Frequently Asked Questions
What is Flood Form?
Flood Form is a property-level stormwater resilience platform. It combines citywide parcel, elevation, soil, groundwater, and sewer data with more than a decade of Field Form experience designing and installing stormwater systems across New York City to help property owners understand their flood exposure and identify the mitigation strategies that fit their property.
How is Flood Form different from a flood map?
Traditional flood maps show broad areas of flood exposure. Flood Form looks at the individual lot — its building footprint and roof runoff, open area, soil and groundwater conditions, ground elevation, and the sewershed it drains to — to translate that exposure into specific, actionable recommendations.
What types of flooding does Flood Form assess?
Every report scores four types of flood exposure: stormwater (heavy rainfall and surface runoff), sewer backup, groundwater, and coastal flooding. Many properties face more than one, and the report identifies which is the primary driver at your address.
Why do minor rainstorms cause sewer backups in NYC basements?
Most of New York City is served by a combined sewer system, which carries stormwater runoff and sanitary sewage in the same pipes. During moderate-to-heavy rain, runoff volume can exceed pipe capacity faster than it can drain, causing a Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) — and in some cases pushing wastewater back up through private house drains and basement fixtures before it can reach the sewer main.
My basement floods, but I'm not near the coast — why does Flood Form flag flood exposure?
Coastal flooding is only one of four exposure categories Flood Form tracks. Most NYC basement flooding is driven by rainfall runoff overwhelming the combined sewer system or by groundwater intrusion, neither of which requires proximity to water. Your report breaks out exposure by category so you can see which mechanism is actually driving flooding at your address.
Who is Flood Form for?
Anyone can look up an address and view its free Flood Form. Flood Form's services support homeowners, co-op and condo boards, small multifamily and commercial owners, and community organizations, while designers, engineers, real estate professionals, contractors, and public agencies work with Flood Form through Pro, Marketplace, and Enterprise.
Do I need to have experienced flooding to use Flood Form?
No. Flood Form can help you respond to an existing problem or understand vulnerabilities before damage occurs. Planning early usually gives you more options and lets improvements be coordinated with other work on the property.
What is a Stormwater Resilient District (SRD)?
A Stormwater Resilient District is a coordinated neighborhood framework organizing property owners within a shared sewershed to implement property-level mitigation strategies — like green infrastructure and roof runoff diversion — that reduce flood exposure across the district, not just on a single lot. It's the model behind Flood Form's approach to community-scale resilience; see our white paper for the full research and reasoning.
How does the Flood Form process work?
It starts with your free Flood Form for your address. From there you can book a free consultation call, upgrade to Flood Form+, schedule a site visit, or move into a Flood Form Strategy engagement — and then into implementation, with contractor bidding, construction verification, and ongoing maintenance.
How much does Flood Form cost?
Your Flood Form and a 15-minute consultation call are free. Flood Form+ is $249, a site visit is $599 and includes Flood Form+, and Flood Form Strategy engagements start at $3000 and are priced by written quote. Construction costs are separate and depend on the measures your property needs.
What's the difference between Flood Form and Flood Form+?
Every property gets a free Flood Form covering rainfall runoff, combined sewer backup, groundwater, and coastal flood exposure at a high level. Flood Form+ ($249) goes deeper — an advanced diagnostic analysis, infiltration capacity assessment, prioritized mitigation recommendations, and applicable funding programs and regulatory context — without requiring an on-site visit.
Do I need a site visit, or is the online report enough?
Flood Form and Flood Form+ are built entirely from remote data — parcel records, elevation, sewer infrastructure, and flood exposure modeling — so they're a reliable starting point for most homeowners. A site visit ($599) adds a flood resilience specialist's on-site assessment, a written recommendations report, and is the right next step once you're ready to plan an actual mitigation project, since it accounts for conditions a desk review can't see.
What happens during a site visit?
A Flood Form specialist spends up to an hour reviewing how water enters, moves through, collects on, and leaves the property — grading, drains, roof runoff, foundations, cellar or basement conditions, paved and planted areas, runoff from neighbors, and the sewer connection. You receive photo documentation, a written site visit summary with next-step recommendations, and Flood Form+ delivered after the visit.
What is a Flood Form Strategy engagement?
Flood Form Strategy turns the assessment into a property-specific resilience plan. It includes up to two hours of consultation calls, an on-site assessment, a full flood diagnostic, a prioritized mitigation strategy with system layout and sizing where applicable, contractor-ready specifications, and client dashboard access.
How long does the process take?
Your Flood Form is available as soon as you look up your address. Site visits depend on scheduling, and Flood Form Strategy engagements take longer because they involve additional investigation and design; we'll give you an expected timeline when you request a quote.
Does every property need a drywell or infiltration system?
No. Infiltration is only one category of mitigation, and some lots don't have the soil conditions or legal setback area to support it. The right strategy may involve downspout diversion, detention storage, drain improvements, regrading, backflow preventers, waterproofing, sump pumps, retaining walls, added permeable area, maintenance, or a combination.
Will Flood Form tell me exactly what to install?
Flood Form+ identifies likely priorities and recommended measures. Detailed sizing, placement, specifications, and sequencing are developed through a site visit and Flood Form Strategy engagement.
How much does it actually cost to fix a flooding basement?
It depends entirely on the mechanism — a rainfall/runoff issue might be addressed with roof drainage and grading changes, while active sewer backup or groundwater intrusion typically needs backflow preventers, sump systems, or infiltration infrastructure, each at different price points. Flood Form+ or a site visit gives you prioritized, property-specific recommendations before you're pricing out contractor bids, so you're not over- or under-building the fix.
Does Flood Form perform construction?
Flood Form carries projects from assessment to implementation: design, contractor bidding through the Flood Form Marketplace, construction oversight, verification of completed work, and maintenance. Depending on scope, construction may be completed by Field Form or by qualified specialty contractors.
Will I need permits or another professional?
Some improvements may require permits, filings, or a licensed plumber, architect, engineer, electrician, waterproofing contractor, or other specialist. Flood Form will flag these needs when they're known, but final requirements are determined by the relevant authorities and licensed professionals.
Can improvements be completed in phases?
Yes. Recommendations are prioritized so you can address the most urgent vulnerabilities first and coordinate larger improvements with future construction, landscaping, or maintenance work.
Are there grants or funding programs to help pay for flood mitigation?
Yes — a number of city, state, and utility-run programs offset the cost of stormwater and flood resilience work, and eligibility depends on your property type, location, and the measures involved. Flood Form+ and Flood Form Strategy engagements identify which programs apply to your specific property as part of the report.
Will flood mitigation work lower my flood insurance premium or help with a sale?
Documented mitigation work can support flood insurance rating and is increasingly something buyers and their agents ask about in flood-prone neighborhoods. Flood Form's reports and site visit summaries are written to be shareable with insurers, lenders, and future buyers as evidence of the exposure profile and the steps taken to address it.
Does Flood Form provide community or block-level assessments?
Yes. Flood Form can evaluate patterns across a block, portfolio, or sewershed to identify shared conditions, priority properties, and collective strategies — the basis of the Stormwater Resilient District model — and help coordinate investment across multiple owners.
What is Flood Club?
Flood Club is a free (currently beta) dashboard where you can look up any address to see flood exposure and stormwater resiliency statistics for its tax block and sewershed, and get alerts tied to rainfall and conditions in your neighborhood — useful for tracking exposure over time, not just at a single point of purchase.
I'm a contractor or engineer — how do I work with Flood Form?
Flood Form serves professionals through a few paths: contractors and trades get access to mitigation projects across NYC through the Flood Form Marketplace; designers, engineers, and real estate professionals get unlimited report access and planning tools through Flood Form Pro; and municipalities or larger portfolios can license the underlying data and software through Flood Form Enterprise.
Will the recommended strategies prevent all flooding?
No flood-resilience system can eliminate flood exposure entirely or guarantee performance in every storm. Recommendations are sized for specific conditions and the information available; storms that exceed those assumptions, or changes to the property, neighboring sites, the sewer system, or climate conditions, can affect performance.
How accurate is a Flood Form assessment?
Flood Form uses the best available public data combined with field-tested assessment methods. Concealed conditions, undocumented construction, inaccurate public records, and changing site conditions can all affect the findings, which is why a site visit — and sometimes specialist testing — is recommended when you need greater certainty.
Is Flood Form an engineering certification or insurance determination?
No. Flood Form is a planning and decision-support service. Unless expressly stated in a separate agreement, it is not an engineering certification, code determination, insurance evaluation, property warranty, or guarantee that flooding will not occur.
Will the system need maintenance?
Most drainage and resilience systems need periodic inspection and maintenance — drains clog, filters fill, pumps fail, and landscapes change over time. Flood Form can set up a maintenance plan suited to the systems installed on your property.
What information should I provide?
Helpful information includes photos or videos, descriptions of past flooding, the dates and depths of water intrusion, previous repairs, drainage or plumbing records, and any upcoming construction plans.
What is the first step?
Enter your address at floodform.nyc to see your free Flood Form. From there you can book a consultation call, order Flood Form+, schedule a site visit, or contact us about a block, portfolio, or community assessment.
Read the full research behind the Stormwater Resilient District model in our white paper, or see how it applies to your property on the Homeowners page.