Insurance Claims Statistics & Trends on Long Island
Insurance claims provide one way to measure financial risk across Long Island. Flooding, coastal storms, motor vehicle crashes, property damage, workplace injuries, and insurance fraud all generate significant claims activity in Nassau County and Suffolk County.
Public insurance data has important limitations. Private insurers generally do not publish complete county-level totals showing every homeowners, auto, business, or liability claim, payment, denial, or loss ratio. The strongest local claims data comes from the federal National Flood Insurance Program, while other insurance categories are best understood through New York State regulatory data, traffic-safety statistics, workers’ compensation reporting, fraud reports, and disaster records.
The data shows that Long Island has an unusually large share of New York’s publicly documented flood-insurance exposure. From 1978 through 2024, Nassau and Suffolk properties received approximately $3.39 billion in National Flood Insurance Program payments, representing 59.2% of all NFIP payments made in New York State during that period.
Key Facts & Details
| Insurance / Risk Measure | Latest Public Figure | Scope |
|---|---|---|
| Nassau NFIP Payments | $2.280 billion | 1978-2024, nominal dollars |
| Suffolk NFIP Payments | $1.113 billion | 1978-2024, nominal dollars |
| Combined Long Island NFIP Payments | $3.393 billion | 59.2% of statewide NFIP payments, 1978-2024 |
| Share of NY NFIP Policies | Nassau 25.1%; Suffolk 18.0% | 2025; combined share 43.1% |
| Severe Weather Events | Nassau 899; Suffolk 1,751 | NOAA-recorded events, 1996-2024 |
| Weather-Related FEMA Declarations | Nassau 31; Suffolk 36 | 1978-2024 |
| People Killed or Injured in LI Traffic Crashes | 29,428 | Nassau + Suffolk, 2024 |
| NYS Insurance Complaints Received | 39,443 | Statewide DFS total, 2025 |
| NYS Suspected Insurance Fraud Reports | 51,419 | Statewide DFS total, 2025 |
| NYS No-Fault Fraud Reports | 36,835 | 72% of suspected insurance fraud reports, 2025 |
| NYS Workers’ Compensation Claims Assembled | 161,264 | Statewide, 2025 |
Important: Not every figure in this table represents an insurance claim. Traffic injuries measure crash exposure, severe-weather events measure hazard exposure, and DFS fraud and complaint figures are statewide regulatory statistics. They are included to provide context where complete Nassau-Suffolk private-insurance claim totals are not publicly available.
Flood Insurance Claims
Flood insurance provides the strongest publicly available county-level claims data for Long Island. FEMA publishes National Flood Insurance Program policy and claims records through OpenFEMA, allowing flood losses to be analyzed by county and other geographic areas.
A 2025 New York State Comptroller analysis of FEMA data found that Nassau and Suffolk were the two leading New York counties for NFIP payments from 1978 through 2024.
| County | NFIP Payments, 1978-2024 | Share of New York Total |
|---|---|---|
| Nassau County | $2,280,289,686 | 39.8% |
| Suffolk County | $1,112,738,419 | 19.4% |
| Nassau + Suffolk | $3,393,028,105 | 59.2% |
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program data analyzed by the New York State Comptroller. Dollar figures are nominal cumulative payments for buildings, contents, and Increased Cost of Compliance claims and are not adjusted for inflation.
Nassau alone accounted for almost two-fifths of all New York NFIP payments over the 47-year period, while Suffolk accounted for nearly one-fifth. Together, the two Long Island counties received the majority of NFIP payments made anywhere in New York State.
The concentration is also visible in current flood-insurance participation. In 2025, Nassau County accounted for approximately 25.1% of New York properties insured through the NFIP, while Suffolk accounted for another 18.0%. Combined, the two counties represented about 43.1% of NFIP-insured properties statewide.
NFIP data should not be interpreted as the total economic cost of flooding. The State Comptroller estimated that only about 3% of New York buildings were covered by NFIP policies, based on an average of 168,062 statewide policies from March 2024 through March 2025. Flood losses affecting uninsured buildings, vehicles, infrastructure, businesses, and other property are outside those NFIP totals.
Superstorm Sandy’s Lasting Impact
Superstorm Sandy remains the dominant modern flood-insurance event in Long Island’s claims history. According to the State Comptroller’s analysis, payments associated with Sandy account for approximately 87.9% of Nassau County’s cumulative NFIP payments from 1978 through 2024 and 77.7% of Suffolk County’s cumulative payments.
This helps explain why the two counties rank so far above most of New York in cumulative flood-insurance payments. Long Island combines extensive coastline, densely developed waterfront communities, expensive residential property, barrier islands, tidal bays, harbors, canals, and large numbers of insured structures.
Sandy also generated a much larger universe of private insurance claims beyond NFIP. In early 2013, the New York State Department of Financial Services reported that insurers representing approximately 90% of the market in Sandy-affected New York areas had received about 432,000 non-flood claims and expected to pay approximately $4.6 billion. Those figures covered multiple affected counties and are not Long Island-only totals, so they are not added to the Nassau-Suffolk NFIP figures above.
Severe Weather & Catastrophe Exposure
Flood claims are part of a broader weather-risk picture. The State Comptroller’s analysis of NOAA Storm Events data identified 1,751 severe-weather events in Suffolk County and 899 in Nassau County from 1996 through 2024.
| Weather Indicator | Nassau County | Suffolk County |
|---|---|---|
| NOAA Severe Weather Events, 1996-2024 | 899 | 1,751 |
| Average Annual Events, 1996-2005 | 19.9 | 46.5 |
| Average Annual Events, 2006-2015 | 36.2 | 56.6 |
| Average Annual Events, 2016-2024 | 37.6 | 80.0 |
| Weather-Related FEMA Disaster / Emergency Declarations, 1978-2024 | 31 | 36 |
Recorded events include thunderstorm wind, high wind, flash flooding, coastal flooding, heavy snow, winter storms, hail, tropical storms, heavy rain, tornadoes, and other hazards. Not every weather event produces an insured loss, and a single major catastrophe can generate far more claims than many smaller events combined.
Standard homeowners insurance generally does not cover flood losses. The New York State Department of Financial Services advises that flood coverage generally requires a separate flood policy. Homeowners in coastal portions of Nassau and Suffolk may also encounter hurricane deductibles, which can be expressed as a percentage of dwelling coverage rather than as a conventional fixed-dollar deductible.
Auto Insurance & Crash Exposure
Complete private auto-insurance claim counts for Nassau and Suffolk are not publicly released by insurers, but official crash statistics demonstrate the scale of potential insurance exposure. The New York Governor’s Traffic Safety Committee reported that 29,428 people were killed or injured in traffic crashes on Long Island during 2024.
The same state reporting identified 58 pedestrian fatalities on Long Island in 2024. Speed-related crashes killed 62 people and injured 2,859. These crash statistics are not claim counts, but crashes involving injuries and vehicle damage can generate liability, collision, comprehensive, uninsured-motorist, and New York no-fault claims.
New York requires basic no-fault Personal Injury Protection coverage. Under the state’s system, basic no-fault benefits can provide up to $50,000 per person for qualifying medical expenses, lost earnings, and certain other economic losses resulting from a motor vehicle accident, regardless of fault within the rules of the system.
Long Island’s large population and extensive roadway system create substantial auto-insurance exposure. Major corridors include the Long Island Expressway, Northern State Parkway, Southern State Parkway, Sunrise Highway, and heavily traveled local roads throughout both counties.
Insurance Complaints & Consumer Recoveries
County-level claim totals are generally unavailable for private auto and property insurance, but the New York State Department of Financial Services publishes statewide complaint and consumer-assistance statistics that provide additional context.
In 2025, DFS received 39,443 insurance complaints and closed 39,064. The agency reported obtaining approximately $121.2 million in recoveries for consumers and providers.
| 2025 DFS Insurance Category | Complaints Closed | Positive Consumer Outcomes | Recovery Amount |
|---|---|---|---|
| Auto & No-Fault | 8,122 | 1,905 | $14.4 million |
| Property Casualty & Service Contracts | 2,869 | 498 | $17.95 million |
| All Insurance Categories | 39,064 | 10,336 | $121.23 million |
These are statewide New York statistics and should not be interpreted as Nassau or Suffolk County totals. A DFS complaint is also not the same thing as an insurance claim. Complaints may involve claim handling, coverage, payment disputes, policy cancellation or nonrenewal, premiums, and other insurance issues.
Insurance Fraud & No-Fault Claims
Insurance fraud is another important part of New York’s claims environment, particularly in automobile no-fault insurance. The DFS Insurance Frauds Bureau received 51,419 reports of suspected insurance fraud in 2025. Approximately 36,835, or 72%, involved no-fault automobile insurance.
| DFS Fraud Measure | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| All Suspected Insurance Fraud Reports | 52,105 | 51,419 |
| No-Fault Fraud Reports | 38,846 | 36,835 |
| New Fraud Investigations | 316 | 243 |
| Arrests | 227 | 169 |
In addition to the 243 investigations opened during 2025, DFS reported referring 95 cases to prosecutorial agencies. Its multi-agency work includes partnerships with the Nassau County District Attorney’s Revenue, Auto, Insurance and Labor Crime Unit and the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Insurance Crime Bureau, among other law-enforcement organizations.
Fraud reports are allegations or referrals and should not be interpreted as confirmed criminal acts. Investigations can involve staged accidents, fraudulent medical billing, false injury claims, misrepresentation, property claims, workers’ compensation, and other insurance-related conduct.
Workers’ Compensation Claims
The New York State Workers’ Compensation Board publishes detailed statewide information on work-related injury and illness claims. County-level totals comparable to the FEMA flood data are not routinely presented in the Board’s annual report, so statewide figures are used here for context rather than being assigned to Nassau or Suffolk.
In 2025, the Board assembled and designated 161,264 workers’ compensation claims as complete, down approximately 2.1% from 164,739 in 2024. A claim is considered complete after the Board receives formal notice of the injury from the insurer and qualifying medical documentation.
| Year | NYS Workers’ Compensation Claims Assembled |
|---|---|
| 2021 | 146,788 |
| 2022 | 159,147 |
| 2023 | 167,292 |
| 2024 | 164,739 |
| 2025 | 161,264 |
The Board identified health care and social assistance, public administration, and transportation and warehousing among the industries producing the most workers’ compensation claims in 2025. The top 10 industries together accounted for 85.6% of claims assembled during the year.
Long Island’s substantial employment base in health care, government, education, construction, transportation, retail, hospitality, and service industries means workers’ compensation remains an important component of the region’s overall insurance landscape, even though a precise two-county total is not published in the statewide annual report.
Homeowners & Property Claims
Private homeowners claims can arise from wind, fallen trees, fire, theft, plumbing failures, frozen pipes, roof damage, lightning, severe thunderstorms, and other covered losses. Unlike NFIP flood claims, however, complete homeowners claim counts and payouts are generally proprietary insurer data and are not published in a standardized county-level public database.
Coverage also depends on the cause of a loss. Standard homeowners and renters policies generally exclude flooding. Sewer or water-backup coverage may be available through an endorsement, while wind damage may be covered subject to policy terms and deductibles. In coastal portions of Nassau and Suffolk, homeowners may also be subject to hurricane deductibles when applicable policy and storm-trigger conditions are met.
For this reason, a single event can generate several different types of financial losses that are handled through different systems. Flood damage may fall under NFIP or private flood insurance, wind damage may fall under homeowners coverage, vehicle damage may be handled through auto insurance, business interruption may require commercial coverage, and public infrastructure losses may be addressed through government disaster programs.
Major Long Island Insurance & Disaster Benchmarks
| Event / Risk | Insurance Significance | Long Island Context |
|---|---|---|
| Superstorm Sandy – 2012 | Flood, wind, homeowners, commercial, auto, and disaster-recovery claims | Sandy-related payments account for approximately 87.9% of Nassau and 77.7% of Suffolk cumulative NFIP payments through 2024. |
| Hurricane Irene / Tropical Storm Lee – 2011 | Flooding and storm losses | 2011 was one of New York’s largest NFIP payout years. |
| Tropical Storm Isaias – 2020 | Wind, trees, utility interruption, vehicles, and property losses | Major reminder that damaging tropical systems do not need to make landfall as hurricanes. |
| Henri / Ida – 2021 | Heavy rain, flash flooding, coastal impacts, and property claims | 2021 ranked among New York’s largest recent NFIP payout years. |
| Recurring Nor’easters & Winter Storms | Coastal flooding, wind, roofs, trees, frozen pipes, slip-and-fall and auto claims | Recurring risk throughout Nassau and Suffolk. |
| Everyday Motor Vehicle Crashes | No-fault, bodily injury, property damage, collision, and other auto claims | 29,428 people were killed or injured in Long Island crashes during 2024. |
Understanding the Data
NFIP payments are not the same as total flood damage. They measure payments under National Flood Insurance Program policies. Properties without flood insurance and losses outside policy coverage are not included.
Insurance complaints are not claim counts. DFS complaint figures measure matters submitted to the regulator and can include disputes involving payments, coverage, premiums, cancellation, nonrenewal, and other issues.
Crash statistics measure insurance exposure rather than actual claims. A crash can result in multiple insurance claims, one claim, or no paid insurance claim at all.
Fraud reports are suspected activity. Reports filed with DFS do not by themselves establish that fraud occurred. Investigation and prosecution figures describe later stages of the enforcement process.
Workers’ compensation data is statewide unless specifically identified otherwise. The Workers’ Compensation Board’s annual reports provide detailed system statistics but do not provide a directly comparable Nassau-Suffolk county total for every measure.
Methodology
- Flood insurance: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program claims and policies data, including the New York State Comptroller’s analysis of OpenFEMA records through 2024.
- NFIP dollar amounts: Cumulative Nassau and Suffolk figures are nominal-dollar payments for buildings, contents, and Increased Cost of Compliance from 1978 through 2024.
- Severe weather: NOAA Storm Events data summarized by the New York State Comptroller for 1996 through 2024.
- Disaster declarations: FEMA Stafford Act disaster and emergency declaration records summarized by county.
- Auto risk: New York State Department of Motor Vehicles and Governor’s Traffic Safety Committee statistics. Crash and injury counts are used as measures of exposure and are not presented as insurance claims.
- Insurance complaints and recoveries: New York State Department of Financial Services Consumer Protection and Financial Fraud Enforcement Annual Report for 2025.
- Insurance fraud: New York State Department of Financial Services Insurance Frauds Bureau suspected-fraud, investigation, arrest, and referral statistics.
- Workers’ compensation: New York State Workers’ Compensation Board 2025 Annual Report. Figures identified as statewide are not estimates of Long Island-only activity.
- Private insurance limitations: Complete carrier-level Nassau and Suffolk homeowners, auto, business, liability, denial, and loss-ratio data is not publicly available in a single standardized dataset. Unsupported estimates are not used on this page.
Official Data Sources & Updates
Data reviewed: September 22, 2026.
Primary sources used for this page include FEMA OpenFEMA, the New York State Comptroller’s Severe Weather Events and Resiliency in New York State report, the New York State Department of Financial Services, the DFS Consumer Protection and Financial Fraud Enforcement Annual Report for 2025, the New York State Workers’ Compensation Board 2025 Annual Report, the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles, the Governor’s Traffic Safety Committee, FEMA disaster records, and NOAA severe-weather data.
Insurance statistics should be interpreted according to the system that produced them. NFIP claims measure insured flood losses, workers’ compensation data measures work-related injury and illness claims, DFS complaints measure regulatory consumer matters, fraud reports measure suspected activity, and crash statistics measure roadway risk rather than insurance payments. Used together, these sources show that Long Island’s largest publicly measurable insurance exposure is tied to flooding and coastal weather, while motor vehicle crashes, property losses, workplace injuries, and no-fault fraud remain important parts of the broader regional insurance environment.
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