Colorado State University's TC-RAMS team just released its June 2026 Atlantic hurricane forecast update — and it's a downgrade. 11 named storms, 5 hurricanes, 2 majors, and just a 24% chance of a major hurricane landfall on the U.S. coastline (the historical average is 43%).
With NOAA putting El Niño odds at 98% for peak season, independent adjusters are staring down the real possibility of a second straight year without meaningful hurricane deployments.
And here's the part that should get your attention: last year was HISTORIC — three Category 5 hurricanes, second only to 2005 — and zero hurricanes made U.S. landfall. Basin activity is not the same thing as deployments. In this video, I break down what the downgraded forecast actually says in plain English, why 2025 proved you can't build a career on a deployment lottery ticket, what quiet seasons quietly do to this industry's workforce — and why homeowners are the ones who ultimately pay that price.
Plus, where the claims work is actually shifting in 2026, including a western wildfire season already running 140% of average, and the three moves to make right now so you're working while everyone else watches the radar.
CSU's next forecast update drops July 8 and the national fire outlook updates July 1 — I'll cover both, so subscribe if you haven't.
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This new 2026 hurricane forecast is going to end some adjusting careers,
and the question we're answering today is how you make sure it's not yours.
I'm Matt, and I've got 20 years in the field as an independent property adjuster,
and for almost a decade since, I've trained new adjusters through AdjusterTV,
adjusters that top firms hire by waiving their experience requirements.
And in this video, you'll get what this downgraded forecast actually says,
why last year's historic season still left American adjusters at home,
and exactly where the work is shifting in 2026,
so that you're positioned to be one of the first working.
So let's start with what the forecast actually says.
Back in April, Colorado State University's Department of Atmospheric Science
was calling for 13 named storms and six hurricanes.
As of June 10th, their report has it down to 11 and 5.
Their measure of total seasonal energy, called ACE, got cut from 90 down to 70.
The long-term average is 123.
So we're looking at a season running at maybe 55 to 60% of normal.
The reason is El Nino, of course.
NOAA is putting the odds of El Nino at 98% for the peak of hurricane season,
and they're giving about a 40% chance that it's going to be a strong El Nino.
If you're new to this, here's what El Nino does.
Cranks up the high altitude winds blowing across the Atlantic,
which creates wind shear, and wind shear tears developing storms apart
before they ever get organized.
So let's talk about the landfall odds,
because that's the number that actually pays your bills.
There's a 24% chance of a major hurricane landfall
anywhere on the continental U.S. coastline this year.
The average is 43%, so about 50% of average right now.
The El Nino itself is basically locked in,
but how strong that El Nino gets is not,
and keep that in your back pocket,
because we're going to come back to it here in just a minute.
Now, if you're thinking forecasts are wrong all the time,
you're absolutely right.
So let's talk about last year.
CSU just published their verification report on the 2025 season,
and on paper, last year was historic.
There was 13 named storms, four major hurricanes,
which makes it an above-normal season by NOAA's own definition,
and three of those hurricanes reached Category 5.
Aaron, Humberto, and Melissa.
Only one season in recorded history has ever produced more Category 5s,
and that was 2005.
Hurricane Melissa hit Jamaica with a landfall pressure
that tied the 1935 Labor Day hurricane
for the strongest landfall ever recorded in the Atlantic.
It caused $6 to $7 billion in damage.
It's absolute devastation for Jamaica, Cuba,
and Hispaniola.
2025 was the first year with zero U.S. hurricane landfall since 2015.
CSU was right, however.
2025 was a very active season,
but adjusters' phones in this country stayed quiet
because the hurricanes didn't come anywhere near us.
Now, CSU is telling us that 2026 won't really be active, really, at all.
And listen, you cannot build a career on a lottery ticket,
especially when the lottery odds just got cut in half.
Quiet seasons don't just mean a lean year for adjusters, though.
Quiet seasons are when this industry really starts to shed people.
Adjusters let licenses lapse,
they stop renewing certifications,
they drift into other work,
and they never come back.
Firms trim their rosters,
and along with training companies and other third-party companies
that serve this industry,
a lot of them close their doors.
I want you to think about what that actually means down the road,
because every quiet year doesn't just shrink this year's roster.
It shrinks the talent pipeline for the big year that is absolutely coming.
And the big year is always coming, okay?
When it hits,
the firms are going to need thousands of trained adjusters all at once,
and a chunk of that workforce is going to be gone.
The experience walked away,
and nobody developed the replacements.
So what fills the gaps?
Adjusters rush through the door with a fraction of the training that they need,
or we have claims handled by automated systems
with nobody experienced enough left to check on that work.
And who pays for that?
Well, not the firms,
not the carriers,
not at least not at first.
The homeowner does.
The family standing in a pile of sticks that used to be their house
waiting on an accurate, fair settlement
for someone who's never been properly trained to write one.
That's the quiet cost of a quiet season.
The policyholder is the one who inherits an under-trained industry.
Here's a piece of roster math that you need to understand.
When storms are scarce,
firms don't deploy less of everybody.
They just deploy their best talent first.
So if you're sitting at number 400 or 600 on a roster in a 24% year,
you're functionally not on the roster at all,
which means that the forecast holds,
and the storm season fizzles out.
It simply reveals which careers were already fragile,
the ones built entirely on waiting for the big one.
So now let's talk about the other side of this,
because there is absolutely an other side,
and it's bigger than you might think.
First, it takes only one storm, right?
CSU says that in every single forecast that they publish,
they mean it.
Prepare every season regardless of predicted activity.
1992 was a quiet El Nino suppressed season,
just like this one.
One of the slowest starts anyone had seen in decades.
That season produced Hurricane Andrew,
which until Hurricane Katrina came along in 2005,
was responsible for launching the careers
of thousands of independent property adjusters.
Quiet seasons don't produce zero storms.
They produce fewer storms.
Sometimes they produce meaner storms.
Melissa proved that less than eight months ago.
24% is not a 0%.
It's one in four, and storms don't read forecasts.
So kind of the big takeaway for this video
is that El Nino doesn't delete the weather.
It actually can move it, right?
So a strong El Nino typically energizes
the southern jet stream in the winter.
This means ice storms, severe winter events, flooding.
Remember the huge ice storm in Oklahoma, et cetera,
back in January, February, all the snow.
It may have been a terrible year for skiing out west,
but not back east, right?
And hail doesn't care about El Nino either.
Denver has been hit twice in the last two weeks with hail.
Daily claims don't care about El Nino.
The adjusters who go hungry in El Nino years
are the ones who think of themselves
as hurricane adjusters.
And what's more, while the Atlantic
is kind of maybe standing down,
the west is loading up to burn.
Wildfires this year are already running
at roughly 140% of average.
It's June right now.
Earlier this spring, acreage burned
was tracking at more than double the 10-year norm.
The National Interagency Fire Center
has flagged every single western state
for above normal fire potential
at some point this season.
And it's kind of a one-two punch, right?
Most of the west is drought-primed
with low snow pack, early heat, record dry spell.
And the pockets that did get a wet spring so far
are growing a heavy crop of grass and underbrush
that will be curing into fuel
when the spring rains dry up in July.
I'm watching it happen on my own property
in Montana right now.
The tall green grass on my property in June
is the tinder standing in that same field in August.
And the same El Nino that's suppressing the Atlantic
also tends to weaken the summer monsoon out west as well,
which again can stretch the burn window
deeper into the fall.
So the deployment opportunities this year
might smell like smoke
instead of looking like a spiral on the radar
and smelling like dead fish.
Okay, what does this mean for you?
Every quiet season thins the rosters at firms
and because standing cat teams on the carrier side
drain money off the ledger,
they're the first to get cut
when major insurance companies
look to improve their bottom line,
which means less competition
standing in front of you
at the moment things turn active again.
And they are always going to turn more active.
This El Nino is not gonna last forever.
CSU's own model predictions show this El Nino peaking
and then decaying as we head into 2027.
So here's what you actually do.
Three things.
One, diversify the types of claims
that you know how to handle now.
Learn more than just the homeowner's policy claim types.
Learn commercial and farm ranch claims.
Learn condo claims.
Learn liability.
Go beyond wind claims to winter claims,
fire claims, vandalism claims, okay?
Two, treat 2026 as a skills year.
The certifications, the software depth,
the estimate quality that's gonna move you up
the deployment list.
Construction and water mitigation
are truly learnable skills.
Three, stay deployment ready.
Anyway, keep your licenses current and extensive.
Your storm kit needs to be packed
and waiting on a shelf in the garage.
Your firms need to be updated with your current info,
including licenses, certifications, all that stuff.
Because if that one in four hits,
the prepared adjusters are gonna go to work
and everybody else is gonna watch it
on the weather channels.
And if you wanna complete zero to hero path
from becoming an independent property adjuster in 2026,
check out this video right here.
And as always, thank you so much for watching
and have a great storm.
Oh, and one more thing.
CSU drops their next forecast update on July 8th.
Fire outlook updates on July 1st.
I'm gonna cover both.
So if you're not subscribed, now's a good time.
