Harvey has dumped more than 30 inches of rain in some places, and rivers are swelling and expected to crest at record levels. The Cypress River, which runs through downtown Houston, is expected to rise four feet higher than the record 94.3 feet set in 1949, according to Air Worldwide, a risk modeling firm.
Hunter said that adjusters typically take about 30 days to visit your home and send a check, but the crucial distinction between wind damage and flood damage can be tricky and take longer. Fights in court with insurers over wind-versus-storm damage stretched out for years after Superstorm Sandy in 2012.
Sandy resulted in $8.4 billion in payouts for flood damage from the federal insurance program, according to the Insurance Information Institute. After Katrina in 2005, the program paid $16 billion for flood damage.
The flood program is run by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which owes the Treasury about $23 billion in funds borrowed to cover the cost of past disasters, according to a recent report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office.
For homeowners facing big bills, some banks may be willing to help. During a disaster like Harvey, they typically will institute a type of forbearance program on any borrowers who are in the disaster’s impacted counties.
Wells Fargo, the nation’s largest mortgage lender, said Monday that it was suspending all negative reporting to credit bureaus, collection calls and foreclosure procedures against customers in the impacted communities at least through the end of September.
Customers who contact Wells Fargo can get disaster relief for 60 to 90 days, and can postpone payments. Further relief will be offered case-by-case, the bank said.
Loretta Worters, a spokesperson for the Insurance Information Institute, said floods do have a least one positive effect: They convince people who had shrugged off the risk to their homes to buy policies.
But the memory quickly fades, she added, noting that despite the blows of Katrina and Sandy and other storms only 12% of homeowners nationwide had flood insurance last year.
“People buy coverage immediately after a storm, then it starts to drop,” Worters said. “Three or four years later, we’re back to where we started.”
Article Appeared @https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2017/08/29/hurricane-harvey-houston-flood-insurance-damages-claims/611910001/