Grants offered to stormproof homes

State program reopens; up to $10,000 available for owners By Ron Hurtibise South Florida Sun Sentinel

It started out as a simple first-come, first-serve program offering $10,000 matching grants to owners of older Florida homes who take specific actions to harden their homes against hurricanes.

The My Safe Florida Home program proved wildly popular, quickly obligating its initial funding and leaving latecomers to await legislative approval for new money each year.

Since 2022, the program has reimbursed $369 million to 39,271 homeowners, program spokesman Devin Galetta said Monday.

Now, flush with $280 million approved by the governor and Legislature in June, a more restrictive version of the program will reopen for applications on Monday, Aug. 4.

But the $280 million is considerably less than the $590 million requested by Gov. Ron DeSantis during the spring Legislative session. And that $590 million was intended to fund grants for 10,000 new applicants and 45,000 existing applicants who underwent required windstorm mitigation inspections but were left in limbo last year after existing funds were obligated.

Grant applications for those 45,000 who have completed their initial windstorm mitigation inspection and verified their age and income eligibility will be processed under rules that prioritize low- and moderate-income homeowners, Galetta said.

Homeowners who have not yet begun the process are urged to begin as soon as possible by going to mysafeflhome.com, creating an account and requesting a free inspection to identify improvements that might be eligible for grants and discounts on their property insurance bills.

Eligible improvements include:

Secondary water resistance barriers for roofs. This usually results in approvals for full roof replacements, since inspectors cannot tell whether a roof has a secondary water resistance barrier by sight alone.

Roof-to-wall connection strengthening and roof-to-deck strengthening. This typically requires increasing the number and type of reinforcements to comply with current building codes.

Opening protections. Includes overhead garage doors with steel reinforcements, impact windows or aluminum shutters, and new entry doors to the front or sides of the house.

Windstorm mitigation inspections must be completed before participants will be allowed to request grant funding.

While the first $215 million approved in 2022 and 2023 went to homeowners with no regard to income, lawmakers last year added another $200 million but decided to prioritize low- and moderate-income homeowners over age 60.

Higher-income homeowners were to be considered after the application portal was open for eight weeks.

The problem was that all of the new funding was earmarked after just 17 days and higher-income homeowners never had an opportunity to apply.

This year, homeowners who do not fit into a “low-income” or “moderate-income” classification aren’t being allowed to apply at all at first. They might be allowed to apply for free inspections if funds remain available after the prioritization period ends Sept. 29, according to an update page on the program’s website.

“Should there be any unused home inspection funds remaining after all low- and moderate-income households have been served, the program may open home inspection applications for higher income households on a limited basis,” the site says.

In addition, while moderate- and higher-income homeowners must put up $1 for every $2 requested up to $10,000, homeowners in the low-income category will not be required to contribute any match, Galetta said.

Definitions for low- and moderate-income levels are set by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development. They vary by county and household size. Generally, a household is low-income if its members earn 80% or less than the median income for the county where they live.

The household is considered moderate income if its members earn between 80% and 120% of their county’s median income.

Homeowners can consult a chart on HUD’s website to determine whether their income level satisfies the requirements of the My Safe Florida Home program. It’s available at https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/il.html.

Other program requirements include:

The home must be a single-family, detached residential property or townhouse. It must be site-built and owner-occupied.

The insured value of the home must be $700,000 or less. Low-income homeowners are exempt from this requirement.

It must have ben granted a homestead exemption under Florida law.

Ron Hurtibise covers business and consumer issues for the South Florida Sun Sentinel. He can be reached by phone at 954-356-4071 or by email at rhurtibise@sunsentinel.com.