Living in Southern California (a desert) we often forget floods do happen.  And because they are often years in between, they catch us off guard.

Is your home or business in a flood zone that floods every five, ten, twenty, fifty, or one-hundred years?  Are you near a "dried river bed"?

Is your bank making you get a flood policy to secure your mortgage loan?

Read this article and if needed, contact the Farmers Insurance Agent below.

Reprint from FoxBusiness.com


Written by Jay MacDonald
Published January 31, 2012
Bankrate.com


When torrential rains and massive snowmelt swelled North Dakota's Souris River to 100-year flood levels in June, displacing more than 10,000 residents of Minot, Farmers Insurance agent James Bierschbach's phone began to ring.




"Those houses had been in the high-risk flood zone A back during our last big flood in 1969," he says. "But in the early '80s, they were re-rated to zone X, the 100-year flood level, after some dikes were put in."

As a result, homeowners in the flooded area who had long ago dropped flood coverage or weren't ever required to purchase it were stuck with steep financial losses because most homeowners insurance policies don't cover flood damage.

Not all of Bierschbach's callers were reconsidering flood insurance, however. Some were now buying flood coverage because they had to do so.

"When people want to borrow the money to rebuild, the banks and the Small Business Administration are now requiring flood insurance on any of the houses down in that area to protect them against another flood," he says.