The Burrow
Aug 28, 2024
From spilling a drink on your laptop, to brushing past and breaking a family heirloom, accidents happen. But where in the world is home to the most accident-prone residents?
As experts in home and contents insurance and accidental damage cover, we were curious to find out. We looked at Google searches for the likes of “phone repairs”, “accidental damage” and more, to see which Australian cities, US states and European countries are looking at these the most.
Out of all of the cities and regions in Australia, these are the five that are the most accident-prone.
Although Hobart has the second smallest population on our list at just 216,656, they head straight into first place on our index. The reason for this? Not only do they have the most searches per capita for “accidental damage”, at 3.32, but they also have the second most for “furniture repairs” (2.26), and third for “phone repairs” (2.45).
In second place for clumsiness is Australia’s capital, Canberra. Its 367,752-strong population search for “furniture repairs” more than other locations, at 2.58 per capita, as well as “accidental damage” the second most (2.86), and “TV repairs” the fourth most (2.59).
Darwin is officially the third clumsiest city in Australia, despite it having the smallest population, at a total of 129,062. Per capita, they search for “TV repairs” the most, at 3.72, as well as “accidental damage” the third most (2.40), and “furniture repairs” the fourth most (2.01).
With 3.35 searches per capita for “TV repairs” (which is the second highest on our list), and 2.13 searches for “accidental damage” (the fifth most); overall, the Gold Coast sits in fourth place for clumsiness, with its 591,473-strong population often turning to Google for help with repairs.
Rounding off our top five clumsiest Australian cities is Adelaide, with the fifth largest population on our list, at 1,225,235. Between them, they search for “phone repairs” more than anywhere else per capita (3.07), as well as “laptop repairs” the second most (3.39), and “TV repairs” the third most (2.69).
Despite ranking eighth overall, Melbourne’s citizens search for “laptop repairs” the most per capita, at 4.22; with Sydney having the third highest searches, despite being the least clumsy city overall.
Wollongong scores sixth overall, but has the third most “furniture repairs” searches per capital; and Brisbane sees the second most “phone repairs” searches, at 2.55 per capita, yet scores seventh overall.
Moving over to the USA, it’s time to find out the states that are searching the most for repairs to their belongings.
Despite South Dakota having the fifth smallest population in the US (886,667), it’s officially the clumsiest state in the whole of the country. Between them, the population searches for “phone repairs” and “furniture repairs” more than other states per capita, at 3.33 for both, as well as the ninth most searches for “accidental damage” per capital, at 0.59.
Moving to the east coast, Delaware is the second clumsiest state, with its 989,948-strong population searching for “accidental damage” and “TV repairs” the most per capita than any other state, at 0.94 and 1.36 respectively. In addition to that, Delaware also sees the third most searches per capita for “furniture repairs” (1.17) and fifth for “laptop repairs” (1.83).
In third place for clumsiness is Florida, with its population the third largest in the USA, at a huge 21,538,187. Between them, they’ve searched for “laptop repairs” the most, at 2.24 per capita, as well as “phone repairs” the second most, at 1.77 per capita.
Nevada makes it into fourth place, with 1.79 searches per capita for “laptop repairs” (the sixth highest on our list), as well as 1.38 and 0.97 searches per capita respectively for “phone repairs” and “TV repairs”, which are both the ninth highest compared to the rest of the states.
Rounding off our top five clumsiest US states is New Hampshire, with the 10th lowest population, at 1,377,529. Overall, the state has seen the seventh highest searches for “accidental damage” per capita, at 0.64, and the ninth most for “furniture repairs”, at 0.89 searches per capita.
Georgia is the sixth clumsiest state overall, Colorado the seventh, Texas the eighth, Idaho the ninth, and Vermont the 10th. Georgia and Texas have the third and fourth highest searches for “phone repairs” at 1.70 and 1.69 searches per capita respectively, and Vermont has the second most searches for “furniture repairs”.
Alaska and Rhode Island have the second and third most searches per capita for “accidental damage”, at 0.91 and 0.86, despite placing 26th and 11th overall.
At the other end of the spectrum, West Virginia and New Jersey tie for the title of the least clumsy state, followed by Iowa, Kentucky, and Ohio.
Finally, it’s time to uncover the countries across Europe that suffer from the highest levels of accidental damage.
Iceland is officially the clumsiest country in all of Europe, and for good reason! They may have the fourth smallest population, but per capita, searches are extremely high. They have the most searches for “phone repairs”, at a huge 347.38 per capita (almost seven times as much as the country in second place!), as well as 253.81 searches per capita for “furniture repairs”, which is three times higher than the country in second place!
Not only that, but Iceland has the second most searches for “TV repairs”, and the third for “accidental damage”, showing the need for fixing a variety of items.
It seems Scandinavians have their fair share of accidents, with Norway the second clumsiest country in all of Europe! The population has the most searches for “TV repairs” per capita, at a huge 345.53; as well as seeing the fourth most “furniture repair” searches (21.28) and the fifth most “accidental damage” searches (8.41).
Slovenia has the 11th smallest population in Europe, with 2,119,675 people, yet they’ve still seen the most searches for “laptop repairs”, at 86.48 per capita, as well as the second most searches for “accidental damage” and “furniture repairs” at 10.07 and 80.72 searches per capita, respectively.
In fourth place for clumsiness is Latvia, with a variety of high-scoring searches. At 47.96 searches per capita, they Google “furniture repairs” the third most in Europe, as well as “TV repairs” the fourth most (53.12 per capita), “accidental damage” the seventh most (4.79), and “laptop repairs” the ninth most (3.15).
To round off our fifth clumsiest European country, we’re back to Scandinavia with Finland. With a population of 5,545,475 people, the Finns search for “TV repairs” the third most, at 73.40 per capita, and “phone repairs” the eighth most, at 5.80.
Making up the top 10 clumsiest European countries are San Marino, Malta, Estonia, North Macedonia, and Croatia.
If we look at each individual search query, then we can see that San Marino and Malta search for “phone repairs” the second and third most, at 50.00 and 18.07 per capita, and Germany has the most searches for “accidental damage”, at 12.02 per capita, but narrowly misses out on a top 10 position, instead coming in 11th place.
For “laptop repairs”, Cyprus and Austria place highly, with the third and fourth most searches, yet come 14th and 12th overall.
At the other end of the spectrum, Albania is officially the least clumsy country in Europe, with Italy in second place, the UK in third, Spain in fourth, and Andorra in fifth.
Home insurance and contents insurance is designed to compensate us when things go wrong and our home or belongings are damaged in a fire, storm, break-in, or other insured events. But what happens when we’re the ones who do the damage? Will accidental damage be covered?
Executive General Manager of General Insurance at Compare the Market AU, Adrian Taylor, explains that accidental damage can be covered, but it usually costs extra.
“Accidents happen, but they can be quite expensive. Home and contents insurance doesn’t usually insure your belongings or home against your own clumsiness, as this is typically viewed as preventable damage,” Mr Taylor explains.
“However, many of these accidents can be covered by home and contents insurance, where accidental damage is included. Some providers enable you to add this as an extra, although you may need to pay a bit more.”
Always read the Product Disclosure Statement (PDS) and Target Market Determination (TMD) to check for the inclusions, limits and restrictions before purchasing.
This dataset analyses countries in Europe, states in the USA, and cities in Australia, based on the searches for terms around home and contents repairs per capita. To do this, we looked at the average monthly search volume for terms including ‘phone repairs’, ‘furniture repairs’, ‘laptop repairs’, ‘TV repairs’ and ‘accidental damage’ in each state or city between July 23 – June 24, using keywordtool.io.
All figures were then calculated per capita.