for navigating the complexities of insurance compliance and the integration of AI technologies. 

What's Inside?

• Regulatory Landscape Map: Delve into a detailed state-by-state analysis, uncovering the intricacies of filing laws and approval speeds.
• Staying Ahead of Regulation Changes: Learn how to stay prepared and ensure your compliance strategies are future-proof, aligning with the latest regulatory expectations.
• Essential AI Partner Checklist: Choosing the right AI partner is crucial for success. Our guide offers a meticulous checklist for selecting a partner that is not only compliant but also transparent and supportive, ensuring you make an informed decision.
• Emerging Regulatory Concerns: What do you need to know about privacy, bias, and AI oversight?
• Real-World Applications: Discover how ZestyAI's collaborative approach with regulatory entities has led to successful model approvals across the United States. 

Why This Guide?

As the regulatory framework becomes increasingly complex, having a reliable and insightful resource is indispensable. Our guide is tailored for insurance professionals seeking to enhance their regulatory strategy, embrace AI innovation responsibly, and achieve a competitive edge in the market.

Ready to get up to speed on 2024's regulatory environment? Access the guide.

The landscape of hail risk management is undergoing a significant transformation. Our latest publication, "Hail Risk 2024: An Interactive Guide for Insurers," offers a critical examination, illustrated with compelling data, of the factors contributing to the alarming rise in hail-related losses over the last decade. Major changes to how hail is understood have changed how insurers should view the peril. This guide isn't just about understanding hail risk; it's about redefining how it is managed in the insurance industry.

Why This Guide is Indispensable:

• Losses Rising — Understand the key factors driving record-breaking hail losses, and why there's more to the story than just "climate change."
• Reinsurance  — Learn why insurance carriers now shoulder more of the burden due to changing risk transfer relations.
• The Right Tools  — Explore how AI-based climate risk models are supplementing stochastic and actuarial models for a full picture of climate risk.
• Actionable Steps  — See how leading carriers are applying granular, property-level insights and learn the proactive steps they're taking to mitigate risks and losses.

Ready to get up to speed on hail risk in 2024? Access the guide.

ZestyAI today announced an agreement with TruStage. This partnership will leverage ZestyAI’s suite of advanced property analytics solutions for valuable insights during commercial property underwriting.

TruStage will utilize three of ZestyAI's innovative property risk analytics models: Z-HAIL™, Z-FIRE™, and Z-PROPERTY™. Additionally, TruStage will use ZestyAI's Wildfire Mitigation Pre-Fill solution in response to new wildfire mitigation regulations set forth by the California Department of Insurance (CDI) with scalable, high-accuracy wildfire mitigation data without the need for expensive on-site inspections. 

“Global insured catastrophe claims are expected to top 100 billion dollars again this year, driven increasingly by secondary perils like hail and wildfire,” said Attila Toth, Founder and CEO of ZestyAI.

“By using AI‑driven, property‑specific intelligence instead of coarse territory‑level averages, TruStage can price risk more precisely, respond to California’s new wildfire mitigation requirements, and better protect its commercial policyholders.”

Z-HAIL is an AI-powered climate risk model that predicts the frequency and severity of hail claims for every property in the US. Z-HAIL examines the interaction of climatology, geography, and the unique characteristics of every structure and roof, including accumulated damage. This information can be used in both underwriting and rating at the time of quote. Using insights into a roof’s susceptibility to severe convective storms and the potential severity of those claims, insurers can accurately segment properties by risk level. 

In addition to Z-HAIL, TruStage will use ZestyAI’s Z-FIRE product, an AI-powered, predictive wildfire risk model built on decades of real insurer loss data, and ZestyAI’s Z-PROPERTY platform, which uses computer vision and machine learning to extract insights from aerial and satellite imagery, among other unique data sources, for over 150 million residential and commercial properties.

By leveraging multiple products on the ZestyAI Climate and Property Risk platform, TruStage is empowered to make informed and transparent risk decisions and deliver best-in-class services to its valued customers.

ZestyAI, the Risk and Decision Intelligence Platform for the insurance industry, today announced that its non-weather water risk model, Z-WATER™, has been reviewed and accepted for use in underwriting and rating in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, and Wisconsin. 

Insurers in these states will now be able to set property-specific rates, align coverage with home-level vulnerabilities, and target inspections and mitigation strategies—including smart water sensors—to reduce cross-subsidization and improve portfolio performance.

Non-weather water has become a major pressure point for carriers, with losses now exceeding $13 billion annually and ranking as the third-costliest peril in homeowners insurance.

Routine failures like burst pipes and hidden leaks are now producing catastrophe-scale losses that surpass hurricanes in severity. Yet the peril has been difficult to model using traditional rating tools, which rely on territory-level or age-based proxies that overlook the property-specific factors driving interior water losses.

Using verified insurer loss data, Z-WATER applies computer vision to aerial imagery and incorporates property-level data, permitting history, localized climatology, and infrastructure context to capture the property-specific drivers of interior water losses. By modeling how these variables interact, Z-WATER predicts both the frequency and severity of non-weather water claims with up to 18× greater accuracy than traditional models.

Bryan Rehor, Director of Regulatory Strategy at ZestyAI, said:

“Non-weather water losses place real pressure on carriers’ books, but they’re also highly preventable when you understand where the risks actually lie.

Z-WATER helps insurers pinpoint those vulnerabilities at the property level and price them appropriately, while meeting regulators’ expectations for clarity and fairness.”

These approvals add to ZestyAI’s broader regulatory momentum. Across five perils—including wildfire, hail, wind, storm, and now non-weather water—ZestyAI has secured more than 80 approvals nationwide. Z-PROPERTY™, the company’s property and roof analytics solution, has also earned broad state-level approval, giving insurers and reinsurers trusted parcel-level insights with the same regulatory-grade transparency.

Most filing delays are self-inflicted; not by regulators, but by carriers submitting filings with missing pieces, unclear narratives, or outdated requirements. In prior-approval states, those slips don’t just slow things down; they can freeze millions in premium for months. That was the core message of ZestyAI’s recent webinar, Approval‑Ready: How Carriers and Regulators Can Accelerate Filings, featuring Carter Lawrence, Commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance, and Bryan Rehor, Director of Regulatory Strategy at ZestyAI. 

Watch the full session on demand here: Approval‑Ready: How Carriers and Regulators Can Accelerate Filings.

What regulators want from rate filings

Commissioner Lawrence opened with a simple reminder: regulators are people first, operating under clear statutory mandates but deeply focused on maintaining a healthy, competitive insurance market for the consumers they serve. 

For carriers, that means relationships and preparation matter. He urged companies to proactively meet with departments, especially before submitting novel products or complex filings that benefit from early discussion.​

Why filing delays cost insurers millions

From the carrier perspective, Bryan Rehor shared data from ZORRO Discover, ZestyAI’s agentic AI platform for competitive intelligence trained on hundreds of millions of pages of P&C filings, objection letters, and regulations. In prior‑approval states, ZORRO’s analysis shows that after the first objection, each additional objection typically adds about two months to the approval timeline, and incomplete responses can add another two to four months.​​

Those delays are often driven by preventable operational misses rather than disagreements over rate indications: missing actuarial exhibits, incomplete predictive model documentation, outdated checklists, procedural gaps, and under‑explained catastrophe assumptions. When ZestyAI’s team quantified the impact across lines, we estimated that delayed approvals translate into tens of millions of dollars per day in unrealized premium changes for the industry.​

How ZestyAI’s ZORRO Discover helps carriers become approval‑ready

The panel converged on a key idea: the industry needs to move from reactive, objection‑driven workflows to proactive, intelligence‑driven ones. For regulators, that means using technology to reduce low‑value manual review so teams can focus on complex judgment calls; for carriers, it means embedding regulatory awareness and quality checks directly into rate filing workflows.​

ZORRO Discover continuously ingests regulatory filings and related materials, so it flags gaps against current checklists, common objection themes, and emerging expectations in each state before a filing is submitted. Combined with ZestyAI’s regulator‑approved peril models and rate service organization capabilities, carriers can submit more transparent, thoroughly supported filings that earn trust and move faster through regulatory review.​​

FAQs: approval‑ready insurance filings and ZORRO Discover

What is ZORRO Discover from ZestyAI?‍

ZORRO Discover is ZestyAI’s agentic AI platform for competitive and regulatory intelligence in P&C. It analyzes 2M+ SERFF filings and related materials across all 50 states, turning millions of pages into real-time, citation-backed insights. For regulatory teams, it surfaces objection patterns and regulator expectations upfront, improving research efficiency by 20X. This helps teams run faster and more accurate pre-submission QA, draft cleaner filings, accelerate approvals, and reduce adverse selection.

How can insurance-specific AI reduce filing objections?‍

Agentic AI platforms for competitive intelligence, such as ZORRO Discover, scan millions of filings and related materials, including checklists, statutes, and historic objection letters. They help teams flag missing actuarial support, outdated checklists, weak justifications, and documentation gaps before submission. This “pre‑flight” QA reduces procedural errors that trigger avoidable objections and multi‑month delays.​​

How does ZestyAI help carriers be "approval-ready”?‍

ZestyAI helps carriers be approval-ready by strengthening both the models they file and the way those filings are prepared. Our peril models are filed through a Rate Service Organization (RSO) with standardized, regulator-tested documentation and a growing track record of approvals that carriers can reference as precedent. On the process side, ZORRO Discover provides pre-submission QA using regulatory objections and competitive insights. Together, this gives carriers more complete, regulator-aligned filings, fewer avoidable objections, and faster, more predictable approval timelines.

Why do prior‑approval states create unique challenges?‍

In prior‑approval states, rate and product changes cannot take effect until they are signed off by the Department of Insurance (DOI), so each objection round adds real financial cost as actuarially indicated changes sit idle. ZORRO Discover’s analysis shows that every additional objection can add months to the timeline, making operational quality and proactive compliance crucial levers for profitability.​

How does ZestyAI support regulators and carriers at the same time?‍

ZestyAI reduces friction on both sides of the filing process by providing regulators with better documentation and helping carriers.

For regulators:

• Standardized, RSO-filed model documentation that’s easy to review.
• Regulatory precedent from prior approvals, reducing model-review burden.
• Clear, transparent methodology aligned with statutory expectations.

For carriers:

• Faster approvals by referencing ZestyAI’s existing model approvals.
• Fewer avoidable objections through ZORRO Discover’s QA and objection-pattern insights.
• More complete, regulator-aligned filings with clearer documentation and rationale.
  

Outcome:
Regulators receive fully documented, RSO-filed models that are easier to review and validate. Carriers benefit from two advantages:

1. Clear insight into regulatory expectations to help them avoid common filing errors.
2. The ability to reference ZestyAI’s existing model approvals, which provides regulatory precedent and helps their own filings move through review more quickly.

Together, this reduces avoidable objections and creates a more efficient, predictable approval process for both sides.

To hear directly from Commissioner Carter Lawrence and ZestyAI’s regulatory experts, watch the full webinar on demand: Approval‑Ready: How Carriers and Regulators Can Accelerate Filings

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For insurers evaluating new data partners, transparency isn’t just about the model. It’s about the process. And at ZestyAI, that process is shaped by people who’ve actually operated inside carrier environments. Former actuaries, underwriters, product leaders, and regulatory specialists built our platform with a deep understanding of how difficult it is to integrate new technology inside a regulated ecosystem.

From day one, carriers get immediate value: full portfolio scoring, access to our web application, and the ability to validate data, explore properties, and begin applying insights right away.

Working with ZestyAI means:

• Real carrier experience behind the platform, not outsider assumptions.
• Direct access to industry experts across actuarial, underwriting, and regulatory domains.
• Instant time-to-value, with portfolio scoring and platform access available at kickoff.
• A focus on ROI, with every step designed to deliver measurable impact quickly.

Here’s what that looks like in practice — from kickoff to full production.

ZestyAI’s Onboarding Process: From Kickoff to Deployment

ZestyAI provides a structured onboarding experience aligned with your goals, whether focused on underwriting, rating, or operational efficiency. After the kickoff meeting, we work through a clear sequence designed to move fast while staying aligned with internal governance and IT workflows:

• Define objectives and use cases
• Align on data needs and file structure
• Establish integration protocols (API or batch)
• Support internal testing and model validation
• Provide regulatory guidance for rating, underwriting, and filings (state-specific documentation, actuarial support)

Our approach emphasizes speed-to-value while ensuring the process fits cleanly within your organization’s governance, compliance, and operational requirements. We don’t just integrate a model; we drive measurable outcomes such as improved segmentation, faster quoting, and operational efficiency.

ZestyAI’s models are designed to support a wide range of underwriting and rating workflows. Whether carriers use raw scores, tier bands, or mitigation indicators, the outputs align naturally with existing processes and program designs.

Integration with Guidewire, Duck Creek, Cogitate, and Other Platforms

ZestyAI is platform-agnostic and supports integration with:

• Guidewire
• Duck Creek
• Cogitate
• Custom core systems and middleware

We provide configuration support via secure APIs, batch ingestion, or prefill mapping. Our scores can be embedded into workflows across underwriting, inspection triage, mitigation eligibility, and renewals.

Data Requirements for Pilots or Backtests

To initiate a pilot or backtest, we typically request a dataset that includes:

• Property address or coordinates
• Policy effective and expiration dates
• Claims history (dates, causes, amounts)

Additional fields—such as construction type, roof material, or occupancy—can enhance model matching or segmentation. We’ll review your available data and finalize the format before ingestion.

Batch Scoring, API Integration, and Z-VIEW Access

ZestyAI models can be accessed via:

• Batch processing – ideal for backtests, portfolio scoring, and operational refreshes
• Real-time APIs – for use at quote, renewal, or mid-term policy changes
• Z-VIEW web application – a no-integration option for viewing property scores, risk drivers, and imagery

We support REST API and SFTP-based workflows, depending on your system architecture and compliance requirements. Most carriers start with batch mode and transition to real-time as production expands.

Need to evaluate before integration? ZestyAI’s portfolio scoring option enables carriers to assess entire books of business—no IT lift required.

Technical and Regulatory Support for a Custom Onboarding Experience

We offer hands-on support throughout the onboarding process, including:

• Data mapping and API testing
• Documentation walkthroughs and QA
• Score interpretation and regulatory consulting
• Workflow and dashboard design

We also provide custom analytics—such as lift charts or correlation studies—to support actuarial, underwriting, and product stakeholders across your organization.

For carriers preparing for rating or filing workflows, we also provide full regulatory support, including:

• Filing exhibits and actuarial documentation
• Dislocation and rate-impact analyses
• ASOP-aligned model memos and methodology summaries
• State-specific guidance and responses to DOI questions

Our goal is to make onboarding smooth for every stakeholder—actuarial, underwriting, product, compliance, and regulatory.

Typical Timeline to Run a Pilot or Backtest

Most pilots or backtests are completed within 4 weeks, depending on data quality and scope. After receiving your dataset, we:

• Score policies using the relevant ZestyAI models
• Analyze performance across segments (e.g., lift by decile)
• Present findings and operational recommendations
• Compare portfolio to aggregated state baselines

More advanced use cases—like rating segmentation or mitigation tracking—may require slightly more time to align with stakeholders. Regardless of scope, we aim to deliver clear, actionable insights quickly.

ZestyAI today announced that the Departments of Insurance in West Virginia, Georgia, South Dakota, Montana, Oregon, and Utah have reviewed and accepted its Severe Convective Storm (SCS) risk models, including Z-HAIL™, Z-WIND™, and Z-STORM™, for use in carrier rate and rule filings.

With these additions, ZestyAI’s SCS Suite is now ready for use in 29 states, supporting rating, underwriting, and reinsurance decisions across the most storm-exposed regions in the country.

Meeting the Growing Need for Transparent Storm Risk Assessment

As severe convective storm losses exceed $40 billion for the third consecutive year, regulators and carriers are accelerating the shift toward transparent, property-level models that clearly show what drives hail and wind losses.

ZestyAI’s SCS Suite is trained and validated on verified carrier claims data and delivers clear explanations of the factors behind each property’s risk score. By analyzing how local climatology interacts with individual property characteristics, the platform predicts the likelihood and severity of hail and wind claims with far greater precision than traditional territory or ZIP code–based methods.

Property-Level Storm Risk Models

• Z-HAIL: Quantifies hail risk using property-level drivers—roof geometry, accumulated damage, and local climatology—to pinpoint the buildings at greatest likelihood of hail damage, even within the same area.
• Z-WIND: Analyzes wind risk using AI-driven 3D analysis of roof condition, complexity, and potential failure points —together with localized wind climatology—to determine which buildings are most susceptible to wind damage.
• Z-STORM: Predicts the frequency and severity of storm damage claims, including hail and wind, examining the interaction between climatology and the unique characteristics of every structure and roof.

Bryan Rehor, Director of Regulatory Affairs at ZestyAI, said:

“Carriers and regulators are aligned around the need for transparent, property-specific evaluation of hail and wind vulnerability. “These filings reinforce the shift toward models that clearly explain the drivers of storm loss and support compliant, defensible decisions.”

New Capability: Mitigation-Aware Scoring

ZestyAI recently introduced Mitigation-Aware Scoring, allowing insurers to update model inputs and risk scores in real time based on verified changes to property attributes, such as:

• upgrading or replacing roof materials
• remediating visible roof or property condition issues
• correcting inaccurate data (e.g., misclassified roof type)
• modeling the impact of planned upgrades

Mitigation-Aware Scoring extends capabilities already widely used in Z-FIRE™ and ensures a consistent, carrier-controlled approach to reflecting verified improvements across perils. The functionality strengthens rating accuracy, supports fairer underwriting decisions, and aligns with evolving regulatory expectations around transparency and mitigation recognition.

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