What Is Elevate Florida and Do I Qualify?

Elevate Florida is a statewide residential mitigation program led by the Florida Division of Emergency Management (FDEM) that helps homeowners reduce future storm and flood damage — most often by raising a home above the flood elevation or rebuilding it to a more resilient standard — with federal funding covering the majority of the cost. For Tampa Bay homeowners still dealing with the aftermath of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, it's one of the few programs that puts real money toward the expensive work of elevation and mitigation reconstruction. The catch is that it runs on a cost-share and in application windows, not as an open-ended grant. Carapezza handles the construction side of this work — the elevation and rebuild itself — across Greater Tampa Bay, and the first thing worth understanding is how the program is structured.

How the Program Is Structured

Elevate Florida is funded through federal mitigation programs and administered by the state. When homeowners apply, they select from four project types offered under the program:

• Structural elevation — raising the existing home above the base flood elevation on engineered foundations.
• Mitigation reconstruction — demolishing a substantially damaged home and rebuilding a new, code-compliant, elevated structure in its place.
• Wind mitigation — retrofits that harden the home against wind.
• Acquisition and demolition — the state purchases and clears a repeatedly flooded property.

The cost share is the number to internalize: 75 percent federal and 25 percent homeowner for structural elevation, mitigation reconstruction, and wind mitigation projects. That means the homeowner is ultimately responsible for up to a quarter of the project cost. For acquisition and demolition, the cost share is deducted from the offer price rather than paid out of pocket.

Do You Qualify?

The core eligibility requirements are straightforward. To apply, you must:

• Be a U.S. citizen,
• Be the legal owner of a residential property in the State of Florida, and
• Be able to contribute up to 25 percent of the project's total cost.

Beyond those basics, project selection weighs a home's flood and damage history, since the program's purpose is to reduce future losses on properties most exposed to them. Homes that have been substantially damaged or repeatedly flooded are exactly the profile the program is built for — which describes a great many properties across Pinellas and coastal Hillsborough after the 2024 storm season.

Timing Matters — This Runs in Windows

Elevate Florida does not accept applications year-round. The first statewide application window ran February 7 to April 11, 2025, and drew more than 12,000 applications from residents in 64 counties — a strong signal of how much demand exists and how competitive the funding is. If you're considering it, the practical move is to confirm the current application status directly with FDEM and to have your property details, damage documentation, and project scope ready before a window opens rather than scrambling once it does.

Where a Builder Fits In

The program provides the funding path; a licensed general contractor does the actual work. Elevating a home or rebuilding a substantially damaged one is serious construction — new engineered foundations or pilings, utilities re-run to the raised structure, and a design built to the Florida Building Code 8th Edition and the ASCE 7-22 wind standard. In Tampa Bay's flood zones, the FEMA 50% rule for substantial damage and improvement often forces the question in the first place: when the cost to repair a substantially damaged home reaches half its pre-damage market value, the structure has to be brought into full floodplain-management compliance, which typically means elevation to the base flood elevation. That's the exact scenario Elevate Florida is designed to help fund, and the exact kind of work Carapezza builds.

For Greater Tampa Bay homeowners weighing whether to elevate, our role is the construction: designing and building the elevated or reconstructed home to code once your path forward is clear. The mitigation program and your insurance may not cover everything — NFIP's Increased Cost of Compliance coverage, for example, can provide up to $30,000 toward bringing a substantially damaged insured home into compliance, which can offset part of a homeowner's share. Sorting out how those pieces fit is worth doing before construction, not during. Carapezza has designed and built across Tampa Bay since 1989, including the resilient, storm-conscious construction this program is meant to support.

Considering elevating or rebuilding a storm-damaged home in Tampa Bay? Call (813) 707-0235 or explore our home elevation and storm damage restoration services to talk through your options.