If your homeowners insurance in North Carolina went up last June, brace for it to go up again. The second half of a two-year settlement between the state’s insurance regulator and the insurance industry takes effect June 1, 2026 — six weeks from now. For most North Carolina homeowners, that means another 7.5 percent increase on top of the 7.5 percent that already hit in June 2025.
The two-year, 15 percent cumulative increase was the outcome of a settlement negotiated by Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey in January 2025. It replaced an original request from the North Carolina Rate Bureau — which represents insurers operating in the state — for an average 42.2 percent statewide increase, with proposed hikes reaching as high as 99.4 percent in some coastal areas. The settlement saved North Carolina homeowners an estimated $777 million compared to what carriers had requested. But the settlement also meant two years of guaranteed increases, and the second one is almost here.
What homeowners in coastal counties will see
The June 2026 increase is not the same number everywhere in the state. The settlement established 40 different territory rates, and the variation is significant.
Homeowners in the beach communities of Carteret, Onslow, Pender, New Hanover, and Brunswick counties face the steepest increases in this second round — an average 15.9 percent rise on June 1. That follows the 16 percent hit those same coastal homeowners absorbed in June 2025. Combined over two years, beach territory homeowners in the Cape Fear and Crystal Coast areas will have seen their base rates increase by nearly 32 percent under this settlement — a number still well below the 99.4 percent the Rate Bureau originally requested, but steep by any measure…