Flood risk alerts for landlords

Why this matters for landlords

• Flood damage is expensive, disruptive to tenants, and can take a property out of use for months during drying and repair.
• A landlord managing properties across several towns can't realistically track EA warnings for every one of them manually — this does it for every property on the account, automatically.
• Advance warning, even a few hours, can be the difference between moving belongings and arranging tenant safety versus discovering damage after the fact.

How we detect it

We check the Environment Agency's real-time flood-monitoring data for active alerts and warnings within 3km of the property, using their own severity scale rather than a number we invented. That radius was spot-checked against five UK towns with well-documented flood history, and it caught every one of their flood areas. Coverage is England only: the Environment Agency issues flood warnings for England, so properties in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland won't receive this alert.

Full methodology, including the backtesting and where the evidence is strongest and weakest, is on the how it works page.

What to do when you get this alert

• Check on tenant safety first if a Flood Warning or Severe Flood Warning has been issued. That's a more serious classification than a Flood Alert.
• Contact tenants directly if you haven't already heard from them, and share any relevant advice from the Environment Agency for the specific flood area.
• Review flood resilience measures at the property once conditions clear (airbrick covers, non-return valves, raised electrics) if this is a recurring alert for that location.
• Keep the alert as a dated record of the Environment Agency's own severity classification, for the property's insurer.

Further reading

• Flood Alert, Flood Warning, Severe Flood Warning: what each means for a landlord