Flood Insurance

The NFIP (National Flood Insurance Program) provides flood insurance to property owners, renters and businesses, and having this coverage helps them recover faster when floodwaters recede. . Homes and businesses in high-risk flood areas with mortgages from government-backed lenders are required to have flood insurance. Policies can be purchased through Soper, Perez and Associates, Inc.

Recently some Homeowner Insurance Companies have begun offering flood insurance policies known as the “Private Market,” in addition to their Homeowner’s policies. 

Florida’s Department of Financial Services website defines flood as:

The definition of a flood is the same regardless of whether your policy is underwritten by the NFIP or the private market. “Flood” means a general and temporary condition of partial or complete inundation of two or more acres of normally dry land areas or two or more properties, at least one of which is the policyholder’s property. For example, flooding in your yard, and in your neighbor’s yard or in the public street meets the requirement for flooding under the policy. Flooding of just one property is not considered to be a covered flood under a NFIP policy unless the area of water displacement is at least two acres. The flood must come from:

• The overflow of inland or tidal waters; or
• The unusual and rapid accumulation or runoff of surface waters from any source; or
• Mud slides, (i.e. mud flows) which are proximately caused by flood, as defined above, and are akin to a river of liquid and flowing mud on the surface of normally dry land areas, as when earth is carried by a current of water and deposited along the path of the current; or
• The collapse or subsidence of land along the shore of a lake or other body of water as a result of erosion or undermining caused by waves or currents of water exceeding the cyclical levels which result in flood, as defined above.

In closing Flood policies purchased due to a home closing/purchase does allow the policy to take effect on the day of closing/purchasing of a home.  However, a policy purchased after a home closing/purchase does have a 30 waiting period.