Many Florida residents say they’ll have to sell their homes if insurance costs keep rising – and climate change virtually guarantees more robust increases in the future.
The only Florida property I’d be willing to own is a concrete pad with utilities piped in. And I’d put a fully-fueled RV on it so that I could quickly get out of town ahead of the storm.
intercst
Also have it insured in a state that does not have hurricanes or tornado’s so you don’t get caught up in that.
Andy
Florida is getting sadder and deeper in doodoo and fantasyland by the year, and that started long before oncoming GCC was both a scientific and political certainty, back when they merely pretended that hurricanes were not going to destroy cheater built housing.
david fb
Or just live in a state that doesn’t have hurricanes or tornados in the first place. Except for its astonishing redness, I like Tennessee. Taxes are low, we’re too far inland to get hurricanes (get a little fringe wetness from time to time) or tornados (Memphis does, but not this end). No earthquakes, power from TVA is pretty cheap, floods are unusual.
Winter is barely a mild storm or two; an inch of snow would be a 3-day shutdown. Summers are insufferable, but I guess we have to get used to that everywhere, no?
The only real issue is trying to understand the locals, and not getting caught in the narrow lanes at the WalMart checkout. At least I think they’re narrow. They’re fine for me, for some others around here maybe not.
While insurance is only a small part of why we are lowering our real estate footprint, as I commented in another thread our insurance rates in VA have also spiked 50% higher this year with zero provocation.
We had 3 properties until last year when we sold our rental. We will be selling our current primary residence in early 2024, waiting to be able to take advantage of the capital gains exclusion that can only be done every 2 years. We were able to exclude gains on the sale of our rental because we sold it before renting more than 3 years and had lived in it for two prior to renting. We will be consolidating our things at our vacation home, probably living there for Spring and Fall when things are perfect there. At other times we are renting properties via VRBO or Furnished finder. The medium term furnished rental of 30 days plus is a growing approach. It will allow us the opportunity to explore areas that have potential for us to relocate to, or simply explore an area more in depth, which is my kind of travel. If we find the “perfect” place we will probably buy another primary residence, or more likely continue traveling like this until there is a need for assisted living.
Rents for the furnished properties include utilities and no maintenance on our part, freeing us up to play. We just came back from 5 weeks in Asheville and will be heading out to our next spot for 7 weeks on Sunday. Really excited to explore.
IP