It’s wonderful when “journalists” who have no clue write a story about things they have no clue about
Climate change is coming for Florida’s real estate. Why don’t prices reflect it?
As a University of Miami doctoral student studying climate change, Mayra Cruz knew more than most about the risks of sea rise and wetter storms and hurricanes.
So when she and her husband bought their first home in 2021, they picked inland Miami Springs and bought federal flood insurance. They felt good, learning the only previous claim had come long ago, after Hurricane Andrew.
Then three storms in three years sloshed 18 inches of water into their backyard. And when the city posted a warning about flooding on Instagram, it used pictures of her impassable street.
Last summer, the couple decided to sell because of the repeated flooding. They wrote a “crystal clear” disclosure: the home escaped damage, but water got unnervingly close. Cruz worried if anyone would buy it. “My Realtor said it would still sell. I asked ‘Are you sure?’ I wouldn’t buy this house knowing what I know.”
Because non-cultists understand that storms happen, and that some years it could be bad and others see nothing. But, especially in the Miami area, it has always had a loaded gun pointed at it.
They got an offer almost immediately, selling for nearly $250,000 more than they paid for it.
This has made them very sad. Because cult.
It’s a paradox of South Florida’s super-heated real estate market: When homeowners like Cruz move out because of growing flood risks, somebody else always seems willing to move in — and often at a much higher price.
“Our housing value almost doubled in that time,” Cruz said. “That’s absolutely insane. Our house should not have been worth that much.”
Says you. But, buyers have a different opinion.
The value of her home and thousands of others in Florida have been buoyed at least in part by what some experts call a climate denial bubble. A wave of reports in the last five years has pegged the size of the bubble in the billions and suggested a correction is looming, potentially a major one. It has yet to come.
Anyhow, this is a long doomsday screed about how buyers are wrong because doom is coming, so, I’m going to stop now. Except to note that sea rise in the Miami area is above the Holocene average of 6-8 inches per century, but, still not as high as what is expected for a Holocene warm period.
You are more than welcome to use my journolism image and definitions.
The obvious questions then become: why did they list it for that much, or sell it to someone for that much? If Mrs Cruz sincerely believes that their “house should not have been worth that much,” doesn’t that mean she concomitantly believes that they robbed the people who bought it?
It’s Russian Roulette. Somebody will end up losing. If you read the article (haha) you’d see that a neighborhood in St Pete has stagnant prices.
“Superstorm” Sandy hit the Garden State, and all kinds of histrionics were raised, but the ‘solution’ wasn’t a loss of value in the land. Rather, the government passed regulations to require hurricane proofing homes, primarily by requiring them to be raised to a height above where Sandy flooded. Houses which were rebuilt were put on huge stilts, with the ground floors not being allowed as living space, though owners could use them as garages. Walls for the first floor had to be constructed in such a way as to be washed away without damaging the structure in the event of tidal flooding.
My Pennsylvania neighbor’s very old, very tall evergreen tree blew over in Sandy, despite us being more than 100 miles inland, but all it hit was the fence between our back yards, and a six foot tall Red Sunset Maple we had planted that spring. That maple is now about twenty feet tall, so it survived! The fence wasn’t damaged, and Pete had the thing cut up and out of my yard by the time I got back home from work the next evening.
Lol
There is a reason that the Miami Herald is the 7th largest newspaper in FL
Always remember to be most skeptical over data you want to believe
Especially if not from a trusted source
Zillow reported state wide FL home prices down 2.5% and home insurance RATES going up showing perceived risk is increasing
Global Warming Update: Antarctica’s Record Breaking Rebound: Ice Sheet Grows for the First Time in Decades
https://commoncts.blogspot.com/2025/05/global-warming-update-antarcticas.html