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Maybe its insensitive to say this, but isn't this a REALLY good thing and will save tens of thousands of lives? How else do you convince people not to build an

Maybe its insensitive to say this, but isn't this a REALLY good thing and will save tens of thousands of lives? How else do you convince people not to build and live in spots that are known to be disaster areas, in a country that has so much space that you can drive somewhere and run out of fuel?

dbish 1y ago
100%. This is working as it should.
- sonicggg 1y ago
  How exactly is it working? Florida's population keeps growing no matter what. Highest point in the whole state is a tiny hill.
  - epistasis 1y ago
    People who want to pay for the cost of replacing their homes in Florida will pay for it, and they still get to make the choice to pay instead of being forced out of the place they would prefer to live.
  - infecto 1y ago
    Correct me if I am wrong but is not most of the damage near the ocean where you get massive surf flooding? Typically a few miles inland is ok no? That’s at least what I have read in the past. Might be wrong!
  - maerF0x0 1y ago
    People are indicating they feel their best rational option is to stay (or even go there). If you know the government will throw billions to your aid, then a disaster zone is actually far less risk than if they would not. Or maybe you just like the beaches in Miami so much that you would rather part with the money than the beauty? Still a market working rationally.
echelon 1y ago
I'll limit the scope of my reply to hurricane zones as wildfires and flooding are a bit different. People in hurricane zones are used to evacuating and have plenty of advanced notice. For the vast majority of the time they're able to enjoy a healthy beach lifestyle - relaxing, great climate, fun hobbies. It's extremely rewarding to live near the beach. I'm sure there are studies that show positive impact to health and healthspan outcomes as well. The problem is that America was for several generations living in a privileged bubble. The post-WWII period was very good for us. We could afford to build, rebuild, and rebuild again. Labor costs and material costs were low, and there wasn't overwhelming demand. This advantage lasted for a whopping 50 years as we transitioned from strength to strength, shifting from a manufacturing economy to a robust consumption and services economy. Until recently, it didn't cost a million dollars to put a home near the beach. What's changed is the economic position of the country and the financial capability of the average American. We can't build houses for $60,000 anymore. This is less a signal of "insurance getting smarter" and more of a signal the outsized advantages of America are coming (have already come) to an end.
- nemomarx 1y ago
  If you want to constantly rebuild your house, be my guest, but you're going to have to pay a lot for the nice climate and beach property in that case. the post war economy was an aberration when the rest of the world was recovering from being bombed to hell, it was never going to last forever. excesses like cheap rebuilding are just not as good of an idea of building to last in safe areas.
- itchyjunk 1y ago
  So, in other words, it's a "really good thing".
- dcchambers 1y ago
  Florida shorelines used to be full of little fishing shacks and beach cottages. If hurricane winds tore it down or it floated away in a storm surge it wasn't the end of the world to replace it because costs were reasonable. It's a totally different story now that the average beachside "home" is a $10 million dollar mansion.
jpadkins 1y ago
came here to say this. We really don't want to subsidize people living next to active volcanoes. If you agree with that, then you can extend the analogy to all other forms of predictable natural disasters.
- shadowgovt 1y ago
  FWIW, we actually do subsidize people living next to active volcanoes. If for no other reason than Hawaii is strategically significant (I think there are good humanitarian reasons also, but I'm pretty sure the US federal government would continue to see it as strategically valuable to help people in Hawaii recover from the occasional eruption regardless). https://recovery.hawaiicounty.gov/resources/recovery-grants/kilauearecoverygrantprogram https://recovery.hawaiicounty.gov/resources/recovery-grants/...
  - jpadkins 1y ago
    interesting, thanks for the info! I disagree it is humanitarian to entice people to live in more dangerous areas.
    - shadowgovt 1y ago
      This is a fraught space. Without going into deep detail, the people of Hawaii care little what mainlanders think is "humanitarian" about where they have historically lived for at least 1,500 years. And to be fair to them, it's hard to make solid assertions that a living situation is bad when it has existed for 1,500 years.
      - jpadkins 1y ago
        Whether or not people live in Hawaii is not the question. Of course in a free society you can live wherever you want. The question is is it good for the mainlanders to subsidize or give money to people in Hawaii to live next to volcanoes. As you said, they have lived there for 1,500 years without subsidies from others. They can continue to do so without taking capital from people who chose to live in safer places.
paxys 1y ago
Over the long term - probably. Today - there are thousands of families who have to decide whether to live in an uninsured home in a disaster prone area or spend a bunch of money/uproot their lives/move elsewhere/find a new job etc. I'm going to guess most will stick with option 1, because they cannot afford the alternative.
- neves 1y ago
  You need to spend public money in this. Not just to save the banks.
- maerF0x0 1y ago
  Those families are suffering the effects of their choices. It could be that they rationally prefer the risk of devastation or the higher insurance rate, than living somewhere else. We should allow them the freedom to choose, without also subsidizing the choice.
czbond 1y ago
I don't disagree with you on new builds and new purchases. But homeowners living in some of these areas for 10...30 years suddenly becoming un-insurable when the environment changed around them is a thorny issue.
- no_wizard 1y ago
  Why do these home owners deserve more support? because what? They own some property? (Or at least the bank does) I don’t feel sorry for these people. They made choice and the evidence this was inevitable was in front of them for 10 years at least. They don’t deserve special consideration. Considering how we treat things like job loss, which is a good allegory here as it has all the same features of circumstance, why do they deserve special considerations that aren’t extended to other groups?
- hypeatei 1y ago
  How is that a thorny issue? What got us into this housing crisis is exactly the mindset you're displaying here: once you get yours, it's yours for the rest of time and anyone who tries to change that should be voted out.
jonbiggums22 1y ago
What makes you think they won't be bailed out by creating a national subsidized insurance program? The national flood insurance program only exists because insurance companies didn't consider insuring properties that are destroyed by flood all the time a good idea and stopped doing it altogether.
- jillesvangurp 1y ago
  Maybe that's a thing the first few times this happens. But it won't be happening just once or twice. Using public funding to keep on bailing people out is going to get expensive for everyone and won't be that popular the more often it happens. Expensive bailouts make them a natural cutting target. The way this works out financially is that insurance prices go first. Then banks do the obvious thing which is to be reluctant to provide mortgages on property likely to suffer damage within the mortgage period. That probably is already a thing. That in turn makes existing property a harder sell and affects property prices negatively. And as a result, some property mortgages might be under water before the property is under water. A natural disaster would wipe out the uninsured property and then the mortgage. Any banks with lots of exposure to that might be facing issues if that happens. Any public funding used mitigate that is more likely to go to these banks than the people affected. Which won't be popular. Easy to spell this out, because minus the root cause (natural disasters), this is more or less what happened around 2009 when banks had to be bailed out because of the subprime loans. Loads of foreclosures and misery. But it was the banks that got the bailout. The predictable end result is that after a few disasters, certain areas just won't be rebuilt again because nobody is willing to fund that. Some people might move out before the worst happens. Banks and insurers will be the first to move out. Probably sooner rather than later. That probably won't be great for people that remain since investments in public infrastructure and maintenance of things like roads will also drop off for the same reason.
dylan604 1y ago
Having insurance doesn't save lives. The people in those homes are able to leave during the storm so they are not in danger while the insurance is left footing the bill to repair the damage. So I'm not sure where you will get tens of thousands of lives saved.
- nemomarx 1y ago
  If they don't have insurance, hopefully they will leave and less new people will build houses on uninsurable land. At least some of those people will then avoid injury and death in the storms?
- infecto 1y ago
  I read it as less insurance coverage, less people buying and building. There is always some % of folks that stick around. Over the medium and long term that probably equates to some number of lives.
- yepitwas 1y ago
  ... anyone got stats on what happens to mortality rates during such an evacuation?
sleepyguy 1y ago
You could still have people living there, but the problem is that they don't build for the kind of inclement weather they are threatened by. The building code should require all construction to meet certain levels of survivability. You never see concrete houses blowing down anywhere, but in Florida, they like to build on the coast using matchsticks....
ratelimitsteve 1y ago
it's a good thing until it's your house. when we bought 5 years ago there had been exactly one tornado within a hundred miles of us in the entirety of the historical record. Now there's been one each of the last three years and I'm sitting in what was supposed to be the central investment of my lifetime wondering if its asset value is gonna plummet to zero while the cost for me to actually stay here is gonna become entirely unmaintainable, leaving me with no way to hold this position and no exit aside from maybe bankruptcy. Dispassionate analysis of systems is important but remembering that this system is made of actual human beings and involves what for many of them is their life's work is also important. I did everything right, went to school, got the job, built the nest egg, invested in the community (the historically non-disaster-prone community), now it could potentially all disappear out from underneath me and there's nothing I can do to prevent it.
- nemomarx 1y ago
  I really do sympathize, but we are apparently all deciding not to do anything that might help with the climate so these shifts in weather patterns are unavoidable. I hope you can get out of there before the house is unsellable, or at least get the material cost back.
snarf21 1y ago
I would go slightly further and say that a lot of this is subsidized by things like FEMA and NFIP and as such, there should be a three strikes rule. If a property makes a claim based on a disaster like this, they shouldn't be able to just rebuild there indefinitely, regardless of the cost. After the third claim, that property should be rezoned and made unavailable for development. Make it a park or at worst an open parking lot with no infrastructure.
- infecto 1y ago
  I would argue it should happen after the first disaster. The government has subsidized houses being built in known flood paths for too long imo. If you are in a known zone and had a major loss. You don’t get money to rebuild but instead money to build elsewhere.
- adolph 1y ago
  What is a "three strikes" for if the cost of periodic rebuilding is financed by unsubsidized insurance? "Rezoning" is a needless control that then prevents future development that might be impervious to whatever disasters caused the periodic rebuilding before.
  - cameldrv 1y ago
    The problem is that due to the nature of democracy, people expect to be bailed out if there is a huge disaster. If you don’t want to pay another claim, you need to make demolishing the house and rezoning the land a condition of paying the final claim.
- ortusdux 1y ago
  They have been doing a version of this for a while in some areas. The homeowner gets a bailout, but the money comes with rebuild requirements (often lifting/lofting the building above a 100 year flood level). If they are met, your property remains insurable and eligible for future help. Conversely, the owner can take the money and keep or sell the land. The problem with this method is that it tends to gentrify the region. Wealthier people can afford to live elsewhere during the repairs, but people living paycheck to paycheck are often forced to take the money and sell the land.
reactordev 1y ago
tell me you don't live in the US without telling me you don't live in the US. Everywhere is a disaster "zone", whether it's hurricanes, floods, tornados, dust storms, landslides - They'll find an excuse. This comment about how we shouldn't be living in disaster zones is completely out of touch with A) Where people live. and B) What a disaster zone is. Coastal cities (where 59% of people live) will say it's prone to hurricanes and tsunami's, flooding and storms. 50% increase. Inland cities, floods and landslides - 50% increase. Desert Towns, dust storms and tornados - 50% increase. Mountain Towns, floods and landslides - 50% increase. Nomadic villages of hippies and communes, tornados and floods - 50% increase. I know not of a single home owner who's premiums didn't go up, no matter where they live.
- mint5 1y ago
  That’s a huge misconception of how insurance works. And those disasters are geographically off. Hurricanes are not a coastal thing for the whole nation, west coast does not get them. Tornadoes are not a desert thing. All those sound like being pulled out of a hat without actual knowledge.
  - reactordev 1y ago
    Tell that to the insurance companies that upped my premium for hurricane disasters even though I don’t live near the coast. I’m at least 500 miles inland. It no longer matters about geography and it matters whether there was ever one in the past. The last few hurricanes went deep into Midwest land so naturally, we are now in hurricane zones.
    - mint5 1y ago
      Sorry are we pretending that hurricane last year, or was it earlier this year, didn’t cause havoc hundreds of miles inland?
- HankStallone 1y ago
  My rural home insurance in the Midwest where the only risk is tornados has certainly gone up. When I saw the headline "disaster-prone cities," I thought maybe they were talking about crime or terrorism or something. For something like a hurricane, everyone in the danger area would see insurance rates go up, not just those in the cities. Odd way to word it.
throwmeaway222 1y ago
Well in the end it evens out in making more people homeless. Here are your choices: a 800k house that require you to work 18 taco bell/gas station/home depot shifts per day OR out in the boonies where if you want insurance you need to work 5 shifts per day. Both are impossible, so you just work 3 shifts and don't have insurance and use food stamps to eat. There stories are not well distributed but people that get priced out of cities end up buying a singlewide/double wide or just rent and then the house gets destroyed and they have no insurance and end up entirely on the streets. So yes it is definitely insensitive to say that. Perhaps you would understand if your cushy tech job was 25k per year instead of 225k.
- infecto 1y ago
  How does it make more people homeless? Insurance absolutely is a good proxy for real risk and there are plenty of places to be building homes. If you live in a flood zone you can still get the government to help cover some of the risk but also… flood zones are not new. I don’t really want to incentive people to continue to buy and build in these areas. Use the dollars to rebuild elsewhere.
  - rimunroe 1y ago
    Because when people get priced out of their existing homes they often find that they can't afford houses elsewhere either.
  - throwmeaway222 1y ago
    Insurance was not supposed to work this way first of all. You're a woman so we're going to charge you double for health insurance because you know, your boobs might get lumps. I do agree with people that "rebuild and rebuild and rebuild" in the same area without the codes catching up.. I think if someone is wealthy enough they can afford james hardie siding ALL the way up - for example in a fire zone. I think the insurance should be the same cost but the payout should be capped based on the decisions that are made.
    - quickthrowman 1y ago
rufus_foreman 1y ago
Tens of thousands? Over what time period? You may be way overestimating the number of people that die from natural disasters. Hurricanes killed around 2,000 people in the last quarter century, not tens of thousands, https://www.statista.com/statistics/203729/fatalities-caused-by-tropical-cyclones-in-the-us/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/203729/fatalities-caused....
- lionkor 1y ago
  Im counting all the lives lost by natural disasters, by the resulting depressions, financial issues, etc. Its not as simple as "N people died from literally being inside the storm, therefore the number of potentially saved lives is N". There is always a domino effect from a massive disaster, even if "just" a couple of people die directly at the hand of the disaster.
  - rufus_foreman 1y ago
    The next largest category of natural disaster fatalities after tropical storms in the US is heat waves. The insurance companies aren't stopping writing polices in places that have heat waves, that's most of the country. Next after heat waves is severe storms. Same thing. Then winter storms. Same thing. Insurance companies are avoiding a couple particular types of natural disaster that have the capacity for massive property damage at a single point in time in a concentrated area, mainly tropical storms and wildfires. Those natural disasters just don't cause many deaths in the US. Tens of millions of people live in those areas. If you're going to talk about "the resulting depressions, financial issues, etc." you might want to give some consideration to tens of millions of people being forced to move, to risk going uninsured, or losing their homes.
OtherShrezzing 1y ago
It’s good for preventing new homes on those areas. Less good if you already own a home, and its value is now falling inline with the increasing premiums.
nonethewiser 1y ago
Yeah its definitely a good thing ON THE WHOLE. It's legitimately bad for the people it affects and the sort of vindication people feel for seeing them suffer is sick. One common reaction to this is state subsidies or regulation to make it more affordable (see this in California and Florida). While this is bad, spending money on the problem is good. People often conflate "dont subsidize" with "dont spend money." Instead they should spend it to offset the damage/inconvenience done to the people affected. Moving assistance or something. Not subsidize living in dangerous areas. It's kind of the Warren Buffet approach to people whose livelihoods are ruined by a changing economy. It's real harm and its not fair, but you dont stop progress. You also dont say "fuck em" - you support the people who get left behind.
- epistasis 1y ago
  People had decades of warning of this happening. Any assistance on moving out is a very bad idea. There are rising insurance costs, slowly, people have time to respond. People in Florida did not even advocate for mitigations that would have prevented the rising costs, when they were given decades of warning. Protecting home values above all else is very bad for society. Unless renters are given the same protection and massive handouts, it's a very unfair system
  - nonethewiser 1y ago
    Moving the money away from insurance subsidies doesnt preserver home values.
    - epistasis 1y ago
      Exactly, subsidizing insurance for these high risk homes is a subsidy for home values, and would be a very unfair thing to do.
      - nonethewiser 1y ago
        Yes
quickthrowman 1y ago
Yes, it absolutely is. East Grand Forks, MN demolished all buildings in the floodplain after the 1997 floods. I understand Florida is bigger than East Grand Forks, but not every single person living in Florida will be priced out of home insurance at the same time, hopefully there’s enough wealthy people who can afford to self-insure to buy up all of the existing homes, but it’s unlikely and someone will have to lose money. > East Grand Forks, along with Grand Forks, was heavily damaged by a major flood in 1997. The entire city was under a mandatory evacuation and almost no homes were spared damage. After the flood, several neighborhoods had to be demolished because of damage. The city cleared development from the floodplain bordering the Red and Red Lake rivers. It developed a large park known as the Greater Grand Forks Greenway to provide a new recreation area for residents along the river. A similar park was developed in Grand Forks. The parklands, with trees and a variety of greenery, can absorb floodwaters and help protect the cities naturally. Moving residential and business development out of these areas also helps prevent future flood damage. In addition, a new system of dikes was constructed to protect the city from future flooding. The city has since rebuilt.
cratermoon 1y ago
What areas of the US did you have in mind, specifically? I must point out that much of the available space is marginally suitable, at best, for residential communities. We already have large cities in places that require unsustainable levels of resource consumption to continue existing. Just considering water: Los Angeles is a desert made green by importing water from hundreds of miles away (and destroying the communities that used to exist near the water sources). The Colorado River is oversubscribed, and most years never reaches the ocean. Groundwater sources like the Ogallala Aquifer are depleted. This doesn't begin to count the effects of sprawl and urbanization on wildlife populations.

dbish 1y ago

100%. This is working as it should.

sonicggg 1y ago
How exactly is it working? Florida's population keeps growing no matter what. Highest point in the whole state is a tiny hill.
- epistasis 1y ago
  People who want to pay for the cost of replacing their homes in Florida will pay for it, and they still get to make the choice to pay instead of being forced out of the place they would prefer to live.
- infecto 1y ago
  Correct me if I am wrong but is not most of the damage near the ocean where you get massive surf flooding? Typically a few miles inland is ok no? That’s at least what I have read in the past. Might be wrong!
- maerF0x0 1y ago
  People are indicating they feel their best rational option is to stay (or even go there). If you know the government will throw billions to your aid, then a disaster zone is actually far less risk than if they would not. Or maybe you just like the beaches in Miami so much that you would rather part with the money than the beauty? Still a market working rationally.

echelon 1y ago

I'll limit the scope of my reply to hurricane zones as wildfires and flooding are a bit different. People in hurricane zones are used to evacuating and have plenty of advanced notice. For the vast majority of the time they're able to enjoy a healthy beach lifestyle - relaxing, great climate, fun hobbies. It's extremely rewarding to live near the beach. I'm sure there are studies that show positive impact to health and healthspan outcomes as well. The problem is that America was for several generations living in a privileged bubble. The post-WWII period was very good for us. We could afford to build, rebuild, and rebuild again. Labor costs and material costs were low, and there wasn't overwhelming demand. This advantage lasted for a whopping 50 years as we transitioned from strength to strength, shifting from a manufacturing economy to a robust consumption and services economy. Until recently, it didn't cost a million dollars to put a home near the beach. What's changed is the economic position of the country and the financial capability of the average American. We can't build houses for $60,000 anymore. This is less a signal of "insurance getting smarter" and more of a signal the outsized advantages of America are coming (have already come) to an end.

nemomarx 1y ago
If you want to constantly rebuild your house, be my guest, but you're going to have to pay a lot for the nice climate and beach property in that case. the post war economy was an aberration when the rest of the world was recovering from being bombed to hell, it was never going to last forever. excesses like cheap rebuilding are just not as good of an idea of building to last in safe areas.
itchyjunk 1y ago
So, in other words, it's a "really good thing".
dcchambers 1y ago
Florida shorelines used to be full of little fishing shacks and beach cottages. If hurricane winds tore it down or it floated away in a storm surge it wasn't the end of the world to replace it because costs were reasonable. It's a totally different story now that the average beachside "home" is a $10 million dollar mansion.

jpadkins 1y ago

came here to say this. We really don't want to subsidize people living next to active volcanoes. If you agree with that, then you can extend the analogy to all other forms of predictable natural disasters.

shadowgovt 1y ago
FWIW, we actually do subsidize people living next to active volcanoes. If for no other reason than Hawaii is strategically significant (I think there are good humanitarian reasons also, but I'm pretty sure the US federal government would continue to see it as strategically valuable to help people in Hawaii recover from the occasional eruption regardless). https://recovery.hawaiicounty.gov/resources/recovery-grants/kilauearecoverygrantprogram https://recovery.hawaiicounty.gov/resources/recovery-grants/...
- jpadkins 1y ago
  interesting, thanks for the info! I disagree it is humanitarian to entice people to live in more dangerous areas.
  - shadowgovt 1y ago
    This is a fraught space. Without going into deep detail, the people of Hawaii care little what mainlanders think is "humanitarian" about where they have historically lived for at least 1,500 years. And to be fair to them, it's hard to make solid assertions that a living situation is bad when it has existed for 1,500 years.
    - jpadkins 1y ago
      Whether or not people live in Hawaii is not the question. Of course in a free society you can live wherever you want. The question is is it good for the mainlanders to subsidize or give money to people in Hawaii to live next to volcanoes. As you said, they have lived there for 1,500 years without subsidies from others. They can continue to do so without taking capital from people who chose to live in safer places.

paxys 1y ago

Over the long term - probably. Today - there are thousands of families who have to decide whether to live in an uninsured home in a disaster prone area or spend a bunch of money/uproot their lives/move elsewhere/find a new job etc. I'm going to guess most will stick with option 1, because they cannot afford the alternative.

neves 1y ago
You need to spend public money in this. Not just to save the banks.
maerF0x0 1y ago
Those families are suffering the effects of their choices. It could be that they rationally prefer the risk of devastation or the higher insurance rate, than living somewhere else. We should allow them the freedom to choose, without also subsidizing the choice.

czbond 1y ago

I don't disagree with you on new builds and new purchases. But homeowners living in some of these areas for 10...30 years suddenly becoming un-insurable when the environment changed around them is a thorny issue.

no_wizard 1y ago
Why do these home owners deserve more support? because what? They own some property? (Or at least the bank does) I don’t feel sorry for these people. They made choice and the evidence this was inevitable was in front of them for 10 years at least. They don’t deserve special consideration. Considering how we treat things like job loss, which is a good allegory here as it has all the same features of circumstance, why do they deserve special considerations that aren’t extended to other groups?
hypeatei 1y ago
How is that a thorny issue? What got us into this housing crisis is exactly the mindset you're displaying here: once you get yours, it's yours for the rest of time and anyone who tries to change that should be voted out.

jonbiggums22 1y ago

What makes you think they won't be bailed out by creating a national subsidized insurance program? The national flood insurance program only exists because insurance companies didn't consider insuring properties that are destroyed by flood all the time a good idea and stopped doing it altogether.

jillesvangurp 1y ago
Maybe that's a thing the first few times this happens. But it won't be happening just once or twice. Using public funding to keep on bailing people out is going to get expensive for everyone and won't be that popular the more often it happens. Expensive bailouts make them a natural cutting target. The way this works out financially is that insurance prices go first. Then banks do the obvious thing which is to be reluctant to provide mortgages on property likely to suffer damage within the mortgage period. That probably is already a thing. That in turn makes existing property a harder sell and affects property prices negatively. And as a result, some property mortgages might be under water before the property is under water. A natural disaster would wipe out the uninsured property and then the mortgage. Any banks with lots of exposure to that might be facing issues if that happens. Any public funding used mitigate that is more likely to go to these banks than the people affected. Which won't be popular. Easy to spell this out, because minus the root cause (natural disasters), this is more or less what happened around 2009 when banks had to be bailed out because of the subprime loans. Loads of foreclosures and misery. But it was the banks that got the bailout. The predictable end result is that after a few disasters, certain areas just won't be rebuilt again because nobody is willing to fund that. Some people might move out before the worst happens. Banks and insurers will be the first to move out. Probably sooner rather than later. That probably won't be great for people that remain since investments in public infrastructure and maintenance of things like roads will also drop off for the same reason.

dylan604 1y ago

Having insurance doesn't save lives. The people in those homes are able to leave during the storm so they are not in danger while the insurance is left footing the bill to repair the damage. So I'm not sure where you will get tens of thousands of lives saved.

nemomarx 1y ago
If they don't have insurance, hopefully they will leave and less new people will build houses on uninsurable land. At least some of those people will then avoid injury and death in the storms?
infecto 1y ago
I read it as less insurance coverage, less people buying and building. There is always some % of folks that stick around. Over the medium and long term that probably equates to some number of lives.
yepitwas 1y ago
... anyone got stats on what happens to mortality rates during such an evacuation?

sleepyguy 1y ago

You could still have people living there, but the problem is that they don't build for the kind of inclement weather they are threatened by. The building code should require all construction to meet certain levels of survivability. You never see concrete houses blowing down anywhere, but in Florida, they like to build on the coast using matchsticks....

ratelimitsteve 1y ago

it's a good thing until it's your house. when we bought 5 years ago there had been exactly one tornado within a hundred miles of us in the entirety of the historical record. Now there's been one each of the last three years and I'm sitting in what was supposed to be the central investment of my lifetime wondering if its asset value is gonna plummet to zero while the cost for me to actually stay here is gonna become entirely unmaintainable, leaving me with no way to hold this position and no exit aside from maybe bankruptcy. Dispassionate analysis of systems is important but remembering that this system is made of actual human beings and involves what for many of them is their life's work is also important. I did everything right, went to school, got the job, built the nest egg, invested in the community (the historically non-disaster-prone community), now it could potentially all disappear out from underneath me and there's nothing I can do to prevent it.

nemomarx 1y ago
I really do sympathize, but we are apparently all deciding not to do anything that might help with the climate so these shifts in weather patterns are unavoidable. I hope you can get out of there before the house is unsellable, or at least get the material cost back.

snarf21 1y ago

I would go slightly further and say that a lot of this is subsidized by things like FEMA and NFIP and as such, there should be a three strikes rule. If a property makes a claim based on a disaster like this, they shouldn't be able to just rebuild there indefinitely, regardless of the cost. After the third claim, that property should be rezoned and made unavailable for development. Make it a park or at worst an open parking lot with no infrastructure.

infecto 1y ago
I would argue it should happen after the first disaster. The government has subsidized houses being built in known flood paths for too long imo. If you are in a known zone and had a major loss. You don’t get money to rebuild but instead money to build elsewhere.
adolph 1y ago
What is a "three strikes" for if the cost of periodic rebuilding is financed by unsubsidized insurance? "Rezoning" is a needless control that then prevents future development that might be impervious to whatever disasters caused the periodic rebuilding before.
- cameldrv 1y ago
  The problem is that due to the nature of democracy, people expect to be bailed out if there is a huge disaster. If you don’t want to pay another claim, you need to make demolishing the house and rezoning the land a condition of paying the final claim.
ortusdux 1y ago
They have been doing a version of this for a while in some areas. The homeowner gets a bailout, but the money comes with rebuild requirements (often lifting/lofting the building above a 100 year flood level). If they are met, your property remains insurable and eligible for future help. Conversely, the owner can take the money and keep or sell the land. The problem with this method is that it tends to gentrify the region. Wealthier people can afford to live elsewhere during the repairs, but people living paycheck to paycheck are often forced to take the money and sell the land.

reactordev 1y ago

tell me you don't live in the US without telling me you don't live in the US. Everywhere is a disaster "zone", whether it's hurricanes, floods, tornados, dust storms, landslides - They'll find an excuse. This comment about how we shouldn't be living in disaster zones is completely out of touch with A) Where people live. and B) What a disaster zone is. Coastal cities (where 59% of people live) will say it's prone to hurricanes and tsunami's, flooding and storms. 50% increase. Inland cities, floods and landslides - 50% increase. Desert Towns, dust storms and tornados - 50% increase. Mountain Towns, floods and landslides - 50% increase. Nomadic villages of hippies and communes, tornados and floods - 50% increase. I know not of a single home owner who's premiums didn't go up, no matter where they live.

mint5 1y ago
That’s a huge misconception of how insurance works. And those disasters are geographically off. Hurricanes are not a coastal thing for the whole nation, west coast does not get them. Tornadoes are not a desert thing. All those sound like being pulled out of a hat without actual knowledge.
- reactordev 1y ago
  Tell that to the insurance companies that upped my premium for hurricane disasters even though I don’t live near the coast. I’m at least 500 miles inland. It no longer matters about geography and it matters whether there was ever one in the past. The last few hurricanes went deep into Midwest land so naturally, we are now in hurricane zones.
  - mint5 1y ago
    Sorry are we pretending that hurricane last year, or was it earlier this year, didn’t cause havoc hundreds of miles inland?
HankStallone 1y ago
My rural home insurance in the Midwest where the only risk is tornados has certainly gone up. When I saw the headline "disaster-prone cities," I thought maybe they were talking about crime or terrorism or something. For something like a hurricane, everyone in the danger area would see insurance rates go up, not just those in the cities. Odd way to word it.

throwmeaway222 1y ago

Well in the end it evens out in making more people homeless. Here are your choices: a 800k house that require you to work 18 taco bell/gas station/home depot shifts per day OR out in the boonies where if you want insurance you need to work 5 shifts per day. Both are impossible, so you just work 3 shifts and don't have insurance and use food stamps to eat. There stories are not well distributed but people that get priced out of cities end up buying a singlewide/double wide or just rent and then the house gets destroyed and they have no insurance and end up entirely on the streets. So yes it is definitely insensitive to say that. Perhaps you would understand if your cushy tech job was 25k per year instead of 225k.

infecto 1y ago
How does it make more people homeless? Insurance absolutely is a good proxy for real risk and there are plenty of places to be building homes. If you live in a flood zone you can still get the government to help cover some of the risk but also… flood zones are not new. I don’t really want to incentive people to continue to buy and build in these areas. Use the dollars to rebuild elsewhere.
- rimunroe 1y ago
  Because when people get priced out of their existing homes they often find that they can't afford houses elsewhere either.
- throwmeaway222 1y ago
  Insurance was not supposed to work this way first of all. You're a woman so we're going to charge you double for health insurance because you know, your boobs might get lumps. I do agree with people that "rebuild and rebuild and rebuild" in the same area without the codes catching up.. I think if someone is wealthy enough they can afford james hardie siding ALL the way up - for example in a fire zone. I think the insurance should be the same cost but the payout should be capped based on the decisions that are made.
  - quickthrowman 1y ago

rufus_foreman 1y ago

Tens of thousands? Over what time period? You may be way overestimating the number of people that die from natural disasters. Hurricanes killed around 2,000 people in the last quarter century, not tens of thousands, https://www.statista.com/statistics/203729/fatalities-caused-by-tropical-cyclones-in-the-us/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/203729/fatalities-caused....

lionkor 1y ago
Im counting all the lives lost by natural disasters, by the resulting depressions, financial issues, etc. Its not as simple as "N people died from literally being inside the storm, therefore the number of potentially saved lives is N". There is always a domino effect from a massive disaster, even if "just" a couple of people die directly at the hand of the disaster.
- rufus_foreman 1y ago
  The next largest category of natural disaster fatalities after tropical storms in the US is heat waves. The insurance companies aren't stopping writing polices in places that have heat waves, that's most of the country. Next after heat waves is severe storms. Same thing. Then winter storms. Same thing. Insurance companies are avoiding a couple particular types of natural disaster that have the capacity for massive property damage at a single point in time in a concentrated area, mainly tropical storms and wildfires. Those natural disasters just don't cause many deaths in the US. Tens of millions of people live in those areas. If you're going to talk about "the resulting depressions, financial issues, etc." you might want to give some consideration to tens of millions of people being forced to move, to risk going uninsured, or losing their homes.

OtherShrezzing 1y ago

It’s good for preventing new homes on those areas. Less good if you already own a home, and its value is now falling inline with the increasing premiums.

nonethewiser 1y ago

Yeah its definitely a good thing ON THE WHOLE. It's legitimately bad for the people it affects and the sort of vindication people feel for seeing them suffer is sick. One common reaction to this is state subsidies or regulation to make it more affordable (see this in California and Florida). While this is bad, spending money on the problem is good. People often conflate "dont subsidize" with "dont spend money." Instead they should spend it to offset the damage/inconvenience done to the people affected. Moving assistance or something. Not subsidize living in dangerous areas. It's kind of the Warren Buffet approach to people whose livelihoods are ruined by a changing economy. It's real harm and its not fair, but you dont stop progress. You also dont say "fuck em" - you support the people who get left behind.

epistasis 1y ago
People had decades of warning of this happening. Any assistance on moving out is a very bad idea. There are rising insurance costs, slowly, people have time to respond. People in Florida did not even advocate for mitigations that would have prevented the rising costs, when they were given decades of warning. Protecting home values above all else is very bad for society. Unless renters are given the same protection and massive handouts, it's a very unfair system
- nonethewiser 1y ago
  Moving the money away from insurance subsidies doesnt preserver home values.
  - epistasis 1y ago
    Exactly, subsidizing insurance for these high risk homes is a subsidy for home values, and would be a very unfair thing to do.
    - nonethewiser 1y ago
      Yes

quickthrowman 1y ago

Yes, it absolutely is. East Grand Forks, MN demolished all buildings in the floodplain after the 1997 floods. I understand Florida is bigger than East Grand Forks, but not every single person living in Florida will be priced out of home insurance at the same time, hopefully there’s enough wealthy people who can afford to self-insure to buy up all of the existing homes, but it’s unlikely and someone will have to lose money. > East Grand Forks, along with Grand Forks, was heavily damaged by a major flood in 1997. The entire city was under a mandatory evacuation and almost no homes were spared damage. After the flood, several neighborhoods had to be demolished because of damage. The city cleared development from the floodplain bordering the Red and Red Lake rivers. It developed a large park known as the Greater Grand Forks Greenway to provide a new recreation area for residents along the river. A similar park was developed in Grand Forks. The parklands, with trees and a variety of greenery, can absorb floodwaters and help protect the cities naturally. Moving residential and business development out of these areas also helps prevent future flood damage. In addition, a new system of dikes was constructed to protect the city from future flooding. The city has since rebuilt.

cratermoon 1y ago

What areas of the US did you have in mind, specifically? I must point out that much of the available space is marginally suitable, at best, for residential communities. We already have large cities in places that require unsustainable levels of resource consumption to continue existing. Just considering water: Los Angeles is a desert made green by importing water from hundreds of miles away (and destroying the communities that used to exist near the water sources). The Colorado River is oversubscribed, and most years never reaches the ocean. Groundwater sources like the Ogallala Aquifer are depleted. This doesn't begin to count the effects of sprawl and urbanization on wildlife populations.