Tag: sea level rise flooding

Florida Bill Would Establish State-level Coordination of Sea Level Rise Response

Florida legislators are considering a bill that would establish a state-wide Office of Resiliency and a task force to research the best ways to protect the Sunshine State’s 1350 miles of coastline from sea level rise flooding.

The legislation, which has bipartisan support, is needed to help communities coordinate their response to sea level rise. With years of state-level climate change neglect, governments in South Florida and the Keys have formed their own regional compact to study the problem and seek ways to meet the challenge that complement each others’ efforts. State leadership and funding would certainly help them.

According to a Finance & Commerce report, the proposal could still face some political headwinds in Tallahassee. Environmentalists would like to see the new resiliency office deal with both sea level rise and the causes of climate change.

Miami’s Sea Level Rise Real Estate Challenges Coming Soon to a Coastal Community Near You

Miami’s extremely low elevation puts the city at the front lines of the battle against sea level rise flooding. The city is constantly grappling with ways to control floodwaters that are serving as a general guide for other cities and town all along the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf of Mexico coastlines.

This week, the city of Miami unveiled its “Miami Forever Climate Ready” plan to combat climate change and sea level rise flooding. Jane Gilbert, the city’s resiliency chief, said the plan outlines 86 actions that need to be taken to control flooding and reducing the city’s carbon footprint.

Among the recommendations to address climate change heat are making buildings more energy-efficient, buying electric vehicles, and planting more trees. To meet the challenge of rising seas, the city plans to upgrade failing stormwater system, raising sea walls, installing stormwater pump stations, and creating wetlands to shift floodwaters from city streets. In areas that experience extreme flooding, the city is considering buying out private property, which, in many cases, is cheaper than rebuilding structures that are repeatedly damaged by floodwaters.

Massive amounts of money will be needed for the city to address sea level rise flooding and climate change, which will worsen in the decades to come. City officials say the challenge is finding funding for the projects when real estate could lose value, which would reduce the amount of tax revenue the city has to work with. If this happens, issuing bonds to pay for the projects could also become more difficult.

Despite the challenges, the report says Miami shouldn’t wait to implement the recommendations. The report says, “Now is the time, while Miami’s economy is still growing, to turn this climate change into an opportunity.” In 2017, Miami voters approved a $400 million bond to improve the city’s sea level rise flooding defenses.

Buyers, sellers, owners, and real estate agents need to know what their local governments are doing to combat sea level rise for several reasons: 1) The projects could impact their tax rates and flood insurance premiums; 2) The projects could determine whether or not their property floods; 3) The project’s effectiveness could impact their property value; and 4) The projects could impact their quality of life if nearby seawalls are raised or pump stations are installed.

Now You Can Binge Watch the FREE Sea Level Rise Real Estate Introductory Video Series!

Sea level rise flooding is a growing problem for coastal communities along the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf of Mexico coastlines. Unfortunately, there isn’t a lot of information out there — and certainly not in one place — to help buyers, sellers, owners, and real estate agents to make informed decisions about how to respond to the challenge.

I created SeaLevelRiseRealEstate.com and wrote “7 Sea Level Rise Real Estate Questions” to give people an understanding of climate change and sea level rise, along with the questions they need to ask and the valuable resources that can provide useful answers, so they’ll make the right decisions based on the threats posed by sea level rise flooding and their ability to address them. To further reinforce the points made on the website and in the book, I produced five introductory videos that I’m posting on this site all at once.

The videos consist of an introductory video followed by videos that each address the central issues that should be of concern to buyers, sellers, owners, and real estate agents. The videos aren’t as comprehensive as the information found in “7 Sea Level Rise Real Estate Questions” but they give a great overview of the general issues of concern.

You can view the videos by clicking this link.

Report Predicts 15%-35% Drop in Florida Home Values Due to Climate Change and Sea Level Rise

A report released by McKinsey & Company, a global management consulting firm, predicts that Florida homes exposed to sea level rise flooding and storm surge from stronger hurricanes — fueled by a warmer atmosphere and ocean water — could lose 15-to-35% of their value by 2050. That translates into $30 billion to $80 billion worth of devaluation.

The company, which studied past trends to arrive at the estimate, says if not effectively addressed, flooding could result in lenders no longer offering 30-year mortgages in affected areas. Furthermore real estate owners could get hit with higher insurance premiums and possibly lose access to insurance altogether if providers leave the market.

If the coastal real estate market faces a downturn due to sea level rise flooding, the report says there’s also a concern that property tax revenues will be reduced, leaving communities with less funding to address the problem.

The report’s authors warn that their estimates may be on the conservative side. Losses could be much higher if water, sewage and transportation systems are flooded or buyers become much more sensitive to climate risk when purchasing properties.

The researchers say Florida is going to have to make hard choices to address sea level rise flooding. The state will have to decide whether to protect the coasts with seawalls and other methods or abandon risk-prone areas.

To protect their financial futures, real estate owners everywhere need to pay close attention to how federal, state and local governments plan to protect their communities from the threat of sea level rise flooding.

Annapolis, Maryland, Committee Delivers Plan to Address Sea Level Rise Flooding

For decades, the Annapolis, Maryland, waterfront has been struggling with nuisance flooding that has forced some businesses to temporarily close in the quaint historic district. This week, a 100 member committee presented a report to the city council that proposes measures to address today’s flooding problem and even higher sea level rise-driven tides in the years to come.

The plan, which calls for temporary and permanent resiliency barriers, the rebuilding of Hillman Garage, and the redevelopment and elevation of parts of of City Dock, comes with a $25-50 million price tag. The committee suggested that a portion of the project funded through an increase in the county and city hotel tax and a bond issue. The remainder could be funded by private investment, grants and federal and state funding sources.

So-called “sunny day” flooding has become a problem for communities all along the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf of Mexico. Buyers, sellers, owners and real estate agents need to be aware of how governments are addressing the problem. Some, like Annapolis, are taking a pro-active approach. Too many others are ignoring the problem that will one day reach a point where the floodwaters themselves will insist on being addressed as they inundate properties.

Buyers, sellers, owners and real estate agents need to be aware of what’s being done in their community or town of interest and not only in terms of where the floodwaters are going. They also need to know if their taxes will be hiked to pay for flood mitigation projects and if any structures, such as sea walls or pumps, will be built nearby that could impact their property value. In the worst case scenario, they need to know if the government is in total denial stage, which could lead them to get flooded out.

Information about this critical issue is included in “7 Sea Level Real Estate Questions.”

Sea Level Rise Reality: No Roads, No Real Estate

Communities from Hawaii to the Florida Keys are already confronting a harsh reality of sea level rise flooding. When flood waters inundate or undermine roads, they have a choice: spend millions or even billions of dollars to save the roads, or abandon them and the real estate that relies on them.

According to a recent report by Mahealani Richardson for HawaiiNewsNow, sea level rise-driven erosion recently caused 1,500 feet of highway to collapse in Haaula, a town on O’ahu. The state is spending $600,000 on emergency repairs, but a permanent solution to save the coastal highway from rising seas could cost up to $1.5 billion for a dozen miles.

Ed Sniffen, a highways administrator, told NewsNow, “It’s a huge but complex situation that we have to consider. Not only are we affecting who can drive through that area in the future, but access to that area in the future.”

Monroe County officials in the Florida Keys are facing the same challenge. According to an article by Theresa Java posted on KeysNews.com, county commissioners there are considering whether to elevate a road in Stillwright Point that flooded 91 days between September and December or abandon it altogether. The road’s fate — and the property owners who rely on it to get around — will depend on how much it will cost to save the road and, considering that seas continue to rise, how much time the repair will buy.

The county’s resiliency officer said a billion dollars probably isn’t enough to save all of the county’s 314 miles of roads. Mayor Heather Carruthers said, “This is the very beginning of very difficult decisions that governments around the world will be forced to make.”

If you search “sea level rise road” on Google, you’ll find dozens of cities and town are confronting the same sea level rise problem. Finding a solution isn’t just a cost-benefit question. Officials also have to consider the decision’s impact on local residents. In some cases, residents have threatened to sue if the government abandons their lifeline roads.

Buyers taking a look at real estate in coastal areas need to consider not only whether or not a property of interest is experiencing sea level rise flooding, they also have to consider how sea level rise flooding is impacting critical infrastructure, such as roads and water and sewer service. The floodwaters could not only prevent them from getting around and receiving critical services, they could also result in a huge tax hike if a community has to initiate projects to save the infrastructure. In a worst case scenario, flooding could force them to move.

Infrastructure issues are discussed in detail in “7 Sea Level Rise Real Estate Questions.”

Real Estate Buyers Need to Be Aware of Sea Level Rise’s Impact on Infrastructure

Buyers of real estate in coastal areas don’t just need to know if the property of interest experiences sea level rise flooding. They also need to know how salty floodwaters are impacting critical infrastructure.

Case in point: Fort Lauderdale, Florida. For decades, officials there have raided the city’s sewer and water budget to fund other projects. Without critical maintenance, the system is collapsing. Last month alone, breaks in a pipe caused 126 million gallons of sewage to course down a neighborhood street and into a river.

In 2017, an engineering firm gave the city an 800 page report that said $1.4 billion worth of work that needed to be completed on the leaky wastewater treatment system to stop the sewage spills. Experts said part of the problem is that the system has aged beyond its useful life. Another problem is that sea level rise is immersing metal pipes in salty water which is causing them to corrode and fail.

Fort Lauderdale isn’t alone in confronting this costly challenge. Miami, too, has a failing wastewater treatment system that has led to spills and huge fines. Many other cities all along the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf coastlines are bound to get hit with similar problems as their infrastructure is invaded by rising seas.

One thing Fort Lauderdale and Miami have in common is the struggle to find money to make the needed repairs. The only options are higher taxes or bond issues. Either way, property owners are bound to get soaked.

The timing of these costs couldn’t be worse. In addition to the need to upgrade their wastewater treatment systems, both cities need to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to raise roads and pipes and build barriers and pumps to hold back the ocean.

In the end, buyers need to take future tax hikes into account when they’re considering whether or not to purchase real estate in areas impacted by sea level rise flooding. This issue is discussed in detail in “7 sea Level Rise Real Estate Questions.”

FEMA’S Climate Change Denialism Endangers Coastal Real Estate Owners

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which is responsible for responding to natural disasters and administering the Federal Flood Insurance Program, has become a major threat to coastal area real estate owners.

FEMA is notorious for using maps based on out of date data to set the flood zones that are used to determine both the level of risk faced by property owners and their flood insurance premiums. The maps are so bad the Department of Homeland Security said only 4-in-10 maps “adequately identified the level of flood risk” in 2017, according to this Bloomberg report. Despite more and more coastal properties being flooded by sea level rise, the agency doesn’t consider sea level rise or the king tides that make the flooding even more intense in the fall when it designates the flood zones.

FEMA’s climate change and sea level rise denialism was exposed yet again by its failure to include both terms in the agency’s National Preparedness Report released in December. Environmentalists say the agency’s inaction on climate change and sea level rise put the nation at risk.

“We can’t prepare the country — we can’t prepare communities — if we take this deliberately politicized route of excluding any mention of climate change,” Rachel Cleetus, a Union of Concerned Scientists’ climate expert told E&E News.

FEMA’s climate change and sea level rise denialism is in stark contrast to the position being taken by science-driven agencies. For example, NASA has webpages that warn about climate change fueling extreme weather events. And, in 2018, the National Climate Assessment, prepared by 300 experts guided by a 60 member federal advisory committee, concluded that climate change will continue to cause extreme weather that damages infrastructure, ecosystems and social systems.

FEMA’s inability to take climate change and sea level rise flooding seriously is further proof that buyers, sellers, owners, and real estate agents in coastal areas need to perform due diligence to protect their financial interests. They all need to go where the federal government — and many state and local governments won’t — and gather information on where flooding is occurring, what other areas it threatens, and how local governments plan to deal with it. They also need to know how sea level rise flooding will affect their tax rates and flood insurance premiums. “7 Sea Level Rise Real Estate Questions” can help them to gather the information they need to make informed decisions.

Does Your State Require Real Estate Sellers to Disclose Sea Level Rise Flooding?

Each state has different requirements regarding a seller’s obligation to disclose sea level rise flooding issues to buyers in a real estate transaction. Not being aware of a state’s seller’s disclosure law can put buyers, sellers and even real estate agents at great risk.

Some states, like Louisiana, are very stringent. Sellers have to tell a buyer if a property floods, the source of the flooding, the type of damage the flooding causes, and whether any flood insurance claims have been filed. The last point is important because there have been cases where buyers have purchased a property and not been aware of a flooding issue. When the property floods and they file a claim, the past claims can be used against them and their insurance rates can skyrocket.

Other states, like Virginia, are pretty much the wild west when it comes to seller’s disclosures. Basically, sellers don’t have to disclose anything, and it’s up to buyers to find out what’s going on.

Florida lies somewhere in the middle. The state requires sellers to disclose defects that they’re aware of that materially affect the value of a property. This could be construed as meaning they’re required to inform buyers if a property experiences flooding. But in all actuality, the language is so non-specific that the state’s insurers are expected to lobby for legislation this year that’s more in line with Louisiana’s detailed level of disclosure.

Strong seller’s disclosure laws protect buyers, sellers, and real estate agents. Buyers, of course, are protected because they’re informed about sea level rise flooding issue BEFORE they make a purchase. Sellers are protected because they will know exactly what’s they’re required to tell the buyer. This can help them to avoid lawsuits for failure to disclose flooding. And real estate agents are protected because they, too, will know what’s expected of them, and they’ll be able to provide better advice to their clients.

A note of caution: Even in states that have strong seller’s disclosure laws, buyers should find out from more than one source if a property or neighborhood floods. Buyers should ask the seller to order a Comprehensive Loss Underwriting Exchange report from their insurer. The report will tell the buyer if any claims have been filed with most insurers in the last 5-7 years. Strolling the neighborhood and asking residents if the property or neighborhood floods can also yield valuable information.

The Natural Resources Defense Council has an excellent online map that features information about each state’s seller’s disclosure law. There’s also more information about this important issue in “7 Sea Level Rise Real Estate Questions.”

Sea Level Rise Flooding Victims in Norfolk, Virginia, Develop a King Tide App

Tired of sitting idle while sea level rise flooding inundated their neighborhood, an enterprising group of citizens in Norfolk, Virginia, decided to band together and develop a King Tide app. Dave Mayfield, a former environmental reporter, told CBS he was depressed from all the bad climate change news so he came up with the idea for the “Catch the King” app. Now hundreds of residents are measuring the timing and extent of king tide and sea level rise-driven flooding that emerges out of Callie Bay. Their data will help mappers to improve the accuracy of their tide and flooding forecasts.

The CBS report by Brooke Silva-Braga includes a quote from a new resident who didn’t know about the regular flooding of his yard until after he bought the property. He said it cost him $90,000 to raise his property. That, my friends, is why I wrote “7 Sea Level Rise Real Estate Questions.” The book tells folks buying in coastal areas — as well as sellers, owners, and real estate agents — what they need to know about sea level rise flooding BEFORE they decide how to proceed in a real estate transaction. Virginia, incidentally, is one of the states with the laxest seller disclosure requirement laws, which is also discussed at length in the book.