Flood insurance

[gfretwell]

No problem. I dodged both of them.

We only pay fire theft and liability. (regular homeowner)

[gfretwell]

In Florida you need a separate policy for wind storm and it is easily

2x your homeowners for lousy coverage. Deductibles can be up to 10% on the cheapest policies.

[Frank]

Older development here that was not in a flood plain came into it when a lot of up land development took place causing considerably more run off. All these extra roofs, roads and pavements cause more runoff that could not be absorbed into the ground. It was remediated by the the county creating catch basins. Government should be responsible because they allowed development without considering what was down stream.

People curse insurance companies but I have a son that is a lawyer for one and get plenty of stories of people taking advantage of them or downright defrauding them.

[trader_4]

IDK what the exact mix was, but I suspect overall there was more wind damage in terms of number of properties, but the flood damage, where it happened was way more devastating. I'm a couple miles inland, had substantial wind damages, ie shingle blow off. Big tree fell on a house down the street, crushing it, etc. Lots of damage like that all around. But no flood damage here. In the areas close to the ocean or bay, they got flooded or destroyed. Worst was right on the ocean where many multi-million dollar houses were completely destroyed. That area is a narrow strip, only a couple city blocks wide, with the ocean on one side, the bay on the other. The worst areas, the ocean flowed right across to the bay, taking houses and the road with it.

It also had some bizarre aspects, that you would never have predicted. On that strip with ocean and bay, there is an area with those multi-million dollar homes on large lots. Shortly after, it changes suddenly to more modest and typical shore houses. Within a few miles, you have small little summer houses that look more like one room shacks. They are right on top of each other, in rows, each one is probably on

30 x 30 lot. They look like it wouldn't take much to finish them off. Yet, they were largely intact, little damage. The multi-million homes, most of the town, suffered huge damages, with many houses ripped apart, total losses. A few were swept into the bay. I think the essential difference was that some area are probably just a few feet higher, so the flood waters couldn't cut across from ocean to bay.

Same thing here. If this place floods, it would have to be something like a 100ft+ tidal wave that can make it inland 2+ miles, etc.

[dpb]

...

...

I remain intrigued by the analysis revealing that such an obvious fact that given that hurricanes in particular, if severe, are widespread events that any one in an actuarial business could neglect to account for common cause in estimating liabilities and hence setting rates. It just seems amazing to me that not one but essentially all blew it (so to speak :) )...

[gfretwell]

The biggest single thing they are doing in Florida has been a much tougher building code since Andrew and inspections to see if a given existing home has these wind mitigation features. Most of my county is in the 150MPH wind zone and on the barrier islands it is 160.

The basic flood code here is the bottom floor needs to be 14' ASL. At the beach that means pretty tall pilings. When you get away from the beach, you are still going to have a house on a hill. They will typically truck in 100 yards of dirt or more to build each hill East of 41. It is more if you are seaward of that. I am 11' on the flood map and that means I need 3' of dirt under my house ... minimum. The way flood maps are going, I think I would go more like 5 or 6 if I was building new. An extra $14,000 or $20,000 worth of dirt now, could pay you back in a decade or less in flood insurance alone.

[trader_4]

I guess they didn't blow it all that badly, because I didn't see any insurance companies, going bust, unable to meet claims, etc.

[dpb]

On 01/14/2015 12:29 PM, trader_4 wrote: ...

Au contraire...in FL alone, "Eleven insurance companies went bankrupt, and 30 others lost up to 20 percent or more of their surplus. About

930,000 policyholders were left with no coverage options. ..."

[gfretwell]

They still took a big hit. Don't be shocked if the old companies you have known forever simply stop writing policies near the water and you start seeing new names for companies that do that. It is virtually impossible to get homeowners from any company you have heard of in Florida if you are within 10 miles of the coast. It is the way State Farm, Allstate etc limit liability. They just do not write policies.

[dpb]

That certainly is _a_good_thing_ _(tm)_ if folks are going to build in high-risk areas (and they are; that's a given).

It's just as significant, though, that FL (and the rest of the hurricane belt, altho most to a lesser degree) has totally revamped their insurance regulations and explicitly include a "catastrophic" modeling into the rate-setting computations of risk.

[Kurt Ullman]

I lost track of the final outcome but at one time 5-6 years ago, State Farm was threatening to exit the state entirely (auto, life everything) because FL was trying to tell them they had to write wind insurance and also how much they could charge.

[gfretwell]

When Donna hit, Ft Myers was a sleepy little town and there was not as much money to be lost here. People were smart enough not to be building castles on the beach. It was really the last memorable storm before Charley and Wilma.