Surprise! The lot you bought and house you have planned are in a flood zone !
 

No one disclosed to us when we selected a pond lot in Chitty Chatty that this could be an issue. After our planning meetings, payment of 20 % we spoke with the bank about a mortgage and were told that we would have to carry flood insurance which DOUBLES our home insurance cost. We are very angry about this. We could have chosen a different lot if we had known. We were told that in a couple of years the area may be resurveyed and that FEMA would send a letter if it is no longer classified this way. Then we have to fight with the mortgage company to have this requirement dismissed. As for now it states "for the life of the loan ". Watch out if you are purchasing a pond lot. Has anyone else had this experience?

What was your flood factor? Mine was a 5, which it said there is a chance it might flood at least once in the next 38 years. I'm nowhere near a pond or water. I didn't get a mortgage but my homeowners insurance never asked about it.

Just type in your address.

Find Your Home'''s Flood Risk | Flood Factor

On the Sumter County Flood Zone Map my area is in the white, which is good, so I'm not worried. South of 44 looks like a lot of the area is flood zone.

FEMA Flood Hazard Areas Map of Sumter County, FL | PropertyShark.com

Homeowner's insurance might not care as it doesn't cover flood issues. You get flood damage, not their problem. It doesn't look like being on a man made pond, AKA may or may not have water, is a flood risk factor. Being where the natural water table is at or near the surface, eg swampland, is a factor.

OP It is the law that The Villages was not required to tell you about the flood rating when you bought the property, but IMO they should have. But that's not how Florida works where the laws protect the developers much more than unwashed masses. Buyer beware.
Of course when you sell your home you also will be under no obligation to tell potential buyers they are buying a home that needs flood insurance to get a mortgage. Will you nonetheless tell them?

Your real estate agent should have disclosed this to you.
Property Disclosure Statements: Duty to Reveal Hazards in Florida Must Be Disclosed to Home Buyers | About Florida Law

Flood insurance is separate from regular homeowners insurance. The bank requires the flood insurance because they have a vested interest in the property. If the house is destroyed by a flood, the bank loses their loan collateral.

So you bought a house on a pond and didn’t consider investigating flood zones or flood insurance?
Yes, it should have been disclosed, but you bought a house on a pond.

I don't know about Chitty Chatty, but I understand that some of the ponds in The Villages are interconnected by a piping system. The developer can control the water levels in the ponds by allowing water to flow from one pond to another and prevent flooding of the houses. They can also remove water from the ponds by using the irrigation system. You will often see the sprinklers running for long periods after a heavy rain.

Info about the flood zone in Chitty Chatty was out five months ago. I made a comment about it in a villager's YouTube video "isn't CC in a flood zone?" I thought it would be helpful for others to know that flood insurance rates for that place would be sky high.

So apparently the problem is that Chitty Chatty, all or part of it, is in a Flood Zone, not that there happens to be a pond.

I have a house that backs up to a retention pond and I am in risk factor 1 (lowest risk). There is a weir on our pond that will dump water into Lake Deaton. During Irma it worked as designed.

Being on a pond does not equate to being in a flood zone. Many other factors come into play. And some flood zones are not even near any kind of water body.

in rural florida, what's the difference between swamp land and farm land?

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about 3 feet of dirt

I can’t imagine buying a lot in Florida near a pond and not thinking it could flood. After hurricane Irma a lot of The Villages had flooding.

Thanks John, interesting map. We abut a wildlife preserve (AKA, a glorified swamp). The map shows up blue right up to the fence line in our back yard, then our property is white (low flood risk). Irma proved the map to be correct, as the water in the preserve came just about to our fence line, but our back yard remained dry. Before Irma, the preserve in our back yard was very dry, afterwards it was definitely a swamp. It was actually kind of enjoyable when the preserve filled with water, the wildlife in the area exploded, especially the birds and frogs.

Well, that is simply not true. There were a few homes in the northern part of The Villages that experienced some flooding. The vast majority of The Villages was fine as the water management system, which includes the retention ponds and golf courses, worked as designed. The golf courses are designed to take up the overflow.