Washington historic floods uncover critical gap in renter protection

Historic floods that tore through Western Washington last month have exposed a gap in state law that left many of the region’s most vulnerable people unprepared for disaster and financially devastated.

Unlike other states, Washington law does not require landlords to tell renters that a unit is prone to flooding. As a result, many renters in Washington’s river-adjacent communities, which are often rural and low-income, were unaware they were living in a zone FEMA had designated high risk for flooding when an atmospheric river hit last month.

“I lost everything,” said Rose Harries, a 32-year-old renter who lost close to $10,000 worth of items when 5 feet of water swallowed her Renton apartment last month. “Thirty-four apartments flooded. It was pretty devastating to a lot of these people,” she said.

Her apartment complex’s management, which declined to comment, gave residents a discount at a local motel and is helping her move into another unit, she said. But one question keeps nagging Harries: Why didn’t she know the apartments were on a floodplain?

“It was surprising to me that it wasn’t a communicated thing,” she said. “I just had no (idea) that this would happen.”

Flood maps show that even within a single apartment complex like Harries’, some units are far more vulnerable than others. Many renters in those units didn’t know they may have benefited from purchasing a specific insurance policy for flooding, and now are paying thousands of dollars out of pocket.

As the climate warms, experts say floods will continue growing more powerful and frequent across Washington’s river-threaded landscapes. In preparation, lawmakers have focused on mitigating floods, but have so far stopped short of strengthening the rights of floodplain residents.

Renters like Harries said knowing their rental had a high chance of flooding before they moved in would have been life-changing, allowing them to choose another unit or purchase additional insurance.

“I’m sure if they had said, ‘Well, look, you’re actually at risk,’ it would have been a different story,” Harries said. “No one was prepared for something like this.”

‘I never would have moved there’

In Washington, home sellers must disclose to buyers whether a property is on a floodplain – that is, an area vulnerable to floods. Sellers must also disclose whether the property has experienced any flooding, standing water or drainage problems in the past.

Other states, including Oregon and California, extend that disclosure protection to renters. But Washington does not, leaving renters among the hardest hit – and least protected.

That’s what happened to the Rosas family, whose rented mobile home in Monroe flooded last month after just a few months of living there. With no flood insurance, the already financially fraught family lost nearly all their possessions.

“If I knew, I never would have moved there,” said José Rosas, 39.

Washington’s lack of a disclosure law left renters financially and physically in danger last month, said Michele Thomas, director of Policy and Advocacy at the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance.

“The very least we should be doing is requiring disclosure to people that they’re moving into a flood zone so they can weigh all the pros and cons of renting that particular unit,” she said.

The knowledge that they live on a floodplain allows renters to be more prepared when flooding does come, she said. They also might consider purchasing flood insurance, since standard renters insurance does not cover damage from naturally occurring floods.

Sean Flynn, president of the Rental Housing Association of Washington, worries that forcing landlords to disclose that their rental is in a flood zone could cause unnecessary fear and ostracism of certain properties.

“We don’t want units sitting vacant because people are afraid of a flood that comes once every 100 years,” he said. “We’re in a housing crisis, so we want every unit on the board.”

Anybody can look up their address on floodplain maps, he said, making a disclosure requirement an unnecessary step for landlords.

“I don’t think the disclosure would have prevented flooding,” he said.

The debate is now attracting regulatory attention.

The Office of the Insurance Commissioner, a state agency that regulates the insurance industry to protect consumers, is monitoring how this coverage gap affects consumers, said spokesperson Aaron VanTuyl.

The office is evaluating whether additional consumer education or guidance would be helpful, including disclosure and transparency requirements for the state legislature to consider, he said.

No knowledge, no coverage

Unaware that their homes were at risk of flooding, many renters never purchased flood insurance before the December flooding event.

Over the last several weeks, GoFundMe, an online fundraising website, has been inundated with pleas for help from Washington renters affected by floods. They describe families taken by surprise by the floods, escaping with little more than the clothes on their backs, and renters’ insurance refusing to cover damaged items.

A landlord’s flood insurance will protect the building, but not renters’ personal belongings. Standard renters’ insurance only covers damage from internal flooding, like burst pipes or leaking appliances, not damage from natural flooding.

Selena Yumul, 24, didn’t know she was living in a floodplain and, therefore, didn’t know she’d need flood insurance. Her family, which includes her husband and three young boys, fled their Puyallup apartment last month before water poured in.

“It just didn’t cross my mind that it could flood one day,” she said.

Her apartment’s property management company did not respond to requests for comment.

Yumul’s family returned to find thousands of dollars’ worth of furniture and belongings submerged in water. Their renters’ insurance policy covered nothing.

States like California require landlords of rental housing in flood-prone areas to recommend that tenants purchase both renters’ insurance and flood insurance.

If Yumul had known how vulnerable the area was to flooding and that they’d need a flood insurance policy, she would have purchased one, she said.

“I might not have even moved there,” she said.

FEMA-run flood insurance coverage for the contents of a rental is typically a few hundred dollars a year, according to the National Flood Insurance Program’s quoting tool. Some low-income renters might choose to look elsewhere rather than pay for flood insurance, Thomas said.

“Tenants should know (flood-risk) so they can weigh the pros and cons and make an informed decision,” Thomas said.

Risky rentals

Renters who were aware they were living on a floodplain still say a formal flood-risk disclosure requirement would have helped.

Heather Moe, 52, said her landlord informally told her that her rental in Snoqualmie was on a floodplain, but that any floodwaters were unlikely to reach the unit. Desperate for affordable housing after being priced out of her Seattle apartment, she moved in.

What she didn’t know was that the unit was still likely to flood. FEMA had designated the area as high risk for flooding. The unit, built around five years ago, was also unpermitted. The city of Snoqualmie bans building living spaces below a home’s lowest floor in flood-prone areas.

Moe’s landlord did not respond to requests for comment about his unit’s lack of permitting.

Moe wishes she had known the exact risks of moving into that unit, which flooded last month. She lost nearly everything she owned, including precious heirlooms.

“I could have died in (the unit) like a concrete coffin,” she said. “I had to drive away knowing I was probably going to come back to nothing.”

Moe, the former co-owner of a Georgetown bakery called Two Tartes, said the flooding pushed her deeper into the poverty she had been trying to crawl out of since her divorce in 2014.

She wishes the state ensured renters had a thorough understanding of all the risks of moving into a floodplain and helped them understand how to prepare, such as explaining why renters in high-risk areas might consider purchasing flood insurance.

But for now, people like Moe are relying on online fundraisers to rebuild their lives.

“A GoFundMe should not be a security blanket for every disaster in the world,” she said.