'Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act' Aims to Keep Prices Low After Sandy

From the Office of Assembly Republican Chris A. Brown:

Assembly Republican Chris A. Brown today voted to support a resolution urging Congress to protect local families from skyrocketing insurance increases.

A member of the Assembly Financial Institutions and Insurance Committee, Brown, R-Atlantic, voted in favor of the resolution to enact the federal “Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act,” which received unanimous backing from the committee.

“Congress needs to move quickly to save homeowners from skyrocketing flood insurance rates,” said Brown. “Many New Jersey residents whose lives were turned upside down by the devastation of Super Storm Sandy now face a different kind of threat: Exorbitant rate increases that make their homes too expensive to hold on too, but impossible to sell.”

The resolution, AR-208, urges Congress to pass, and the President to approve, the “Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act of 2013,” which would effectively delay the implementation of substantial rate increases for four years or longer. The federal Act calls for the Federal Emergency Management Agency to complete an affordability study and propose a framework that addresses affordability issues.

“Government should not price families out of the homes they’ve worked a lifetime to build,” said Brown. “Families are still in the process of paying to rebuild and raise their homes. To hit these families with sharp premium increases now would drive them from their homes.”