Do I Need Flood Insurance?
There comes a time when every zealous homeowner asks himself – usually at a very inconvenient hour, like 3 am: Do I need Flood Insurance?
The answer is: probably.
Here’s why: Most homeowners insurance policy, renter, landlord, and business insurance policies exclude coverage for flooding. And there used to be a time when one would only recommend flood insurance to people living near the beach and on the coast. But that time has long passed. A flood can be caused by a number of things. Not only by water surges caused by a high tide, but also due to outdated sewer and urbanization projects. With the rise of climate change and human action in leveling forests, overbuilding the land, and increasing use of asphalt all reduced the soil's natural ability to absorb excess water, compounding the risk of disastrous flooding. Combining that with the fact that sea levels have been rising and rains have become heavier and more frequent, floods have become more and more common in every area of the country. A heavy prolonged rain can be enough to flood sections of a city.
So, do you need Flood Insurance? We’ll say this: you should learn about your area’s history with floods to see if it’s something very urgent. But even if there hasn’t been a lot of floods, if you can; do it. Don’t save pennies: In 2017 alone 116 people died in America because of floods. Yes, a life is something you can insure but can never take back and it’s an extreme example; but let’s tone it down then: if that much people died because of floods, can you imagine the number of homes that get damaged due to flood? Here’s another scary number: over 90% of all presidential-declared disasters in the United States are flood related.
Flood insurance is such an important thing that, in some areas, is not a matter of “Do I need Flood Insurance” – it’s mandatory! Annapolis Real Estate Agents, for instance, will be quick to point out to home buyers that they should include flood insurance in their budget to figure out how much they can offer on a house and determine how much they can pay on a mortgage, because most parts of the city require flood insurance and any mortgage company that is not willing to lose their asset will force you to get one in order to lend you the money.
If you need some additional resource, check our Worst Cities for Natural Disasters article!
Popular Insurance Questions
Popular Insurance Glossary Terms
Statutory liabilities minus the interest MAINTENANCE RESERVE minus the ASSET VALUATION RESERVE. ...
Liability incurred by a business for acts other than those of its own employees. This particular situation may arise when an independent contractor is hired. The business can be held liable ...
Investment strategy that advocates the transfer of amounts from one category of investment to another category according to a perception of how each of these categories of investments will ...
Assets that are not readily convertible into cash 'without a significant loss of principle, such as an automobile, a house, television set, a radio, etc. ...
When people think of home insurance policies, they usually only think about the obvious coverage of its house structure. But that, known as Dwelling Insurance, is only one of the coverage ...
Same as term Captive Agent: representative of a single insurer or fleet of insurers who is obliged to submit business only to that company, or at the very minimum, give that company first ...
Modifications of the traditional defined benefit plan in which employees are credited with a specified percentage for each year of recognized service with the employer. Upon termination of ...
Same as term Blanket Position Bond: covers all employees of a business on a blanket basis with the maximumlimit of coverage applied separately to each employee guilty of a crime. ...
Privately formed insurance company whose objective is to make a profit. ...
Have a question or comment?
We're here to help.