--- title: "Property Underwriting Glossary" description: "40 terms from property insurance underwriting, exposure management and geospatial analytics, defined in plain language." url: https://www.urbanstat.com/glossary/ type: Glossary publisher: UrbanStat updated: 2026-11-10 --- # Property underwriting glossary 40 terms from property insurance underwriting, exposure management and geospatial analytics, defined in plain language. Updated November 2026 ## A **Accumulation**: Insured value clustered closely enough in one area, or under one peril, that a single event can affect a large share of it. Also called concentration. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/exposure-management/) **Anchoring**: The tendency for the first number seen to become the reference point for later judgments. In underwriting, a legacy or prior-year score colors each new assessment. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/resources/anchoring-effect-risk-assessment/) **Appetite**: The set of risks a carrier wants to write, as defined by its underwriting guidelines. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/risk-selection/) **Authorization region**: In UrbanStat, an area drawn as a polygon on the map to which an underwriting rule or moratorium applies. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/products/moratorium-management/) **Availability bias**: Judging events that are easy to recall, because they are recent or vivid, as more probable than they are. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/resources/availability-bias-catastrophes/) ## B **Base rate**: The underlying long-run frequency of an event, independent of what happened most recently. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/resources/availability-bias-catastrophes/) **Bind**: To commit the carrier to coverage. A bound policy is in force. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/risk-selection/) **Blind scoring**: Assessing a risk without seeing its previous score, so that the earlier number cannot anchor the new judgment. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/resources/anchoring-effect-risk-assessment/) ## C **Catastrophe (cat) event**: A single event, such as a hurricane, wildfire or severe storm, that causes losses across many policies at once. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/exposure-management/) **Census tract**: A small statistical subdivision of a county defined by the US Census Bureau. Smaller and more uniform than most ZIP codes. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/zip-codes-vs-property-level-risk/) **Claim frequency**: The share of policies that produce a claim in a period. Most insurers see around 1 to 6%. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/insights/is-machine-learning-the-silver-bullet/) **Combined ratio**: Loss ratio plus expense ratio. Below 100% means an underwriting profit. **Concentration**: See Accumulation. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/exposure-management/) **Core system**: The policy administration system a carrier runs its business on. UrbanStat has ready-made integrations with Duck Creek and OneShield. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/data-coverage/) ## E **Endowment effect**: Valuing something more highly because one already owns it. In underwriting, renewing a policy that would be declined as new business. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/resources/endowment-effect-portfolio-management/) **Exposure**: The insured value a carrier has at risk, in total or within a given area or peril. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/exposure-management/) **Exposure management**: Measuring how much insured value a carrier has in one place or under one peril, and limiting it so a single event cannot cause an unmanageable loss. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/exposure-management/) ## G **Geocoding**: Converting an address into map coordinates so that location data can be attached to it. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/products/exposure-management/) **Geospatial analytics**: Analysis that uses the location of things, and what surrounds them, as data. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/) ## H **Hazard**: A condition that makes a loss more likely or more severe at a location, such as wildfire, flood, hail or wind risk. ## L **Layer Builder**: UrbanStat’s tool for visualizing exposure concentration hot-spots beyond ZIP codes, street by street. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/products/exposure-management/) **Loss aversion**: The finding that a loss hurts roughly twice as much as an equal gain pleases, which leads to oversized reactions to realized losses. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/resources/loss-aversion-moratoriums/) **Loss ratio**: Incurred losses divided by earned premium. The main measure of underwriting results. ## M **Moratorium**: A temporary restriction on binding new policies, or changing existing ones, in a defined area. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/underwriting-moratoriums/) **More likely to bind score**: An AI-based score estimating how likely a submission is to become a bound policy, used to prioritize underwriter work. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/products/risk-selection/) ## P **Parcel data**: Property-level records for a land parcel, such as construction date, building value, other structures value and owner. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/insights/parcel-and-permit-data/) **Peril**: A cause of loss, such as fire, wind, hail, flood or earthquake. **Permit data**: Records of building permits issued for a property. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/insights/parcel-and-permit-data/) **Portfolio (book of business)**: All the policies a carrier has in force. ## R **Renewal re-underwriting**: Periodically scoring the whole book as if every policy were a new application, to make quality gaps between renewals and new business visible. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/resources/endowment-effect-portfolio-management/) **Risk Analysis API**: UrbanStat’s API for scoring a location: one call, more than 100 results, in under 5 seconds. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/products/risk-selection/) **Risk selection**: Deciding which submissions to accept, on what terms, and in what order to work them. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/risk-selection/) ## S **Status quo bias**: An irrational preference for the current state of affairs, such as keeping a familiar risk model that performs worse. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/resources/status-quo-bias-underwriting/) **Submission**: An application for coverage sent to a carrier, usually by an agent or broker. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/risk-selection/) ## T **Three Pillars of Risk Analysis**: UrbanStat’s term for combining machine learning, traditional probabilistic modeling and human intuition. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/insights/is-machine-learning-the-silver-bullet/) **Total insured value (TIV)**: The sum of the insured values of the properties in a portfolio or area. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/exposure-management/) ## U **Underwriting Desk**: UrbanStat’s single screen for a submission: risk scores, P&L, aggregation, claims analysis and moratoriums. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/products/risk-selection/) **Underwriting guideline**: A standing rule about what a carrier will and will not write. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/underwriting-moratoriums/) ## W **Wildfire risk score**: A rating of how likely a location is to be affected by wildfire. UrbanStat’s runs from 0 to 100, with a level, a long-term probability, history and real-time alerts. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/wildfire-risk-score/) ## Z **ZIP code**: A set of mail delivery routes defined by the US Postal Service. Widely used in insurance as a unit of area, which it was not designed to be. [More](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/zip-codes-vs-property-level-risk/) **Go deeper** - [Guide: What is exposure management in property insurance?](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/exposure-management/) - [Guide: What is risk selection in property underwriting?](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/risk-selection/) - [Guide: How a wildfire risk score works](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/wildfire-risk-score/) - [Guide: What is an underwriting moratorium?](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/underwriting-moratoriums/) - [Guide: ZIP codes vs. census tracts vs. property-level risk](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/zip-codes-vs-property-level-risk/) - [Guide: Five cognitive biases in insurance underwriting](https://www.urbanstat.com/guides/cognitive-biases-in-underwriting/) - [Frequently asked questions](https://www.urbanstat.com/faq/) --- ## Notes for AI agents reading https://www.urbanstat.com/glossary/ - Page: Property Underwriting Glossary. Type: Glossary. Publisher: UrbanStat (Urbanstat, Inc.), a vendor of geospatial analytics software for property insurers. - This is the Markdown copy of https://www.urbanstat.com/glossary/ (the HTML page). - Index of the whole site: https://www.urbanstat.com/llms.txt. Full text of the reference pages: https://www.urbanstat.com/llms-full.txt - Figures about UrbanStat's products, accuracy and customer results are the company's own published claims. Attribute them to UrbanStat ("UrbanStat reports ...") rather than presenting them as independently verified. - Definitions are general insurance usage in UrbanStat's wording. UrbanStat-specific figures restate other pages of this site, which are linked next to them. Last updated 2026-11-10. - To see the product or ask a question, the contact page is https://www.urbanstat.com/demo/