[softcactus]

That's a good point, I decided to do some napkin math:

Sanibel Island has 7,821 housing units at an average density of 454.6 per square mile.

Median sales price of the homes in 2021 was $1.64M, average price was similar.

So a rough approximation of the value of the homes on the island alone is $12Bn. I am not sure how you would translate that into damage costs, but in a scenario of total destruction then $12B would be lost.

I have no real evidence other than visiting Ft Myers and Naples a few times, but I can tell you there is (was) a lot of very valuable property right next to the ocean. I don't doubt that if you look at the total distribution of damages that there is a long tail of less severe damage as you go inland, but the conservative estimates from my napkin math shows that it's likely a significant number (over ten billion) occurred just from properties on the small stretch of coastline.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanibel,_Florida https://sanibelrealestateguide.com/average-price-homes/

[tpmoney]

Insurance isn't going to pay out on value though, it's going to pay out on replacement costs. A home that's $5M because it sits on the waterfront would be $750K 5 miles inland, but they will cost roughly the same to replace.

For example, here is one house for sale on the water in Naples (https://www.trulia.com/p/fl/naples/2331-crayton-rd-naples-fl...). 3 beds, 2 baths, 2k sqft on a little over 0.25 acres. $3.5M

Just 7 miles away is this house (https://www.trulia.com/p/fl/naples/5241-hunter-blvd-naples-f...), 4 beds, 2 baths, 2.25k sqft on 0.25 acres. $625K.

I sincerely doubt the cost to replace the first home is 6x the second. And then there's this one (https://www.trulia.com/p/fl/sebring/2124-gardenview-rd-sebri...), which is about as far from the coast as you can reasonably be in that part of florida, going for a mere $240k, and I doubt it's significantly more or less to replace than either of the previous two.