The 2020 hurricane season was so bad, the National Hurricane Center ran out of letters in the Alphabet. Hurricane Delta. It's the first timewe've ever gotten to the Greek alphabet. This year,Twenty-nine named storms. Hurricanes bring high windsand treacherous rainfall. Two residents we speak to say it stilllooks like a bomb went off in their town. But often the mostdamage is caused by flooding. It is the largest naturalcatastrophe that we have. It's happening all the time. I could take you outsidemy house right now. It's flooded, from the king tides. We've had three majorfloods in the house. Two of them have that major floods. Even just a little bit ofwater can devastate a home. FEMA estimates one inch of floodwater cancause up to twenty five thousand dollars in damage. It's mid intensity storms that park forlong durations that are being the facilitators of themost catastrophic losses. With sea level on the rise andincreased storm severity, all Americans are at risk. If you live somewhere whereit rains, you need flood insurance. However, flood insuranceis inherently complicated.
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Arguably, if the insurance costs werehigher, perhaps people wouldn't be living in such risky areas. Congress created the National Flood InsuranceProgram, or NFIP, in 1968 to help Americans facing flooding. At the time, there was no otherinsurance for flood that was available in the United States. The application andunderwriting process with the NFIP is very tedious and often theclaims paying process is slow. The NFIP is over 20 billiondollars in debt to the U.S. Treasury. This line on the map, theone percent annual chance lying on the map is had unintended consequences. Could the private sector provide abetter model for flood insurance? And did governmentally fundedflood insurance encourage dangerous practices? Fourteen point six millionproperties in the continental U.S. are at a substantial riskof flooding in 2020. In 2019 ninety three people died directlydue to flooding in the U.S. You can check out your riskat floodfactor.com, but experts say almost every home is at risk. We are seeing more severe floods,more severe hurricanes, more severe wildfires. Why? Most of the time,
it's because morepeople are living in harm's way. Folks think that they're not at risk andthey know that they don't need a flood insurance coverage when clearly 30percent of our losses in any particular year happen in thelow to moderate risk area. Take, for example, Florida, the nation'sthird most populous state and fifth fastest growing state in the USwith a growth percentage rate of one point five percent. Once the pandemic hit and remote workbecame the norm, even more people started flocking tothe Sunshine State. My name is Curt Dyer andI live on Miami Beach, Florida. I've lived here for 30 years. I love Miami Beach. I instantlyfell in love with it. It's a beautiful town, friendlypeople, great food, beautiful beaches. Florida is one of the top twostates facing the biggest substantial flood risk, and that risk will onlycontinue to grow over time. The first flood that we had in2009, we literally had the little bedroom and bath. I guessthere were completely. And we have four steps going upto the kitchen and the guest bedroom. The water was up to the top steps. Washer dryers, of course,
werefloated in the garage. We lost our water heater. We lost the central ACthat we just put in. We lost I had fish floatingin the pool from the bay. We had a partial we had two parts ofa boat dock washed up onto our front yard. There was itwas quite dramatic. I was devastated,absolutely devastated. It was just a shock. But when yousee water in your house, it's just it's devastating. You know, it'sa miserable feeling. You know, you get a check. Luckily,I'm fortunate enough to have insurance and I couldn't afford to pay for it. Most a lot of people don't. But I would have considered buying orI mean, I love Miami Beach. I wanted a house. We've seen a lotmore of not just storm flooding, but a random rainy day flooding too. Part of it is due to building. You know, the more we build, the lessground there is to soak up the rainwater. Unfortunately, most people don'tthink about risks when they're purchasing property.
They just look ata beautiful barrier island or a beautiful forest in California and therisk doesn't come into play for them. I had no clue this houseflooded and the seller nor the realtor disclosed it. But I have no regrets. You know, I just need to takecare of the situation, that's all. Cities like Miami and New Orleans willlikely experience the most sea level rise flooding, which may in turncause mass migration away from there.
