Can anyone tell me what this letter from DHS FEMA means?

[magellan]

We've had flood insurance through a private insurer since we moved to FL. This is the first time we've gotten a letter from FEMA about flood insurance and I don't know what to make of it. We've never made a flood claim in the past.

Is this form they want us to sign a way of protecting them from future claims by people like us with private flood insurance? Am I right to think something's off here and we should be hesitant? TIA.

Important Information About Your Flood Insurance Coverage

Thank you for choosing to protect yourself with flood insurance. This package contains important information about your flood insurance coverage. The federal law governing the National Flood Insurance Program requires FEMA to submit this Acknowledgment Form to you for your signature. Please promptly sign, date, and return the Acknowledgment Form in the envelope provided.

Your insurance company has already provided you with a copy of your flood insurance policy, the Summary of Coverage, and declarations page. The Declarations Page includes your policy limits, as well as your deductible limits.

In this package, you will find:

• The National Flood Insurance Claims Handbook, with details on filing a claim;
  
• The Acknowledgment of Receipt Form, to sign and return to FEMA; and
  
• Your property's flood loss history

An Important Note on Coverage
While it is up to you to choose the coverage that's right for you, please be aware that:

• You understand that you have the option to purchase both building and contents coverage as part of your policy or;
  
• You may purchase building or contents coverage separately.
  
• Your lender (if applicable) may have a requirement for how much coverage you choose; and
  
• New coverage, or increases in current coverage, will likely require a 30-day waiting period to become effective

Thank you for your cooperation and for choosing to protect yourself with flood insurance. If you have any questions about the Acknowledgment Form or Property Flood Loss History, call 1-866-395-7496. For any other questions, contact your agent.

Encl's

Oh yeah, the Acknowledgment Form basically says that by signing, dating and returning it "you acknowledge that":

• You have received your Declarations Page, and a Summary of Coverage from your insurance company
  
• We have provided you with your property's loss history and the NFIP Flood Insurance Claims Handbook
  
• You understand that you have the option to purchase both building and contents coverage as part of your policy or;
  
• You may purchase building or contents coverage separately.

[uppityperson]

1. kick for someone who might know more than distrustful uppitypeople do

[Gormy Cuss]

2. On the bottom of the form there should be a form number

perhaps with an OMB clearance number too. Find the number and google it with "flood insurance" and see what comes up.*

On the surface this sounds like a simple acknowledgment that FEMA has fulfilled its requirements, but I am not familiar with the form nor its purpose.


*in rare instances this is on the top of the form but generally it's at the bottom.

[magellan]

3. Nothing on the bottom

There are two numbers in the upper left of the form, but googling them turns up nothing.

After re-reading the Property Loss History (we're 'no losses on file'), I'm thinking this might be about reducing repetitive loss claims because at the bottom it says:

"The Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2004 provided for the establishment of a pilot grant program for the mitigation of severe repetitive loss properties. The act defines a severe repetitive loss property as a property covered by a flood insurance policy that has incurred floor-related damage 1) for which 4 or more separate claims payments have been made, with the amount of each claim exceeding $5000 or 2) for which 2 separate claims payments have been made, with the cumulative amount of such claims exceeding the value of the property. Once that pilot grant program is established, you will be notified if the recorded claims history of your property shows it to be a severe repetitive loss property."

The whole thing is so vague and nanny state-ish...It comes off as if they're trying to help with their handbook, but hello, we know how to make a claim if we need to. Meanwhile I doubt if they're bothering to directly contact and assist the people who live in flood plains and don't have/can't afford flood insurance.

P.S. About the form's purpose, I believe it has to do with the above mentioned 2004 Act, which is here: http://www.fema.gov/txt/nfip/fira2004.txt

[rzemanfl]

4. I got one of these too. It lists the three times flood insurance has

paid on our home (all prior to our buying it). The the floods were in 1985, 1993 and 1996 (we bought in 1997). Had we known about the 1996 flooding I highly doubt we'd have bought this place. We are near the intracoastal in the Tampa Bay area. Even with three flood claims we do not meet the mitigation requirements. There was a time a few years back where we could have had the government pay 75% of the cost of elevating our house (essentially rebuilding it as a two story with the first story of very limited use) but we'd have had to store our stuff and move out while the work was done. We are too old to be going up and down stairs constantly. Your post reminded me I have yet to return the form, which I got a while back and posted about at DU when I received it.

It looks to me like the insurance companies still were making a profit off of this house over the long term despite the losses.

[magellan]

7. Exactly what my husband said

The insurance companies are still making a nice profit.

Like you, my parents live in a flood plain (they're in Stuart), and at their age and in their financial position any mitigation remedy would be terribly hard on them. As usual the corporations are protected while the people giving them the money can be left vulnerable.

[momster]

16. Will they pay for an elevator?

That would solve the ambulatory problem.

[rzemanfl]

17. We no longer qualify for that program, so the question is moot.

We didn't want to move out of our home for six months to a year either. If I wanted to live on stilts I would have joined a circus.

[rzemanfl]

5. Citizen's Insurance in Florida requires us to purchase our

contents insurance from them and requires coverage that is far in excess of the replacement cost of what we have in the house. We also have to insure "outbuildings" we don't have in order to get coverage from "the insurer of last resort." When I questioned that the response was basically "tough shit."

The artifically high property values generated by the Bush Administration's Ponzi scheme to keep the economy going are also helping to screw us by driving up the dollar amount we have to insure.

[magellan]

8. Wow. Our flood insurance provider isn't like that at all

I assume it's because we don't live in a flood plain and the property has no flood loss history. But requiring that you're over-insured and insured for things you don't have is outrageous! I guess other insurers give you the same bs?

Property insurance is such a dilemma. There has to be a better way but I'm darned if I know what it is.

[rzemanfl]

10. No other insurer will cover us. Citizen's is run by the state as the

"insurer of last resort."

[magellan]

11. So basically they can get away with extortion?

That really sucks. I'm sorry for you. No one should be treated that way.

[rzemanfl]

15. Well, we are certainly not alone. Thanks for the sympathy

though.

[DoYouEverWonder]

6. I means that your home is now considered to be

in an area that is prone to flooding.

FEMA (or someone) has just finished revising all the floodplain maps for the State of FL. If your home is in a floodplain area, then you are required to have flood insurance. This does not mean that your home has ever been flooded or ever will be, just that you are now one of the lucky ones to live in a designated floodplain.

The funny thing with these new maps is that some people like me, have been reclassified out of the floodplain, which means I no longer have to carry flood insurance, where in the past it was required. So all those years, I had the great fortune to pay for flood insurance that I never used and apparently didn't need.

If you want to dispute your new designation, there is a process you can go through but it is very expensive where you do your own geological survey, but it's probably not worth the expense for something that may not change anything.

[magellan]

9. Where are these new maps?

Because I'm looking at the map of our area on the FEMA site, and it shows us as still being in Zone X, no flooding. I looked at this before we moved into our house too. Maybe they overheard me complaining about how part of our backyard floods (a few inches tops) with runoff after significant long rains! lol

[DoYouEverWonder]

12. You probably need to call your County's Building & Zoning Dept

The maps online may not be the new ones.

Keep in mind that in order to get classified into a floodplain has as much to do with the property around you as your own. Even though you might not 'flood' much, if other people around you do, then you're part of the club.

One nice little out that they have is that even if you do flood, unless everyone else around you floods too, then the flood insurance doesn't cover you anyway.

[magellan]

13. Huh??

Oh I hope you're wrong about how flood insurance works! Because according to what I've read (and what we have our policy for), if a tree comes through our roof and our belongings are ruined by the rain that subsequently falls inside, our flood insurance covers us. Property insurance generally won't pay in that scenario.

[DoYouEverWonder]

14. The National Flood insurance plans

definitely won't cover that sort of thing.

I thought they did too and found out otherwise.

[Divernan]

19. Typically, homeowner's ins. covers rain that "comes down"; flood

insurance covers damage from ground waters/overflowing lakes, rivers, etc. If a tree falls down on your house and rain comes in and damages the property, the homeowner's policy should cover it, but flood insurance wouldn't. However, if a river floods its banks, and a tree floating down that river hits your house - that's a flood insurance claim.

[Divernan]

18. The operative language is:

"The federal law governing the National Flood Insurance Program requires FEMA to submit this Acknowledgment Form to you for your signature."

This means that the law requires FEMA to take action, but places no requirement on YOU. You don't have to sign/return anything - at least from the portions of the FEMA letter you quote in your OP.

My main concern would be if the property's flood loss history which FEMA sent to you is accurate or not. By signing and returning your acknowledgement, you are accepting as true that history. Did FEMA get the history from its own files or from those of a private insurer? It could be important down the road if flood insurance is denied or cancelled based on the property's flood loss history.
Talk to your neighbors and check out whether the property was flooded on each of those dates mentioned in the history. If not, write a letter to FEMA disputing the history (and of course keep a copy for yourself, with receipt/proof of mailing. You can do this without signing/returning FEMA's acknowledgment form.