Floridians Tropical Storm

As Hurricane Gustav churns towards the Gulf of Mexico, forecast to be a Category 3 major hurricane, we’ve been puzzled by the number of Florida residents interviewed on CNN who have water-damaged homes from Hurricane Tropical Storm Fay and no insurance to cover repairs. To a person, the complaint seems to be that when they bought their home, there wasn’t any money “left over” to buy insurance. No, no, emphatically no! Insurance is part of the cost of home ownership, as Floridians are finding out. Why would anyone think otherwise? Peeps, if you can’t afford to insure a home, you can’t afford the home. It’s a package deal!

Fay, now a tropical depression, broke records by making landfall four times in Florida over the course of a week, leaving widespread flooding in her wake. President Bush declared Brevard, Monroe, Okeechobee and St. Lucie counties disaster areas, freeing up funding for emergency repairs.