Searches bringing back surface water flooding risk

Chronotrigger

Hi all,

Just in the process of purchasing my first property in England. My mortgage application has been approved and I've instructed the solicitors to begin the searches. I got some results today though in the homecheck environmental report reporting that a flood risk had been identified to do with surface water flooding within 25 metres. I had a look on a map of the area and there does appear to be some part of my road which is susceptible to surface water flooding but not the property itself that I am going to purchase. Going onto the government portal for surface water flooding the postcode and door number of the property are "high risk".

I am not sure what my next steps will or should be? I have been advised by a friend to speak to my potential neighbours and ask if they have had any floods in recent memory from heavy rain. I can't ask the seller as its a probate property. Another person spoke about getting indemnity insurance. I really don't want to have to pull out of the deal because of this but I don't know how serious the risks are.

Has anyone been in a similar situation or could advise here?

Thanks.

[Deleted User]

Ask the neighbours but also look into home insurance. How expensive will the property be to insure? Indemnity insurance won't stop the rain falling from the sky.

Ultimately it's down to your own risk. We live in a flood area, but it tends to happen to either side of us, not in our actual property. However, the floods are coming with increasing regularity.

Grumpelstiltskin

My garden and garage flooded last Sunday, why?
The road drains are blocked and I don't think the council have cleaned them out for at least 4 years.
So my property probably shows up as being at risk of flooding but why should I be penalised because the council are not doing their job.
Yes I have contacted them, it took 2  days to get an automated reply saying next time it rains heavy they will come and look.
That's OK as long as it floods Monday to Friday 9am to 5 pm. Out of these hours no  chance.

user1977

Chronotrigger said:

Another person spoke about getting indemnity insurance.

It's just normal home insurance you want to look at, there's no special type of insurance. Have you got quotes to see whether premiums are particularly high? Insurers will have better data (based on claims history) on whether there's actually a problem - often these desktop searches aren't particularly accurate.

TheJP

My house has high risk surface water flooding. The previous owners and neighbors haven't seen any part of the road flood in 30 years. We just had a load of rain for days and there was no sign of flooding. Insurance was no different to my last place.

RS2OOO

Before viewing any property I tend to look here to see how much above sea level the house is:

https://en-gb.topographic-map.com/maps/b9/England/

The Searches for the property I'm buying came back with "Flood Risk" highlighted in big red letters. This was because the area had been flooded in 1961, before the housing estate, sewage and drainage system had even been built. Nothing since then.

user1977

RS2OOO said:

Before viewing any property I tend to look here to see how much above sea level the house is:

https://en-gb.topographic-map.com/maps/b9/England/

The Searches for the property I'm buying came back with "Flood Risk" highlighted in big red letters. This was because the area had been flooded in 1961, before the housing estate, sewage and drainage system had even been built. Nothing since then.

I've seen several posts here before from buyers who have got flood searches for newbuild properties - and of course the desktop report just tells you about the flood risk for Farmer Giles' field, not what it will be after the developers have regraded the land, put in drains, laid tarmac etc. Much more useful info available among the planning papers if they had a look.

Chronotrigger

Deleted_User said:

How expensive will the property be to insure? 

I have been getting quotes of just over £100-£125 for annual building and contents insurance. I suppose this is quite good as they will have access to the data too. Will definitely be speaking to the neighbours when I go back to visit. Thanks

Chronotrigger

user1977 said:

Chronotrigger said:

Another person spoke about getting indemnity insurance.

It's just normal home insurance you want to look at, there's no special type of insurance. Have you got quotes to see whether premiums are particularly high? Insurers will have better data (based on claims history) on whether there's actually a problem - often these desktop searches aren't particularly accurate.

Yeah I have been getting quotes between £100 to £125 for building and contents insurance. I suppose this is quite good, as they will also have access to the data. My mortgage broker quoted over £300 for the insurance! Definitely won't be taking up that quote.

Thrugelmir

What would cause flooding in your area?  A high level of rainfall in a concentrated period can create flooding in the most unexpected of places. Question is what are statistical chances?  With climate warming localised extremes are becoming more frequent. Which makes historical data progressively redundant. 

Chronotrigger

Thrugelmir said:

What would cause flooding in your area?  A high level of rainfall in a concentrated period can create flooding in the most unexpected of places. Question is what are statistical chances?  With climate warming localised extremes are becoming more frequent. Which makes historical data progressively redundant. 

It looks to be rainfall. There aren't any coastal or river risks identified. The stats said 1 in 75 year return, I guess in the grand scheme of things it doesn't sound that bad. But the weather is rather erratic these days. The insurance quotes don't seem overly high so I guess they are overlooking the flood risk on the basis that they don't consider it significant. Or the data isn't being fed into the quote.