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I'd want to know the status of the French drains...were there previous problems with them and were they recently replaced and properly wrapped by a competent contractor? You don't want broken/obstructed drains next to your foundation.
That's what I'm going to check together with the landscaper/drainage specialist in the next few days.
Got the report from insurance company. The rate seems reasonable as I'm outside of FEMA flood zone, but looks like properties in my ZIP had losses recently. This doesn't seem to affect my rate for now as $470 is around the usual rate for Zone X according to my research.
Flood outlook score is pretty high though.
I'm still trying to understand why your flood risk is rated as "High" when you're well outside the high risk zone and are rated as X, meaning "Moderate" (500 year event) or "Low" (depending one whether the X is shaded or solid).
Your $400 premium for flood coverage is also about as low as you're going to get.
So I found a very nice house and already spent a lump sum on inspections and what I have found out is that the house might be in a flood zone.
Here's a summary.
1. The house is not in a flood zone according to FEMA. However, it appears that FEMA stopped their research so I can't treat that as evidence that it's not actually not a flood zone. See picture1 link below.
2. Looking at riskfactor.com however, the house is rated as 8/10 of flood risk and it's right on the edge of the flood zone. See picture 2.
3. The house has walk-out basement. The front yard is not damp (there is septic there too, septic inspection says that there is no flooding expected to be in the septic area but it's higher than backyard). 4. The backyard is on lower level and has a pond and acreek. The area around the pond is pretty damp and around 1/4 of land is marshes.
5. There are french drains around the house which drain the water into the pond.
6. It was raining the day before the inspection. I was there before when there was no rain and the pond was like 2 times smaller.
7. Inspectors didn't find any evidence of water intrusion in the house.
So now the question is: should I walk?
NO!!!!! WALK!!!!!
I live on the Gulf Coast. Flooding is a problem. You NEVER buy a house that even hints that it might someday flood. NEVER. Because if there's a chance it can....sooner or later, it might and probably will.
The weather is getting more disaster-prone with each passing year. During the last couple of years, our corner of the state had flooding in areas that had never flooded before. Hurricanes are more frequent and stronger. There's more development taking up valuable land that used to take water and prevent it from flowing further.
Even if it doesn't flood, you will forever be sweating through every rainy season. Even if you have flood insurance, your house will never be the same after it's flooded inside. Your furniture will be damaged. You may have to walk around and live in water for a few days, until it subsides. Then there's mold.
Buy something that doesn't have a threat of flooding at all, if possible. You'll be glad you did. Even with that, if you live in an area prone to flooding, it might flood in the future, anyway. But why buy something that is more of a sure thing to flood?
If you are getting a mortgage, your lender will make the determination. If a house has been standing strong for years, it’s probably fine. That doesn’t mean that the feds won’t suddenly change the flood zone, so you’ll have to pay. It happened to us.
Flood zone X started at $450. a year, but it’s now almost $1000. If I didn’t have a mortgage I wouldn’t have flood insurance. It’s a scam.
Well...according to FEMA its nowhere near flood zone. More over, it's impossible to be flooded if we take FEMA into consideration because the house is uphill from where FEMA flood zone ends and it's like at least a mile away, maybe even more.
Never mind FEMA or anybody else for that matter.
If you need a mortgage, the lender is only place to ask whether flood insurance is required. If the lender says yes, you'll have to buy very expensive coverage.
If the lender says no, it's up to you if you want to buy the house without buying flood insurance.
If you don't need a mortgage it would be worth the time to call a few mortgage companies and see if flood insurance is required.
If the house is out of the 100 year flood plain it really isn't "low lying". I've found the Flood Factor site to be somewhat histrionic. The best source, and I linked it, is FEMA itself.
Note where I live. I've found that people worrying about flooding outside the risk zone are the same type who cut down every 50 foot tall tree withing 100 yards of their house so they don't fall on it.
I don't fool with flood maps. I look at the land.
Drains won't do you any good if there's no slope for them to carry water away.
A house that's at the bottom of a hollow with everything around it above it, WILL get wet, sooner or later. I've seen too many houses built down in creek bottoms, draws, etc., etc. Sooner or later you'll see the truck out there sucking the water out of the carpets after a real heavy rain.
Just don't do it. Stand there and look around you. Say to yourself, if I were a gallon of water dropped here, or here, or here, where would I run off to? And if the answer is "up the sidewalk and in the front door", run away.
Drains won't do you any good if there's no slope for them to carry water away.
A house that's at the bottom of a hollow with everything around it above it, WILL get wet, sooner or later. I've seen too many houses built down in creek bottoms, draws, etc., etc. Sooner or later you'll see the truck out there sucking the water out of the carpets after a real heavy rain.
Just don't do it. Stand there and look around you. Say to yourself, if I were a gallon of water dropped here, or here, or here, where would I run off to? And if the answer is "up the sidewalk and in the front door", run away.
That’s a horrible analogy for the most typical layperson!
Most people can’t see 20’ of “flat” driveway and know it runs uphill or down; or left or right!
Drains won't do you any good if there's no slope for them to carry water away.
A house that's at the bottom of a hollow with everything around it above it, WILL get wet, sooner or later. I've seen too many houses built down in creek bottoms, draws, etc., etc. Sooner or later you'll see the truck out there sucking the water out of the carpets after a real heavy rain.
Just don't do it. Stand there and look around you. Say to yourself, if I were a gallon of water dropped here, or here, or here, where would I run off to? And if the answer is "up the sidewalk and in the front door", run away.
But is this house in the "creek bottoms" or in the bottom of a hollow? It doesn't sound or look like it.
If the OP has already found the ground to be rather wet from a normal rainstorm, they need to think about what if they get a storm with 8, 10, or 12 inches of rain in a single day or night someday. I've lived through that, houses never considered at risk of flooding were floating away. The rain just would not stop and it had to go somewhere. If there's no slope downhill from this property, or very little of it, then water that comes is not going to flow away from the house, No matter how many french drains you put in, it's eventually going to cause problems. And even if you have insurance, that can't replace some things, like if you have photos of family, heirlooms, etc., you're attached to. A map with topo lines would be very helpful in this discussion. If there just isn't much rise in elevation from that creek to the house, it's a problem. Which I think the insurance company realizes as they say there's a flood risk. To put this in perspective, I have a property with a brook on it. But the brook (a trickle most of the year, about 4 feet wide in spring from snowmelt) is literally over 100 feet lower in elevation below my house. I'm on a mountain. And where the brook is on my property is, it's taking a steep downhill course down the rest of the mountain. The flood risk is basically zero. Now that same brook if it were only a few feet lower than my house, or even 10 feet lower, would make me nervous.
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