Fight hurricanes and high property insurance rates

One powerful way to fight the battle against high property-insurance rates is to reinforce homes to prepare them for a possible hurricane. The first step? Educate yourself about ways to reinforce and strengthen properties, and then encourage local homeowners to make those upgrades, says John Sebree, vice president of public policy at the Florida Association of Realtors®.

Realtors can be a valuable resource to buyers and sellers once they understand ways to make homes safer, more attractive to buy or sell, and a better candidate to be insured, Sebree adds.

For a hands-on education about construction techniques and other hurricane safety features, visit one of the four “Hurricane Houses” located across Florida. Visitors can see three types of window shutters, impact-resistant doors, a steel “safe room” and a garage door that withstands winds of more than 150 mph. Visitors can also look behind the scenes, or at least behind the walls, to see alternative construction methods, such as insulated concrete forms with reinforcement bars and concrete sandwiched between plastic foam sheets.
 
During this year’s legislative session, Realtors asked their representatives to approve $1.5 million to build two more Hurricane Houses on Florida’s west coast – between Fort Myers and Tampa, and somewhere north of Tampa.

Visit Florida’s four Hurricane Houses:

Broward County
3205 College Avenue
Davie, FL
954.577.6300

St. Lucie County
8400 Picos Road
Fort Pierce, FL
772.462.1660

St. Johns County
3125 Agriculture Center Drive
St. Augustine, FL
904.209.0432

Escambia County
3740 Stefani Road
Cantonment, FL
(Near Pensacola)
850.475.5230

More hurricane news and updates:
 
Directory for news and research from UF
http://news.ufl.edu/index.php?s=hurricane+houses+

What’s your home’s hurricane rating?
http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?
AID=/20070404/INSURANCEPROJECT/70404045/1086

Bob Vila’s Hurricane House in Punta Gorda
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/storm/content/home_garden/
epaper/2005/09/18/a1k_hurricane_house_0918.html