7:18

Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. With the

7:20

price of just about everything going up during

7:22

inflation, we thought we'd bring our prices down.

7:25

So to help us, we brought in a reverse auctioneer, which is

7:28

apparently a thing. Mint Mobile Unlimited Premium Wireless. I bet you get

7:30

30, 30, I bet you get 30, I bet you get 20,

7:32

20, 20, I bet you get 20, 20, I

7:35

bet you get 15, 15, 15,

7:37

15, just 15 bucks a month.

7:39

So, give it a try at

7:41

mintmobile.com/switch. $45 upfront for three months plus

7:43

taxes and fees. Promo rate for new customers for limited time.

7:45

Unlimited more than 40 gigabytes per month. Mint Mobile Unlimited Premium

7:47

Wireless. European

10:00

Mortgage Federation, European Covered Bond Council,

10:02

says there are huge risks to

10:04

economic productivity if people can't secure

10:06

homes that protect them from the

10:08

worst effects of climate change. In

10:11

Heat Waves, he notes worker productivity falls,

10:13

meaning a negative impact on GDP. Conversely,

10:16

he speaks of a kind of energy

10:18

retrofit butterfly effect. If people make their

10:20

home cheaper to cool or heat, perhaps

10:22

they will save money, which they may

10:24

spend on other things, their children's education

10:27

say, which in turn improves their children's

10:29

chances of a comfortable life and

10:31

maybe of buying a climate-safe home themselves in

10:33

the future. But there

10:35

is still perhaps a sluggishness to recognize

10:38

the storm that is coming. Energy

10:41

efficiency does little to protect properties from

10:43

the sharper effects of climate change, stronger

10:46

storms, rising seas, wildfires, and floods.

10:49

As governments become unable to cover the

10:51

costs of these disasters, lenders and insurers

10:53

will likely end up exposed to the

10:55

risks. The US National

10:57

Flood Insurance Program, for instance, is already

11:00

creaking under the weight of rising debt.

11:03

As the damage piles up, it

11:05

could well be that the markets

11:07

will become more efficient and the

11:09

incentives to harden properties become stronger

11:11

because nobody's bailing you out anymore,

11:13

says Rolf Thummey at Imperial College

11:15

London, who consults for insurance firms.

11:18

Ultimately, climate change impacts on housing will

11:20

force some to move elsewhere, suggests Burt.

11:23

Given the irrevocability of some scenarios,

11:25

such as coastal villages that could

11:27

be lost to the sea, or

11:29

communities that become doomed to endless

11:31

drought, there are some assets

11:33

that no amount of hardening or retrofit

11:35

will ever save. The structural

11:38

utility of these properties will, like

11:40

water in a drying oasis, simply

11:42

evaporate. To lessen the

11:44

burden on people who are most at risk

11:46

of losing their home to climate change, affordable

11:48

loans might one day be targeted at consumers

11:51

in these areas to help them move to

11:53

safer places, says Burt. Lenders

11:55

who don't take this approach and who

11:57

continue offering mortgages on homes destined come

12:00

to climate change may soon rue the

12:02

day. If you're trying to support

12:04

those markets, Bert says, you're throwing good

12:06

money after bad. Thanks

12:09

for listening to Wired. My name is Zeke

12:11

Robison, and for more stories like this one,

12:13

visit us at wired.com. Like

12:16

what you learned? Subscribe everywhere you

12:19

listen to podcasts and get

12:21

more science news at wired.com/science.