Back in a Tent...?

I can't believe we're back here...

December 2024

Buckle up.

Remember 2013? I bought a house with cash (saved up by living with my parents) and gutted/restored the whole thing with physical labor and a whole lot of YouTube "How To" videos. The inside of the house was an absolute mess, with dust everywhere. To escape, I willingly camped in the detached garage. It was only for a few days over the month, usually over the weekend---a crash-pad when I didn't have the energy to drive back to my parents' house---but it made a big difference for my sanity. 

And I swore I'd never do it again.

Summer 2013

In 2016, I sold the house, and the proceeds (plus a 401k loan and every penny I could scrape together) became the down payment for my new house in Florida. It was more than I can afford with only my salary, but Airbnb made it possible to actually make money. I stopped hosting when my husband and I got married, and we've had a relatively quiet life since.

And then Hurricane Helene came and filled our house with water.

After two months struggling to assemble the pieces of the puzzle, we're moving forward with interior demolition. It's messy, moldy, and exhausting. But I have a cold shower, an air mattress in a tent, and with the help of a sledgehammer, I'm slamming my way forward. 

And I'm crashing in a tent while I'm there... At least it's clean.

This Is Why We Insure...

I consider myself "a happy medium" when it comes to insurance, focused on the actual risk vs actual replacement cost. I have insurance, but I also choose a large deductible and keep cash on hand to cover it. And I am very aware that flooding is a risk, especially living near Tampa Bay. There's a reason insurance companies are pulling out of Florida.

Year	Premium
2/1/2018	$1,514
2/1/2019	$1,598
2/1/2020	$1,705
2/1/2021	$1,968
2/1/2022	$1,968
2/1/2023	$2,388
2/1/2024	$2,172
Total	$13,313

With the extent of the damages, our adjuster immediately put in a request for $40k in emergency funds. More will be coming, but my gamble on insurance already was multiplied by 3. I'd much rather we hadn't flooded, but we did, and this'll help fix it. It will help us actually put things back together.

Update July 2025

Insurance paid out almost $200k. Fortunately or unfortunately, I "multiplied my investment" by over 14 times.

For as much as the flooding sucked, it's nice to have a "new" house that looks exactly like we want it to and it perfectly to our tastes.

Something I wasn't expecting: the cost of furniture. We didn't have contents insurance, since I thought I could easily replace the furniture if something happened and most of it was used/old anyway. It turned out, when 40,000 homes are damaged in one area, it's very hard to find anything used that's still in good shape and wasn't flooded. We did get some good deals, but it was a lot harder than I anticipated, and a good chunk was new.

Renovation Numbers

This doesn't include my own labor and all the time I spent acting as general contractor, which is usually a 20% increase. It's no wonder I'm exhausted.

Line	$	Notes
A/C	$831.74	Tune-up and clean-out. Necessary after the sheer volume of drywall dust.
Appliances	$6,126.40	Washer, dryer, fridge, stove, microwave, and dishwasher.
Bathroom	$23,540.42	Materials (toilets, sinks, tub, tiles, etc), tiles and installation, stucco on the walls in the main.
Carpentry	$12,318.25	All the interior doors, frames, baseboard, trim, shelves in closets
Demo	$5,830.00	Tearing everything out and gutting the house to the studs. I used a week of vacation to take care of a large chunk myself.
Doors/ Windows	$59,087.00	Top-of-the-line doors and windows. Miami-Dade safety standards, insulated and equipped with impact glass. These should be a huge help to mitigate the risk of future damage.
Drywall	$11,811.26	Includes install.
Electric	$11,318.21	New light fixtures throughout the house, raising the outlets to 26" above the floor, and a couple other items.
Exterior	$24,519.84	Flood insurance doesn't cover. Pool demolition, soffit repair, fence repair, and a beautiful mural on the back wall. New French drain to help mitigate risk of future rain flooding.
Finish	$7,507.87	Insulation, marble window sills, marble tile on the fireplace, and a couple other things.
Floor	$15,908.00	All the tile in the house had to be ripped out. We replaced the tile in the master bedroom, but the rest of the house had terrazzo. We paid to have it restored.
Garage Door	$2,867.00
Kitchen	$8,409.03	Lower cabinets, granite for the island, new fixtures.
Misc	$105.59
Painting	$8,165.86	I did a good chunk of the painting, but we also hired for part, especially trim and touch-ups that required more attention.
Plumbing	$2,633.39	Water heater plus installation.
Remediation	$8,633.15	Three rounds of professional mold treatment were required. I also did some spot cleaning.
Tools	$1,485.70	Random tools I had to buy to make this happen. Almost all my tools were lost in the flood.
Grand Total	$211,098.71

The moral of the story: Don't flood if you can help it. That nonsense is expensive.