Abstract
Natural disasters and water damages may impact regional housing markets since housing constitutes a large part of household wealth. I investigate this by using Norwegian data on insurance claims and the housing market, which is a relevant country to investigate due to its extensive and inexpensive insurance coverage against natural disasters, and its high homeownership rate. Insurance claims data also measure the size of damages that have occurred, through both the severity and extent of disasters in an area. To account for numerous small and large disasters across the sample period, I utilize local projection estimates, while also looking at different subsets of the data set for more detailed analyses. I find some signs of impact on the housing market from natural disasters, even though the effects are not very significant. These findings are, however, important for risk evaluation, given the expected rise in frequency and severity of damages in the future.