Florida is drowning. Condos are still being built. Can't humans see the writing on the wall?

By Megan Mayhew Bergman

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Humans tend to respond to immediate threats and financial consequences – and coastal real estate, especially in Florida, may be on the cusp of delivering that harsh wake-up call. The peninsula has outsized exposure: nearly 2 million people live in coastal cities. In the list of the 20 urban areas in America that will suffer the most from rising seas, Florida has five: St Petersburg, Tampa, Miami, Miami Beach and Panama City. In 2016, Zillow predicted that one out of eight homes in Florida would be underwater by 2100, a loss of $413bn in property.

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In Florida, you will see a bewildering mix of optimism, opportunism and denial in the real estate market: luxury condominiums going up in flood-prone South Beach, and property values rising in the vulnerable Keys, post-Hurricane Irma. And though the House of Representatives passed a bill to require real estate agents to disclose flood risks, the Senate has not reviewed it, and a culture of “systemic, fraudulent nondisclosure” persists in high flood risk areas.

You will see the massive benefits of privilege, and the way it allows a homeowner, particularly a second home owner, to afford the risk. You will see emerging issues like Miami’s climate gentrification, where previously low-income neighborhoods like Little Haiti are rising in value and under pressure from developers because of their higher ground, resulting in the displacement of people and place-based culture. Haitian playwright and bookstore owner Jan Mapou recently told a reporter: “Gentrification is coming forcefully: developers buying the major corners, raising the rents, forcing renters onto month-to-month leases … We’re not against development or modernization … but respect the people living there, their culture, their history.”

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