The Cost of Insuring Expensive Waterfront Homes Is About to Skyrocket

[mahatmakanejeeves]

hatrack talked about this three weeks ago. This is a revival of that thread.

I don't see how the houses in the picture could not flood.

Sun Sep 5, 2021: Shocked Shocked 2: For 1.7 Million Floridians, Flood Insurance Premiums Set To Rise

Kevin M. Kruse Retweeted

This is huge.

Florida's coastal development is built to a large extent on heavily subsidized federal flood insurance.

New from me: FEMA is about to start charging people the true cost of their flood risk, partly to warn them about the dangers they face as climate change gets worse.

The shift could reshape coastal real estate markets — unless Congress manages to kill it. https://nytimes.com/2021/09/24/climate/federal-flood-insurance-cost.html?referringSource=articleShare

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The Cost of Insuring Expensive Waterfront Homes Is About to Skyrocket

New federal flood insurance rates that better reflect the real risks of climate change are coming. For some, premiums will rise sharply.



Beachfront homes in Anna Maria, Fla. One ZIP code in the area leads the country in the number of single-family homes facing an increase of more than $1,200. Eve Edelheit for The New York Times

By Christopher Flavelle
Sept. 24, 2021
Updated 9:38 a.m. ET

Florida’s version of the American dream, which holds that even people of relatively modest means can aspire to live near the water, depends on a few crucial components: sugar white beaches, soft ocean breezes and federal flood insurance that is heavily subsidized.

But starting Oct. 1, communities in Florida and elsewhere around the country will see those subsidies begin to disappear in a nationwide experiment in trying to adapt to climate change: Forcing Americans to pay something closer to the real cost of their flood risk, which is rising as the planet warms. ... While the program also covers homes around the country, the pain will be most acutely felt in coastal communities. For the first time, the new rates will also take into account the size of a home, so that large houses by the ocean could see an especially big jump in rates.

Federal officials say the goal is fairness — and also getting homeowners to understand the extent of the risk they face, and perhaps move to safer ground, reducing the human and financial toll of disasters. ... “Subsidized insurance has been critical for supporting coastal real estate markets,” said Benjamin Keys, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Removing that subsidy, he said, is likely to affect where Americans build houses and how much people will pay for them. “It’s going to require a major rethink about coastal living.”

The Biden administration’s new approach threatens home values, perhaps nowhere as intensely as Florida, a state particularly exposed to rising seas and worsening hurricanes. In some parts of the state, the cost of flood insurance will eventually increase tenfold, according to data obtained by The New York Times. ... For example, Jennifer Zales, a real estate agent who lives in Tampa, pays $480 a year for flood insurance. Under the new system, her rates will eventually reach $7,147, according to Jake Holehouse, her insurance agent.

And that is prompting lawmakers from both parties to line up to block the new rates, which will be phased in over several years.

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[blue sky at night]

1. YEAH...I have been waiting for this for years...

M A K E T H E M P A Y ! ! Once the insurance becomes so expensive they will quit rebuilding. Another pet-peeve is why can't we start putting the utilities underground instead of rebuilding the grid year after year after year when the storms rip them up. BTW, As a photographer I can't stand when utility poles are always in the way of otherwise great shots...just saying.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. Orrin Pilkey's Call to Retreat From the Beach

Note: do not confuse Orrin Pilkey with his brother, Walter Pilkey, who taught mechanical engineering at UVa.

HOME > NEWS >

Orrin Pilkey's Call to Retreat From the Beach

Orrin Pilkey's call for humans to retreat from the beach and allow any structure that can’t be moved back to fall into the sea has been called radical and reproachable in more letters to the editor than he can count. But love him or loathe him, there’s no denying the impact Pilkey has had.

November 25, 2019
Over the course of his 56-year career in coastal geology, Orrin Pilkey has butted heads with real-estate developers and property owners in just about every beach town east of the Mississippi.

His call for humans to retreat from the beach and allow any structure that can’t be moved back to fall into the sea has been called radical and reproachable in more letters to the editor than he can count.

But love him or loathe him, there’s no denying the impact Pilkey, James B. Duke Emeritus Professor of Geology, has had.

The North Carolina Coastal Federation calls him “the man who saved our beaches.” The New York Times calls him “the dean of American coastal geology.” His peers have awarded him nearly every honor for public service in his field, and his former students, many of whom are now influential voices in coastal science themselves, speak of him with reverence.

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