What Can Texas CRE Owners Expect as the Insurance Claims Process Gets Underway?
September 15, 2017 | Mary Diduch | National Real Estate Investor
It’s been nearly three weeks since Hurricane Harvey made landfall in Rockport, which lies along the southeastern coast of Texas. While emergency response efforts in the wake of the massive storm, which dumped a record-setting 51 inches of rain on the region, may be winding down, the insurance process for commercial and residential property owners is just getting under way.
The question yet to be definitively answered is: Just how much damage did the storm inflict on the region’s real estate, and how much will insurance cover the claims?
The picture is far from clear. Most of the damage Harvey unleashed was on single-family homes, according to a white paper by research firm Reis. Across the region, an estimated 200,000 homes were damaged, and about five in six do not have flood insurance, which could result in a $150 billion to $180 billion of estimated economic impact, according to a report by brokerage firm Marcus & Millichap. This will boost demand for apartments in the area, but as many as one out of six—or 100,000—multifamily units were flooded during the storm, according to a report from real estate services firm CBRE. The demand may cause rents to rise by as much as 10 percent, Reis forecasts.
