Why not place the blame on who made the ultimatr choice to live in a place: the homeowner?

Because they don't have the power to change how houses are built.

Heh? You can absolutely decide how your house is going to be built and/or refuse to live in a house not built to your standards. Moreover, they certainly have the power to live elsewhere.

Maybe in a magical world where everybody has a great job and plenty of money.

In the real world if an unsafe house exists there will always be someone who is desperate enough to live in it. The only way to stop it is to ban the house, not to rely on market forces.

That's why we have building regulations.

I mean this is obvious really. Suppose there's a house that is cheap and huge and in an amazing location but its wiring isn't up to code and the stairs are steeper than building regs allow. Do you really think nobody would rent it?

Right now I’m talking about property damage, not safety. I would absolutely say that a homeowner who knowingly takes the risk to buy a house with shoddy wiring should bear the risk of that choice (as opposed to the state).

Completely agree. 'Climate change' is just something thrown around now for people and their political units to abdicate responsibility for their own actions. 'Climate change' didn't force people to build housing in California forests and right on Florida beaches, local land-use, urban planning and transportation decisions did.

That’s not all climate change is.

Who said anything about climate change?

The governor of California. Repeatedly.

He publicly blamed the fires on climate change, not PG&E.

As if climate change has made California's forests so hot that they're spontaneously combusting.