How to Prepare for a Flood and Protect Your Home

This guide covers how to prepare for a flood and protect your home, from checking your risk and writing a flood plan to flood-proofing the building, sorting your insurance, and knowing what to do during and after a flood. Unda has carried out more than 5,000 flood risk assessments across the UK since 2014, so what follows is based on what we see on real properties every week.

Find out if you’re at risk

The first step is to find out whether your home is genuinely at risk, and from what. In England you can check your long-term flood risk free on GOV.UK by entering your postcode; it covers rivers, the sea, surface water, reservoirs and groundwater. For live conditions over the next five days, use the Environment Agency’s check for flooding service.

It also helps to know that flooding doesn’t only come from rivers and the sea. Surface water from heavy rain, rising groundwater and even reservoirs all cause flooding, and each behaves differently. Our guide to the different sources of flooding explains which are most likely to affect your property.

If a conveyancing or environmental search has flagged your home, don’t panic. A “high risk” label on a screening report describes the wider area, not your specific building. Our explainer on why your home can be in a flood zone even if it has never flooded sets out what those classifications really mean.

Make a flood plan

A flood plan is just a written note of what your household will do when flooding is expected, kept somewhere everyone can find it. The Environment Agency offers free templates, so the simplest place to start is to make a personal flood plan and keep it with your other essentials. Your plan should cover:

• How you’ll get warnings. Sign up for free flood warnings by phone, text or email, or call Floodline on 0345 988 1188.
• Where the shut-offs are. Know how to turn off your gas, electricity and water before you ever need to.
• What you’ll move, and where — cars, furniture, electricals and anything irreplaceable.
• Where you’ll go, and who needs extra help — children, older or disabled relatives, and pets.

Then make sure everyone in the house knows the plan, not just the person who wrote it.

Build a flood kit

A flood kit, sometimes called a grab bag, is a box of essentials you can reach in a hurry. Keep it in a waterproof container, stored high up, and pack:

• Copies of your insurance policy and important documents in resealable waterproof bags
• Essential medication and a basic first aid kit
• A torch, a wind-up or battery radio, and a power bank or chargers
• Bottled water, warm waterproof clothing and blankets
• Rubber gloves, plus supplies for babies or pets

Photograph each room now, while everything is dry and undamaged. It makes any future insurance claim far easier.

Protect your property

You can reduce flood damage with property flood resilience: measures that either keep water out or limit the harm when it gets in. Fitting property flood resilience measures such as flood doors and barriers, self-closing airbrick covers, non-return valves on drains and a sump-and-pump system can keep shallow flooding out and help the building dry out faster.

A useful rule of thumb: keeping water out works for shallow flooding up to roughly 600mm deep. Beyond that, the pressure of standing water against the walls can cause structural damage, so the safer approach is to let water flow in and out in a controlled way and focus on recovering quickly — tiled floors instead of carpet, raised electrical sockets and water-resistant fittings.

Don’t overlook the cheap, simple things either. Keep a supply of sand and sandbags before you need them, because both sell out fast once a flood is forecast. And keep your drains and gullies clear so heavy rain drains away instead of pooling around the building.

Funding and grants

Flood protection can be costly, but help is available. If your home is flooded and you make an insurance claim, Flood Re’s Build Back Better scheme lets you claim up to £10,000 — on top of the repair costs — to install resilience measures such as flood doors and resilient materials. Insurers covering around 60% of the home insurance market now offer it.

Outside an insurance claim, local authorities and the Environment Agency sometimes offer Property Flood Resilience grants in higher-risk areas or after a flood event. Your local council is the place to ask what’s available near you.

Get the right insurance

Check that your buildings and contents insurance actually covers flooding — not every policy does, and cover can be limited for higher-risk homes. If affordable cover is hard to find, it’s worth understanding how Flood Re works: a joint government and insurer scheme, running until 2039, that helps keep the flood part of home insurance affordable. You still buy and claim through your own insurer, with Flood Re behind the scenes, and ceded claims carry a fixed £250 excess.

Flood risk can also influence how flood risk can affect your home’s value and even flood risk and your mortgage, so it pays to get on top of it early. For an insurer-side view, the ABI’s guidance on preparing for a flood is a useful read — it recommends fitting flood measures alongside a property-level flood risk survey.

And if an insurer has raised concerns, increased your premium or restricted cover, a property-specific flood risk report for your insurer can give them the detailed evidence that broad screening data can’t.

What to do during a flood

If a flood warning is issued, act early and put safety first:

• Turn off the gas, electricity and water if it’s safe — never touch an electrical switch while standing in water.
• Move people, pets, vehicles and valuables upstairs or to higher ground.
• Put any flood barriers or airbrick covers in place.
• Follow evacuation advice from the emergency services straight away; delaying puts you and the rescuers at risk.
• Never walk or drive through floodwater. As the government’s Prepare campaign points out, driving through floodwater is the single biggest cause of death during floods — just 30cm of moving water can float a car.

What to do after a flood

Once the water recedes, take care: it can stay contaminated and hide hazards for weeks.

• Stay out of floodwater unless you have to enter it, and wash thoroughly afterwards.
• Throw away any food or bottled water that’s touched floodwater, and boil tap water until it’s declared safe.
• Photograph the damage and mark the water line before it drops. Get your insurer’s approval before starting repairs, and don’t throw anything away until you’re told to.

A flood is a genuinely distressing experience, and it’s normal to feel its effects long afterwards. The British Red Cross flood advice covers the practical clean-up and where to find emotional support, and you can call NHS 111 for help.

When to get a professional flood risk assessment

For most homeowners the steps above are enough. But there are times when it pays to bring in a specialist — most often when you’re buying a property that’s been flagged as at risk. A generic conveyancing search will tell you there’s risk without telling you what it actually means for that building.

That’s where we come in. An independent flood risk survey for the property looks at the real risk to the building — ground levels, flow paths, flood history and likely depths — so you understand what you’re taking on and whether the price reflects it. If you’re selling, it’s also worth knowing your obligations around declaring flood history when you sell.

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