About Corolla's 4-wheel Drive Area

I get this question asked from time to time and the answer is yes....well mostly.

We will not get delivery from UPS, DHL, or FedEx; but we do get mail brought up the beach from the good old USPS! The mail does get delivered up here but not to our houses. anyone wanting their mail delivered into Carova can get get a mail box assigned to them across the street from the fire station in Carova Beach. For some residents that pretty convenient, for others living in Swan Beach or North Swan Beach, it is as much as 6 miles in the wrong direction. Consequently many of these residents choose to rent a P.O. Box at the closest post office which is located in Corolla.

The Corolla Post Office is located about 1 mile south of the end of the paved road. like most post offices it is accessible 24/7, but catching someone at the window is a little more of a challenge. their hours are M-F 9:00-12:30 1:00-4:00 & Sa 10:00-12:00. Yes the post office window actually closes down from 12:30-1:00 for lunch so keep that in mind when you have to make a special stop.

Another interesting thing about the Corolla Post Office is that the number of out going runs each day changes depending on the time of year. From Memorial Day to Labor Day they have mail going out at 11:00 & 3:00. During the rest of the year, they only have the 3:00 run.

To some people this can be seen as a major inconvenience. There have been times that I needed to get something out that day only to find that I missed the pick up at the mail box and found myself driving 50 minutes round trip and going through almost a 1/4 tank of gas to make sure that it went out on time. but that is the exception, and usually I enjoy the "small town" & "good old days" feel that this post office as well as the rest of the town has.

A CBRA zone (pronounced COBRA zone) is an area designated by Congress that prohibits all federal expenditures, including flood insurance, for residential and commercial development in such zones.

When Carova was designated a CBRA zone, FEMA did grandfather in any houses that could document that they were built prior to a certain date. I believe it was October 1^st 1983, but I could be off. So there are some houses that are insured through FEMA. You can get flood insurance on the other houses, but you have to go to the private sector. Which can cost you a lot depending on the flood one you are in and how much your house is worth.

There are basically three flood zones in Carova: VE, AE, & X. In this scenario X is a good thing. It is determined to be outside the 100 and 500 year floodplains. If your house is in an X zone than now flood insurance should be required. I say “should” because a bank can still insist on one although I have never heard of it happening. Some lots are not entirely in one zone & it doesn’t have to be, but if even one piling is in an AE or VE, then the whole house is considered in that zone.

AE is inundated by 100-year flooding, for which BFEs have been determined. BFE stands for “Base Flood Elevation”. If your property is in an AE zone you can hire a surveyor to get an elevation certificate or do a topographical survey (TOPO). If this shows that if any of your property is above the Base Flood Elevation, then you can apply to FEMA for a LOMA (Letter Of Map Amendment). Again ALL of the house must be within the LOMA area. So if you’re in an AE zone you can get a TOPO to try and get a LOMA from FEMA. Confused yet?

Then there is VE. Some jokingly say that it stands for "Very Expensive". VE is inundated by 100-year flooding with velocity hazard, BFEs have been determined. FEMA is not currently giving out LOMAs for VE flood zones. These are mostly the oceanfront and semi-oceanfront lots. I have heard of the flood policies on some of these costing $25,000 a year. But remember, these houses can run well over a million dollars in purchase price.

Welcome to my Blog.

My name is Jean-Paul Peron. I'm a REALTOR® with Sun Realty on the Outer Banks. My wife and I built our dream home and moved to Carova, a 10 mile stretch of non comercialized beach with no paved roads and home to the Corolla Wild Horses. Carova is an nincorporated community in Cuttituck County in the extreme northeast corner of North Carolina. Its three main neighborhoods of Swan Beach, North Swan Beach, and Carova Beach can only be accessed by four-wheel drive, boat, or (if you want to splurge) by helicopter since there are no paved roads connecting Carova to neighboring Corolla of Virginia. There is actually a fence at the state line to keep the vehicles from crossing into Virginia. Living this far from civilization and this close to the ocean is a blessing that sometimes comes with a price. I will try my best to be share both sides of the coin.

J-P