National Flood Insurance Program in the News

​Realtors® Testify to House Committee on National Flood Insurance Program Stock Index

The National Association of Realtors® testified to the House Financial Service Committee during its hearing, "Preparing for the Storm: Reauthorization of the National Flood Insurance Program." Mabél Guzmán, a 21-year Realtor® from Chicago, IL, told Chairman Maxine Waters that Realtors® support Committee efforts to reform NFIP's mapping and mitigation programs while the nation's largest trade association continues to work with Congress and FEMA to open the door to a private flood insurance market and secure the NFIP's future. 
"The embattled National Flood Insurance Program is central to U.S. disaster preparedness efforts," Guzmán said in her testimony. "According to NAR research, the program is also essential to completing half-a-million home sales per year, each of which contributes two jobs and $80,000 to America's economy. However, the NFIP was not designed nor intended to address the catastrophic loss years we have seen since 2005, meaning the program is not sustainable as currently structured."

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The Trump Administration Could Finally Recognize Climate Change—for Flood Insurance

Economists have found that when money is at stake, companies whose future depends on the weather are more likely to tie their decisions to the scientific consensus on climate change. And perhaps no industry is more dependent on the weather than flood insurance. Here, the “when money is at stake” hypothesis seems to hold true: On Tuesday (March 12), Bloomberg reported (paywall) that the Trump administration was in the process of reevaluating national flood insurance rates to be more in line with actual flood risk.
Which is to say: more in line with the reality of climate change.

The US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which oversees the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), hasn’t indicated what that will mean for policyholders. But an overhaul of the program would almost definitely raise flood insurance rates for people living in flood-prone places. Increasing such rates leads to decreased property value, because it raises the cost of living there, and signals the risk of flooding to potential buyers........... 

The US’s own Fourth National Climate Assessment, released in November 2018, found that as much as $507 billion worth of US real estate is at risk of being inundated by rising sea levels by 2100. Another federal report released in March 2018 from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found that in two-thirds of coastal communities in the US, sea-level rise is already making flooding more frequent.

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