You already do. You are assured a volcano will not destroy your home.

Totally different story if you lived in the Southeast corner of Hawaii.

There is a neat time lapse video of a lava flow that creeps across a road and it just eats a Mustang. I wonder how one files an insurance claim for that? Hopefully the insurance company accepts the video and evidence. Of course knowing insurance policies they likely have a lava exclusion for cars.

It has to really suck to live in what was once your dream location house and see it eaten by a volcano. I also wonder about who owns the land. Are most houses still just on church owned land that is leased for 99 years or do the people own the land, now covered in lava?

Building on a so called "Riff Zone"

Yeah, that's risky.

That's not exactly a high rent area.

I'm no lava expert, but once a lava path is determined, will future flows follow this same path, or, through drying/hardening, will the cuurent flow area be safe from future flows ?

Glad I don't live in an area that experiences this, and the heartbreak it must foster.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/KNXw3RaRKBA?rel=0" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>

At least the owner has proof the Mustang was swallowed by the Lava :-)

Watch lava slowly engulf a poor, abandoned car sitting in the path of Hawaii’s volcano – BGR

Gotta live somewhere and you won't live forever, Beaches are beautiful, as is Hawaii and my own personal favorite, Norris Geyser Basin in Yellowstone. It amazes me that after 'illions of years (whichever it may be) such a molten core exists at all. I remember reading somewhere that Venus' core is considered solid

The news outlets spoke to insurance guys. The answer was, if your home caught fire because of the lava, it may be covered. WTF!

Not sure what you mean about most houses on church land. The majority of properties in Hawaii are held in fee simple interest. There are also large estates, such as Kamehameha Schools, and Alexander and Baldwin, that own vast amounts of land.

When I was looking to buy in Hawaii I saw an awful lot of lease hold properties.

There are still leasehold residential properties, but many estates that leased out their properties to homeowners were forced into fee conversions. However, many commercial buildings in downtown Honolulu are leasehold.

Huh, no 'sploding gas tank?

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1525777086.jpg

This image gives you an idea of the active flows on the Big Island over just the last couple of hundred years. Including flows that almost got into Hilo town as resent as the the late 1980s

The southeast slope of Kilauea has been the most active in this last period of eruption.
Still quite a large area that is the most affordable area for land prices. This part of the island gets a lot of rain so the vegetation grows back on new land there quickly making it seem less volital than it actually is. In 50+ years there can be fern, bush and young trees covering new lava .

The routes of the flows is unpredictable. There are areas that haven't had flows in thousands of years right next to new flows. And where the next rift will open or next flow will travel is not something that can detrimined positively.

The volcanoes area is a thriving arts and woodworkers community, being the best source of good Koa wood.

Some of the subdivisions are placed in pretty risky areas, making it seem chancy as a choice to settle.

Whether it's wildfires, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes or extreme winter it seems most places have some sort of natural risk. I think we are most accepting of the risks we grew up with. Doesn't mean that others are crazy to live with their risk of choice.
Some do seem to chose to put themselves very close to the risk tho. Think waterfront etc.

It is hard to understand why a car gets caught by a flow, maybe broken down?

Cheers Richard

Back in the stone ages when we lived there the churches owned most of the land, or the land the US government did not own. I guess they sold it or transferred the ownership to estates or something.

What is the "fee simple interest" meaning? In Oklahoma, the property my house sits on is part of the deed for the house. I own the house and the land.

Does a homeowner of an individual house like those actually own the land the house sat on. Of course now the land is covered in lava so pretty much useless. I presume they lose ownership of the that chunk of Hawaii.

Fee simple means you own the land under your home be it a house, condo, apt, building or raw land. As for the lava land, I guess the people still own it, eventhough it is not usable anymore. There are some instances of accretion when the sand built up on the beaches, increasing people's property. In Hawaii, if you own beachfront property, you own up to the high water mark /high wash of the waves onto the beach. Imagine how some properties have grown with the lava spewing into the ocean. The state will try to tax that growth one day.

No doubt. I wonder what they will do with property covered in lava and totally unusable and unsalable. I would have to guess no one will buy it. Hopefully the state will give them a token payment to make it legal, and buy the land and no try to send them a bill for the extra property they now own.

The border between Oklahoma and Texas is the south water line of the Red River. THe river is owned by the federal government. When there is a heavy rain and flooding the river often moves, sometimes a lot, as in over a mile. The tax assessors for the counties along the river are watching for property owners to gain land.