Real Estate Agent · Houston, TX · Member since 2026 · 10 posts · 2 votes
Out-of-state buyers check the FEMA zone, see "Zone X" and stop there. In Houston that's not enough.
1) Harvey flooded 154,170 homes in Harris County. A little less than half of them were outside both the 100-year and 500-year floodplains.
2) So pull the zone, then dig into history. msc.fema.gov has the official map. The Harris County Flood Control District's Flood Education Mapping Tool is easier to read, but it isn't the official map.
3) Texas sellers have to tell you more than the zone. Since 2019 the disclosure asks whether water ever got into the house from a natural flood, whether they ever filed a flood insurance claim, and whether they got FEMA or SBA help for flood damage. Read those answers before you price insurance.
4) A "no" on the disclosure only means the seller isn't aware of anything. For a rental, talk to the neighbors and look at the street.
If a house took water twice, I'd pass no matter what the zone says.
Houston investors: do you buy in Zone X without flood coverage, or carry it anyway?
Same story up here in Staten Island after Sandy. Plenty of the houses that took water on the east and south shore were in zones that looked fine on paper, and FEMA has been updating the maps ever since. I tell buyers to ask the seller for any old flood insurance declarations page and claim history, and to get an actual insurance quote before the contract, not after. I've seen a quote come back at a few thousand a year and change the whole deal. Look hard at the basement too. Fresh paint or new drywall low on the walls in an older house is worth asking about.