Half of FEMA-Funded Buyouts Take More Than 5 Years
11/19/2024 – The time to fully complete half of all FEMA-funded buyouts takes more than five years from disaster to closeout.
The screen capture below was taken from a presentation earlier this month to the Harris County Community Flood Resilience Task Force by Thao Costis, head of Harris County’s Housing and Community Development Department.
The slide compares the time it takes to pay off an insurance claim (lower left) to the time it takes to complete a buyout (upper right).
The median is the midpoint of a frequency distribution. That means there is an equal probability of any given transaction falling above it or below it.
The thirteen steps involved in the buyout process as federal state and local governments pass information up and down the ladder to each other and homeowners can take more than six years at times. Meanwhile, insurance payouts usually take six months.
80% of Buyouts Go to Those Making Less than Median Income for Region
Sadly, buyouts affect the most vulnerable among us the most often. Approximately half of all buyouts in Harris County go to homeowners that fall into the bottom quartile of the CDC’s Social Vulnerability Index.
The bottom two quartiles (those making less than the median income for the region) account for a whopping 80% of all buyouts.
Typically, government agencies buy out homes that flood repetitively. That’s because insurance payouts after multiple floods can easily exceed the cost of a home.
But FEMA doesn’t make it easy. This 68-page PDF details all the procedures involved in a FEMA buyout.
Low-income homeowners generally are the least able to afford insurance and often have higher flood risk.
The higher flood risk can stem from living in older homes, built when less stringent building regulations were in place and when flood risk (or our estimates of it) were lower.
The Case for Business Process Re-Engineering
Regardless of the reason, buyout candidates have few good choices if they don’t have insurance. They may not be able to afford to move or afford fix up their homes. And staying put may entail health risks.
Buyout candidates may also not have the time, skills and financial resources to understand their options, navigate the application process, and wait out bureaucracies.
Five years is a long time to wait with black mold growing in the walls.
It’s a classic case for business process re-engineering which buyouts desperately need.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 11/19/2024
2639 Days since Hurricane Harvey
