South Miami's Seismic Design Category, explained

Under the seismic model IBC and ASCE 7 use for new construction, South Miami is Category A. Lowest seismic design category. Building code requires no seismic-specific detailing here beyond ordinary construction practice. Nationally, South Miami ranks above 1% of the 4,875 cities in this dataset for seismic hazard - the 1th percentile.

How South Miami compares

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.019g, short-period spectral response 0.04g, 1-second spectral response 0.02g. Among 228 Florida cities in this dataset, South Miami ranks 212 for seismic hazard, the 7th percentile within the state. About 13,207 people live in South Miami, Florida.

What a retrofit costs in South Miami

Outside California, no state-level retrofit grant equivalent to Brace + Bolt could be found for Florida. A typical retrofit still runs $5,000-$10,000 nationally, about $7,000 for a common single-family job.

Earthquake insurance for a South Miami home

Outside California, earthquake coverage is typically sold as an endorsement added to a standard homeowners policy, not a separate product - worth asking about directly when getting a home-insurance quote for a South Miami address.

More on how this number was built

The methodology guide covers exactly how USGS's public design-maps API produced South Miami's numbers. The guide to what a Seismic Design Category actually means covers why a category is never a substitute for an engineer's assessment of one specific house.