By Fred Malik, Managing Director of FORTIFIED at the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety
Fred Malik. Courtesy, Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety
As communities across Florida begin to rebuild in the wake of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, it is important to understand the role that resilient construction plays in limiting damage from severe weather. While it’s too early to measure the full impact of these two hurricanes accurately, studies of prior storms make it clear that homes built to the modern Florida Building Code (FBC) or voluntary beyond-code resilient construction standards, such as FORTIFIED, suffer less damage, allowing residents to recover more quickly.
Late last year, the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS) released a report showing that while Hurricane Ian caused extreme damage due to storm surge, it also clearly demonstrated the effectiveness of modern building codes, uniform implementation and consistent enforcement in preventing wind damage. Properties built after 2002, when the FBC was first adopted based on lessons learned from Hurricane Andrew, saw substantially less devastation from high winds.
For single-family homes assessed in this study, those built prior to the modern FBC (2002–present) had damage severities on average 1.9 times higher than those built under the modern FBC. Likewise, of the homes that likely experienced peak winds above 130 mph, those built prior to the modern FBC, on average, had 2.3 times higher mean damage severities than modern FBC homes. It is estimated that the modern FBC may have saved between $1 billion and $3 billion in structural damage to single-family homes alone. Amid the storm’s overall destruction, this was a positive result.
A similar study by North Carolina State University’s Institute for Advanced Analytics analyzed insurance claims from Hurricanes Dorian, Florence, Matthew and Isaias to evaluate the effectiveness of roofs installed to the FORTIFIED standard, which is similar to the current FBC, yet adds a few requirements and includes third-party verification. The study found that homes with FORTIFIED roofs had a 34.5% reduction in claims. Owners of FORTIFIED homes that did file a claim had an average of 22.7% less damage than other homeowners.
The results of these studies indicate that Florida homes built or re-roofed to the current FBC should perform well during storms. However, IBHS research shows there are still steps you can take to better protect your home from the next storm. More importantly, if you live in one of the millions of homes built before Florida adopted one of the strongest building codes in the country, adding a FORTIFIED Roof and impact protection for windows can significantly reduce your risk of damage from the future hurricanes.
Going a Step Beyond Code
Elevated homes with tin roofs in Florida to protect them from flooding and wind damage. Courtesy, GAO
Florida has never ranked lower than second in Rating the States, a flagship report evaluating building code adoption and enforcement in the 18 states along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts, issued by IBHS every three years. As the study indicates, the state’s stringent code, uniform adoption and solid enforcement help Florida homeowners better prepare for storms. Yet, homeowners can take another step to increase their home’s resilience.
Whether building new, renovating or re-roofing, homeowners can ask their contractors to follow the FORTIFIED standard, which was developed by IBHS after decades of research. FORTIFIED offers three levels of protection (Roof, Silver and Gold), allowing homeowners to determine their level of resilience. Some of the advantages of FORTIFIED include:
- Roof deck attachment: FORTIFIED requires all roof decking to be attached with ring shank nails at 4 inches on-center. This can double the amount of uplift force a roof can withstand.
- Locked edges: Drip edge flashing is installed over the underlayment to seal the vulnerable roof edge. This can help keep wind and pressure from getting into a home and causing a cascade of damage that could even jeopardize its structural integrity.
- Impact protection: At the Silver and Gold levels, impact protection for windows is required throughout all of Florida.
- Verification: An independent, third-party FORTIFIED evaluator must submit documentation showing construction materials and installation meet FORTIFIED requirements. IBHS then reviews the documentation, verifies it meets the standard and issues a FORTIFIED designation.
In addition to the science-backed standard and the verification process, FORTIFIED offers a directory of certified FORTIFIED providers. All FORTIFIED evaluators, roofing contractors and professionals (engineers, architects and general contractors) have met rigorous qualification requirements and completed training courses specifically designed to ensure a thorough understanding of FORTIFIED requirements. Contractors wishing to learn more about the certification process can visit the FORTIFIED website.
Because of its demonstrated effectiveness, a FORTIFIED designation from IBHS may make a home more attractive to insurance companies. Some carriers are more willing to cover a home with a FORTIFIED designation and may also offer specific FORTIFIED discounts. In a growing number of markets throughout the country, insurers also offer FORTIFIED endorsements, which pay for a roof to be upgraded to the FORTIFIED standard if it is being replaced due to a covered loss.
The small details required by the FORTIFIED standard can have a big impact on a home’s ability to withstand the next storm, and the program’s verification process provides peace of mind that those details have been done right. That’s why nearly 70,000 homeowners across 31 states have built or re-roofed to the FORTIFIED standard.
Fred Malik, widely recognized as “FORTIFIED Fred,” is a seasoned expert in resilient construction with over 30 years of dedicated industry experience. He currently serves as the Managing Director of the FORTIFIED building programs at the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS), where he has spent the last fifteen years spearheading initiatives to enhance the durability and resilience of buildings nationwide. You can reach him at [email protected].
LMA Newsletter of 10-28-24
