CoreLogic, a leading provider of property information, analytics, property-related risk management and geospatial location intelligence is set to become New Zealand’s sole distributor of Ambiental’s suite of flood data products.

Almost 700,000 people¹ across New Zealand are currently at risk of flooding as a result of extreme weather events, representing an exposed risk to approximately 400,000 buildings and equalling a potential loss to of over $135bn worth of property assets. In addition to the exposure of almost 20,000kms of roads, 1,574kms of railways and 20 airports. Given these figures it’s not surprising that floods are considered New Zealand’s number one hazard.

The real estate, insurance and finance sectors are constantly looking for better insights to both predict flood risk and prevent damage or economic losses to people and assets as a result.

A report commissioned by The Treasury in 2018² found that climate change related floods have cost the New Zealand economy at least $120M for privately insured damages from floods over the last 10 years. With extreme precipitation events likely to become more intense and more frequent in many regions and climate change likely to amplify risks³, better insights are incredibly important and valuable.

Ben Speedy, CoreLogic’s Head of Country, New Zealand said, “Despite the devastation caused by earthquakes, flooding is the greatest hazard in terms of frequency, losses, and civil defence emergencies in New Zealand. With major flood events occurring almost every year, CoreLogic NZ’s customers have been asking for an advanced, high precision, nationwide flood model to allow better planning, risk pricing and response. CoreLogic NZ is delighted to bring Ambiental's New Zealand FloodMap and New Zealand FloodScore to our clients. We are excited to be helping our customers take a big step forward in understanding New Zealand’s unique flood risk.”­

Ambiental's national flood model is unique in its use of high resolution terrain modelling, the amount of local science and data employed and its inclusion of all sources of flood risk, enabling Core Logic clients to gain an unprecedented view of flood risk throughout New Zealand. Available to purchase as standalone products or within CoreLogic’s industry leading dashboards and property data, the array of innovative data products on offer will include Ambiental’s New Zealand FloodMap™ and New Zealand FloodScore™ – together providing both detailed views of flood hazard, as well as a very easy to understand view of risk, all from the individual property level.

Ambiental Risk Analytics COO, George Longfoot said, “We are pleased to welcome CoreLogic as a partner. With their passion for empowering customers to make smarter decisions through data-driven insights, we combine shared values and an ongoing pride in continuously innovating and enhancing our product range to offer the most accurate and up to date flood risk information available in the market.”

Sources:
¹ https://niwa.co.nz/news/new-reports-highlight-flood-risk-under-climate-change
² https://treasury.govt.nz/sites/default/files/2018-08/LSF-estimating-financial-cost-of-climate-change-in-nz.pdf Estimating financial costs of climate change in New Zealand: New Zealand Climate Change Research Institute
³ NIWA IPCC, 2014: Climate Change 2014: Synthesis Report. https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/syr/

CoreLogic is the largest provider of property information, analytics, property-related risk management & geospatial location intelligence in Australia and New Zealand.
https://www.corelogic.co.nz/