The FEMA 50% Rule is a federal regulation that affects how much you can spend to repair or improve a property in a regulated flood zone. If your property is in a flood zone, this rule might require you to take extra steps when repairing damage or making large improvements. This rule applies to any structure, residential or commercial that is not elevated above the current Base Flood Elevation plus 1 (one) foot.
FEMA explains:
The 50 percent threshold was chosen as a compromise between two extremes. One extreme would be to prohibit all investment in existing, non-conforming buildings that do not meet the minimum NFIP requirements.
The other extreme would be to allow buildings in flood hazard areas to be improved in any fashion without regard to the flood risk. In the first scenario, there is the potential for causing hardship to those who have built in flood hazard areas without knowing the risk because those buildings were constructed before areas were designated as floodprone. Those individuals would not be able to improve their buildings as damage or age contributes to deterioration. The second scenario provides no mechanism to ensure that increased investment in flood hazard areas would receive needed protection from the flood risk, contributing to the increased peril to life and property. Thus, the threshold of 50 percent is a compromise at a halfway point and conforms to similar building code and zoning standards that also use a 50 percent threshold.
If a local official determines that a damaged building or manufactured home in an SFHA has incurred substantial damage, then the structure must be brought into compliance with floodplain management (and building code) requirements for new construction based on flood zone.
Work necessary to restore a substantially damaged structure to its predamage condition constitutes substantial improvement, regardless of the actual repair work performed. Therefore, when the NFIP regulations refer to substantial improvement, repair of substantial damage is included.
Even if an owner proposes to perform less than all of the work necessary to repair the damage completely, the determination must be made on the cost to fully repair and restore the structure to its pre-damage condition.
Substantial damage, as defined in 44 CFR § 59.1, means “damage of any origin sustained by a structure whereby the cost of restoring the structure to its before-damaged condition would equal or exceed 50 percent of the market value of the structure before the damage occurred.” Most
damage occurs during a single and sudden event, such as a fire, wind storm, lightning strike, falling tree, tornado, earthquake, flood, or natural gas explosion. Damage may also be unrelated to a specific event, such as soil settlement, exposure to the elements, termite infestation, vandalism, deterioration over time, and other causes.
33707news.com 