Flood Insurance: Are you sure your home is covered?
Written by DR |
Bookmarks: Reddit this, del.icio.us
If you're new here, subscribe to my RSS feed to easily see all the latest money management tips, tools and resources. Thanks for visiting!

- Homeowner’s insurance by itself typically does not include flood insurance, which you must buy separately.
- Flood insurance is quirky. For example, my agent tells me that flood insurance will only cover a home if one or more adjacent properties are also damaged. If only your home is damaged, flood insurance won’t cover you. I assume this varies from policy to policy, and certainly if you don’t live really close to anybody else.
- Flood insurance is expensive. Policies can easily go into the thousands per year depending on where you live.
- In 2006, 1/3 of all flood claims were submitted by those living in low to moderate risk areas.
- You may live in a flood zone and not realize it.
It was this last point that was a shocker to me. I live in a high-risk flood zone! I would have never guessed it. And that brings me to a great resource you should check out if you want to look into flood insurance or determine if you live in a high-risk flood zone–Flood Smart.

Flood Smart is a government run website that provides a wealth of information about flooding risk, flood insurance, and even how to find an insurance agent. One feature I found particularly helpful was a tool that allows you to enter your address and determine what your flood risk is. That’s how I learned we live in a high risk area.
Finally, it’s interesting to note that my insurance agent does not believe we need flood insurance. I guess he thinks the risk of a flood where we live is small, notwithstanding our flood risk rating. But isn’t that the very type of risk one should insure against?
No Tags


(average: 4 out of 5)

