I don’t need a geologist to tell me when a tsunami is going to hit our shores...everyone knows about the MEGATSUNAMI that’s got our name on it...
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/8073346/mega-tsunami-could-devastate-britain-canary-islands-volcano/
Get a home insurance quotation for the property. That will tell you about risk. When we moved to be close to the Thames (non-tidal) from rural Oxfordshire, our then home insurance company would not even quote! As it is, our current insurance is basically a ransom.
Vertical distance is of far greater importance than horizontal! A vertical distance of a couple of metres above the very highest recorded tidal surge is better than the same distance horizontally.
I’ve personally seen how things can change with rising water levels, although due mainly to human interference, one being the flooding of the Somerset Levels a few years ago, because a government Environment Agency bod decided that the local rivers shouldn’t be dredged to allow ‘re-wilding’ of local farmlands, despite the area being the result of measures taken by monks 1000 years ago, so farms and properties ended up under water for six months. Dredging eventually took place, and there’s been no significant flooding of the area since.
Coastal erosion isn’t so easily dealt with, and features that may have ameliorated storm damage but were altered by humans just can’t be replaced. Thirty-odd years ago I spent holidays in south Devon, in a little village called Beesands. Along the coast is another village called Hallsands, and the beach extended below a group of ruined cottages built on a rock shelf about ten-twelve feet above the shingle, it was fairly easy to climb up and explore the ruins.
Fast forward to a few years ago, and I couldn’t believe the change to Hallsands - the beach had gone completely, instead there was a vertical wall of rock into about ten feet of water, and most of the ruins had gone.
Last time I was down there, after further easterly storms, I took thes photo of one of the two remaining cottages, this one called ‘Sea View’, where you can see the damage to the small outhouse/garage to the side.
Rising sea levels and longshore drift caused by the dredging of the shingle banks called the Skerries out in the bay to build Devonport dockyard in the late 1800’s have conspired to cause the damage, and it’s not going to stop.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hallsands
If it's anywhere SE UK isostasy will get you before climate change anyway.y mate just bought a pile on the banks of the Medway. Pics he sent from the last big tide with heavy rain were frightening.
You'd need to find something really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really heavy and drop it on Scotland.
What a bizarre question. 30cm.
No chance.
Sounding a bit like Lex Luther from the original Superman.
Where should we be buying cheap property now that will have coastal views in 50 years?
Sounds like if you're retired with no mortgage and no need to ever sell the house, it might be worth the risk to you. If not then it seems a risk.
My friend's garden backs onto the river Lune near Lancaster maybe about 20m from the house and no more than 2-3m below vertically.
He's been there I think 7-8 years and been flooded really badly twice, including one time when the water was almost up to the ceiling of the ground floor, and numerous other smaller floods. Has had loads of hassle with insurance payouts etc as well. I wouldn't.
Thanks for all the responses.
Just to add.. I phoned my insurance company and the current underwriter for my policy would still insure the property at no extra cost. They checked their database and some underwriters wouldnt quote for the postcode. Its a shame as its an awesome little spot and the house is ideal.
I think short term (next 20 years it would probably be fine).. beyond that its at the mercy of whatever sea level rises occur.
The bigger picture is its going to be an awful time for many low lying areas in our lifetime.
Sea level rises dont even register on most peoples radar.. Connecting our activity, CO2 production and the resulting increases in global temperatures / sea level rises is like some incomprehensible issue that most people dont give a crap about. I guess In another 20-30 years it will all be too little.. too late.
We looked at one right on the river bank, really nice outlook and location. Cheap too. I was keen. The river was well known for flooding. It had flooded before in the basement, probably several times. As the house had been there 150 years or so I reckoned the building could take it. I was planning to do a flood resistant fit out as it needed everything doing. High level electrics. No services under the floor. Nothing fitted downstairs. Bottled it in the end and got something by a stream but on a hill. The first house did flood last month.
My uncle has a house on the back beach in Teignmouth. The rear doors form part of the town’s flood defences. But it’s fitted out such that if it failed it would not be so bad.
Houses designed for flood are not the same as other houses. There’s a set near us on the Thames built just this way. Their ground floor was a foot underwater a week ago, but the garage door has slots for pressure and the living is on the second storey. One of the four just sold and others have too since we looked at one.
No, I wouldn't as seen the heartache and stress flooding has caused locally in Keswick and Cockermouth... I couldn't live with the "what if" anxiety if there was high rainfall coupled with high tides....good lucks finding a new home 🙂
I work in FCERM. I wouldn’t buy the house.
I don't even know what FCERM means but I wouldn't buy the house!!
Unless, unless, you spent some time and money making it flood resistant. I once lived in a stone cottage situated on top of a seasonal spring that would flood (only a couple of cms) once a year. Stone tiles on the floor, drainage at the front door, no real drama - but it was fresh spring water, and not too deep................
Retro-fitting flood resistant designs is expensive and it's actually a misnomer, it's not really much more resistant, it enables you to get back to normal quicker after your life has been turned upside down.
For pluvial or fluvial flooding it usually has benefits. For normal coastal flooding it might work but add into the mix storm surge and increased sea levels that are already "baked in" due to the emission pathways and it's an exercise in futility for those 30cm.
The location is critical but in general the answer to the OP is two pages of NO!!
Retro-fitting flood resistant designs is expensive and it’s actually a misnomer, it’s not really much more resistant, it enables you to get back to normal quicker after your life has been turned upside down.
Yep. 700mm max protection without some serious structural undertaking then you're into resilience measures. Having waves come through your windows while you're trying to save your sofa would suck major balls.
Another working in FCRM, and another no.
Marine scientist here. No chance!
With a tidal river you have two issues to consider:
Sea level rise. A few mm rise = a big difference during a big tide and a storm surge.
Flood water coming down the river. Storms are getting more severe, more water in a shorter space of time. So there's less time for the ground to soak it up. The ground in river catchments is now less able to soak water up. A combination of too much extraction by water companies, more hard tarmac as towns get bigger, trees being cut down and grass being replaced with astroturf means water comes charging down the river in much greater volume than it did even a few years ago.
The neighbours are just trying to reassure themselves.
The insurance company is probably budgeting that once the house floods they've locked you in as no one else will insure it.
Dredging eventually took place, and there’s been no significant flooding of the area since.
That's not "sorting flooding". It's punting the problem downstream or into the future. One day it will no longer be enough. It'll over top and all those lovely new houses with no flood resilience built in will inundated and everyone will be right up shit creek.
FCERM - Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management
That’s not “sorting flooding”. It’s punting the problem downstream or into the future. One day it will no longer be enough. It’ll over top and all those lovely new houses with no flood resilience built in will inundated and everyone will be right up shit creek.
Exactly. The only reason it hasn’t flooded since is that the same rainfall conditions haven’t happened since. Same with Calderdale floods. Huge investment to provide defences, but they won’t stop the same amount of water that fell in 2015 flooding the area if it falls again. The defences just give people more time to get somewhere safe and will stop lower level flooding.
The amount of press the flooding in Somerset got was ridiculous. Self entitled southerners complaining that a flood plain flooded 🙄🙄 and flooded a few houses while all the houses and business’ in Hull that flooded were ignored and forgotten about, but there were many many more people affected.
Know it all farmers who think “the old ways are the best” who have no idea about modern weather problems and how fluvial systems react.
Amen
hirty-odd years ago I spent holidays in south Devon, in a little village called Beesands. Along the coast is another village called Hallsands, and the beach extended below a group of ruined cottages built on a rock shelf about ten-twelve feet above the shingle, it was fairly easy to climb up and explore the ruins.
Fast forward to a few years ago, and I couldn’t believe the change to Hallsands – the beach had gone completely, instead there was a vertical wall of rock into about ten feet of water, and most of the ruins had gone.
@CountZero - I've stayed in one of those cottages in Hallsands, also about thirty odd years ago! One of my Dad's friends owned it so my Dad used to take me and my sister there at half-term or summer holiday. As you drove up to the pub there was a steep set of steps and then a footpath along the front. Even then the cliff edge was only 15ft the other side of a flimsy wire mesh fence. The second year we went the cliff edge was noticeably closer...
Looking at Google Earth now, I don't think that line of cottages is there anymore although I can't be sure, it's not the best resolution images.
I know nothing about flooding, but why isn't it possible to get a house water-tight up to the level of the windows pretty cheaply? I would have thought that creating a seal that goes around the door frames for some extra door to be bolted to would be relatively straight forwards - would the water then seep in through the brickwork? Couldn't this just be tanked? Obviously this isn't a solution for a 3-times-a-year flood but if you're looking at a 1-in-30-years event, the inconvinience of not being able to use your house whilst the waters there isn't as bad..
A 1-in-30 years event is one that has an expected frequency of 1-in-30 years (based on a statistical model). It can happen at any time and you can get two in a week, just think of them as statistically very nasty buses, you wait ages for one then 3 come at once. Your 3 times a year could be a 1-in-2 yr, 1-in-50 yr and 1-in-250yr event.
These door barriers already exist and obviously they are limited in what they can prevent entering the building but they are very useful
There’s a limit to the loading that a normally built house wall can take. If you build the property resilience measures too high there’s a risk of structural damage. Then there’s all the services that come into the house that need to be watertight. Then you have to deal with it seeping up through the floor. It gets very expensive very quickly.
And basements, air-bricks etc.etc.
A 1-in-30 years event is one that has an expected frequency of 1-in-30 years (based on a statistical model). It can happen at any time and you can get two in a week, just think of them as statistically very nasty buses, you wait ages for one then 3 come at once. Your 3 times a year could be a 1-in-2 yr, 1-in-50 yr and 1-in-250yr event.
but in a tidal environment, those fluvial floods and tidal surges, also have to happen co-incident with a equinox spring high changing the odds dramatically. even a hour out of phase will mean vastly different outcomes. and by the nature of a tidal environment, you don't need to keep the water out for days, you need to keep it out for a couple of hours at worst.
its not my money, but if the price was right, I'd consider it...
its not my money, but if the price was right, I’d consider it…
Do it, create a vlog, we'll all watch. 😉
What could possibly go wrong? (probably very little until one night in January 2047 when you wake up a mile offshore)
What could possibly go wrong?
many, many things. lots of them completely unrelated to the tide...
like I said, the price/risk ratio would have to be right.
A 1-in-30 years event is one that has an expected frequency of 1-in-30 years (based on a statistical model). It can happen at any time and you can get two in a week, just think of them as statistically very nasty buses, you wait ages for one then 3 come at once. Your 3 times a year could be a 1-in-2 yr, 1-in-50 yr and 1-in-250yr event.
The hardest part to explain to people you are trying to protect...
1in30 isn't a measure of when you can expect it its a measure of how bad it will be.
many, many things. lots of them completely unrelated to the tide…
But how many of those many many things have a "not if but when" attached? Se rise and climate change means the risk gets worse. It doesn't even have to do much damage. If it casues any damage and you need to make a claim thats you locked in, its now a house that floods.
@Cloudnine if the consensus on here has convinced you not to proceed, could you please share a Rightmove link?
There has been some really well informed professionally based opinion, so it would now be interesting to get that same opinion applied to a specific location rather than high level trends.
If it casues any damage and you need to make a claim thats you locked in, its now a house that floods.
yep. and at the right price, in the right location, that is a risk that some people would be prepared to take.
Are you King Canute?
Are you Chicken Licken? 😉
@Cloudnine if the consensus on here has convinced you not to proceed, could you please share a Rightmove link?
Yeah, if you aren't going to buy it, can we take a look at it?
Erm, camembert with star anise, that puts a completely different perspective on it.
Gazump them !
I always enjoy my croissants with an olive branch.
Dies that fern come with tuck attached for the outdoors indoors feel?
I always enjoy my croissants with an olive branch.
A peaceful morning ritual.
There's a distinct lack of wardrobes in the photos. Looks like a hotel too. That would have been snapped up by someone wealthy in London on a whim.
that property is a perfect case in point.
floor level of that property is probably less than 30cm above the equinox spring high tide level. (for reference the foreshore there is generally used as the car park for the pub opposite, don't leave your car there overnight...)
if you believe the majority in this thread, its worthless, about to become uninhabitable and yet it fetches a price tag of £1.4 million...
if you believe the majority in this thread, its worthless in 30+ years from now
There’s a distinct lack of wardrobes in the photos. Looks like a hotel too.
The three larger bedrooms have separate dressing rooms, which aren't pictured. Guest bedrooms look to have big hook things for hangers.
The advert says that it is a holiday let, hence the hotel vibe.
if you believe the majority in this thread, its worthless in 30+ years from now
i'll wager a Camembert with Star Anise that that house will be far from worthless in 30yrs time...
