Total lurker (I post on H&F), but jumping in because I work in floodplain management:)
You may want to check out this link for some more information on how recently passed legislation will impact flood insurance rates in the near future: www.fema.gov/flood-insurance-reform-act-2012
Depending on whether or not the home you're looking at purchasing is compliant with current or soon-to-be-adopted flood maps, this may have a big impact on the rates you will pay in the future.
When is this supposed to start impacting? I'm currently trying to find out flood cert. I know think.. (just called my Dad, the contractor and he wasn't sure) we are 14ft up, but I'm not sure what our base flood elevation is.
According to him the base flood for our area is 8'10. guess I should call my insurance agent.
Total lurker (I post on H&F), but jumping in because I work in floodplain management:)
You may want to check out this link for some more information on how recently passed legislation will impact flood insurance rates in the near future: www.fema.gov/flood-insurance-reform-act-2012
Depending on whether or not the home you're looking at purchasing is compliant with current or soon-to-be-adopted flood maps, this may have a big impact on the rates you will pay in the future.
Our realtor actually mentioned this. She's working on getting an elevation certificate or something so she can figure out what our rate would be, provided it isn't too much work for her.
Post by hurricanedrunk on Aug 23, 2013 13:14:27 GMT -5
I don't have flood insurance anymore as we had an elevation certificate done to get us out of the flood zone but when we did have it it was around $1300 a year. This was two years ago. My mouth dropped at some of the posters with yearly rates under $500. If that was the case we would have considered keeping it. Our offer was contingent on being able to get out of the flood zone.
Is yours based on the taxable value of your house, or your loan amount? This would be about a $1200/yr difference for us.
Why is it stupid? You can't opt out of homeowners insurance because you don't want to pay for it - assuming you have a mortgage. The bank needs to protect itself and if you want to live in a flood zone you just might actually get flooded. It's no fun!
Because it sounds like this particular property isn't actually at that much risk. The flood zone ends at our property, and the neighbors apparently had it resurveyed to have their rates reduced.
Total lurker (I post on H&F), but jumping in because I work in floodplain management:)
You may want to check out this link for some more information on how recently passed legislation will impact flood insurance rates in the near future: www.fema.gov/flood-insurance-reform-act-2012
Depending on whether or not the home you're looking at purchasing is compliant with current or soon-to-be-adopted flood maps, this may have a big impact on the rates you will pay in the future.
When is this supposed to start impacting? I'm currently trying to find out flood cert. I know we are 14ft up, but I'm not sure what our base flood elevation is.
It really depends. It will start impacting homeowners with new mortgages as early as this fall, but if you are currently "grandfathered" in, not until 2015. It was supposed to be 2014, but implementation was pushed back one year to (what PP was referencing above).
I don't have flood insurance anymore as we had an elevation certificate done to get us out of the flood zone but when we did have it it was around $1300 a year. This was two years ago. My mouth dropped at some of the posters with yearly rates under $500. If that was the case we would have considered keeping it. Our offer was contingent on being able to get out of the flood zone.
According to the document posted; It appears that they changed the way they rate houses in Oct 2012. The higher above the base flood elevation your house is, the cheaper the insurance.
This is not my house, but it is identical to this one. Same contractor built both. The entire lower part of the house is all garage. We aren't allowed to have any kind of living space below the base flood level - our base flood is 8ft 10in - Since our actual living space is several feet above the base flood our flood insurance is cheaper.
We are required to build elevated homes in my little town.
When is this supposed to start impacting? I'm currently trying to find out flood cert. I know we are 14ft up, but I'm not sure what our base flood elevation is.
It really depends. It will start impacting homeowners with new mortgages as early as this fall, but if you are currently "grandfathered" in, not until 2015. It was supposed to be 2014, but implementation was pushed back one year to (what PP was referencing above).
You should also be able to get this information by calling the floodplain manager for your community (or your permits office).
Since you are in Zone AE, you will only need to worry about your first floor elevation and not the elevation of your lowest structural crossmember.
The first floor meaning my garage? Attachment Deletedot my house - but my house is EXACTLY like this one.
ETA: I checked out that link. There are no maps for my county. I called my Dad who is a contractor for where I live and he told me the base flood. He said he couldn't remember how many feet above we built the house. I think i can call my insurance agent and get the flood cert.
Why is it stupid? You can't opt out of homeowners insurance because you don't want to pay for it - assuming you have a mortgage. The bank needs to protect itself and if you want to live in a flood zone you just might actually get flooded. It's no fun!
Because it sounds like this particular property isn't actually at that much risk. The flood zone ends at our property, and the neighbors apparently had it resurveyed to have their rates reduced.
So could you resurvey yours? Sounds like your close enough to need it anyway, whether it's mandatory or not.
It really depends. It will start impacting homeowners with new mortgages as early as this fall, but if you are currently "grandfathered" in, not until 2015. It was supposed to be 2014, but implementation was pushed back one year to (what PP was referencing above).
You should also be able to get this information by calling the floodplain manager for your community (or your permits office).
Since you are in Zone AE, you will only need to worry about your first floor elevation and not the elevation of your lowest structural crossmember.
The first floor meaning my garage? ot my house - but my house is EXACTLY like this one.
ETA: I checked out that link. There are no maps for my county. I called my Dad who is a contractor for where I live and he told me the base flood. He said he couldn't remember how many feet above we built the house. I think i can call my insurance agent and get the flood cert.
Yeah, that link sucks. I tried looking it up for our community as well, and nothing came up Our FEMA region (Region 6) has a site called RiskMap that has an interactive flood map feature that we can check BFE's on. As long as the surveyor doing your elevation certificate was using the most up to date maps, the BFE listed on it in Section B9 should be accurate. You can always double check with your county officials to be sure.
The structure that you posted is classified as a Building Diagram 7 (from the angles of the photos you posted, anyway). That means that the first floor is fully elevated on full story foundation walls with a partially or fully enclosed area below (the garage). On the elevation certificate, Section E1 will show the elevation of the top of the bottom floor of the garage, and E2 will measure the top of the bottom floor of the elevated first story. Does that make sense?
For rating purposes, I'm not entirely sure how your premiums would be impacted by the garage area below the first floor. That' s a good question for your insurance agent. Do you have flood venting along the enclosed garage area?
The first floor meaning my garage? ot my house - but my house is EXACTLY like this one.
ETA: I checked out that link. There are no maps for my county. I called my Dad who is a contractor for where I live and he told me the base flood. He said he couldn't remember how many feet above we built the house. I think i can call my insurance agent and get the flood cert.
Yeah, that link sucks. I tried looking it up for our community as well, and nothing came up Our FEMA region (Region 6) has a site called RiskMap that has an interactive flood map feature that we can check BFE's on. As long as the surveyor doing your elevation certificate was using the most up to date maps, the BFE listed on it in Section B9 should be accurate. You can always double check with your county officials to be sure.
The structure that you posted is classified as a Building Diagram 7 (from the angles of the photos you posted, anyway). That means that the first floor is fully elevated on full story foundation walls with a partially or fully enclosed area below (the garage). On the elevation certificate, Section E1 will show the elevation of the top of the bottom floor of the garage, and E2 will measure the top of the bottom floor of the elevated first story. Does that make sense?
For rating purposes, I'm not entirely sure how your premiums would be impacted by the garage area below the first floor. That' s a good question for your insurance agent. Do you have flood venting along the enclosed garage area?
Yes there are vents all the way around the garage.
From what I've been told; Since our garage is below base flood, the flood ins won't cover anything in there. So I HOPE the garage doesn't impact our premiums in the years to come. I get anxiety every May when our insurance renews =/
Thanks for your answers - I'm going to call our agent and see if we're going to get socked.
Because it sounds like this particular property isn't actually at that much risk. The flood zone ends at our property, and the neighbors apparently had it resurveyed to have their rates reduced.
So could you resurvey yours? Sounds like your close enough to need it anyway, whether it's mandatory or not.
I could. But that doesn't mean I'd get it. And, yes, we may likely still carry flood insurance. The rates would be drastically different though.
WOT?*, after Katrina, FEMA gave everyone who registered, a $1700 gift, then another $1700 a couple months later. Those payments were later subtracted from flood insurance payouts. If you didn't have flood insurance, you were eligible for up to $23,000, I think. And there were separate grants for elevating when rebuilding. Each state established some type of grant program to make whole homeowners who lost more than they received from insurance and/or FEMA. The max was $150k. In my case, it didn't even come close. Money was also taxable. There were other programs to pay for temporary housing. I was offered, and declined, a FEMA trailer, etc. Amounts of grants were based on very low averages to rebuild because the actual costs skyrocketed due to scarcity. Don't get me started.... My problem was with my insurance company, no offense to Holly. They told us payouts would be policy limits, then came back and nickel and dimed everything. So neighbors who were settled early got $$$ and those of us who were delayed, got $.
This is what I don't get about flood insurance and FEMA. So, the river by me floods basically every year-it just depends on how high/bad it is whether or not it gets into people's houses. The majority of my neighbors do not have flood insurance because the $30 a month is a lot for them. If the river floods and covers a wide area, the people without flood insurance will still be made whole by FEMA? I know its still wise but paying $350 a year when the same result will occur regardless if I have it makes me wonder why there even is flood insurance and not just a FEMA fund.
How expensive depends on the replacement value of your home, the relative risk of flood and whether you choose to insure the contents.
This is a BTDT subject for me.
DH and I lost out first home in flooding related to Hurricane Floyd. W3 had 3'- feet- of water on our second floor. Our house was declared uninhabitable. We had bought FEMA flood insurance through our regular State Farm agent and when we made our claim, they administered the process which was much easier than my neighbors who were dealing directly with overworked FEMA adjusters.
We chose not to insure our contents. The cost was ridiculous; it was something like 20% of valuation annually. In 5 years of saving we were ahead of the game. We were in the house 14 years when it was destroyed, got a check pretty quickly and bought a new home in under 2 months.
Other points to consider-
If your car is destroyed in a flood, the comprehensive portion of your auto policy pays. Again, we had State Farm which paid a fair amount of my Honda and we had a check in a couple days.
If your home is severely damaged in a flood and the area is declared a Federal Disaster Area, you will be able to amend several years worth of IRS 1040s to deduct your losses. We were able to get about $20K in back taxes returned to us which helped buy new furniture and stuff.
Wow. I'm shocked by some of these prices. I live in a suburb of new orleans and pay $365 a year. Definitely worth the dollar a day.
I'm purchasing a home in a suburb of New Orleans, would you mind telling me who is your insurance provider.
We went through Eagan Insurance in Metairie. I really really like them (the personal service of a small company but they broker with the big insurance companies). Our homeowners is through ASI and I THINK the flood is Fidelity (??) but FEMA sets the rates. We are in flood zone C on the Northshore (which is why our flood is on the cheaper side). I haven't had to file any insurance claims yet though since we just bought our house last year, but they were great to work with when we were buying.
I'm purchasing a home in a suburb of New Orleans, would you mind telling me who is your insurance provider.
We went through Eagan Insurance in Metairie. I really really like them (the personal service of a small company but they broker with the big insurance companies). Our homeowners is through ASI and I THINK the flood is Fidelity (??) but FEMA sets the rates. We are in flood zone C on the Northshore (which is why our flood is on the cheaper side). I haven't had to file any insurance claims yet though since we just bought our house last year, but they were great to work with when we were buying.
Thank you, we are on the West Bank. Our flood zone is x which is really good. I'm just getting really high home insurance quote.