SinkholeOdds

Sinkhole risk in Osceola County, FL: Pockets of it

Pockets of it

Soluble rock at the surface or under thin cover in part of the county.

On soluble rock
100%
At or near the surface
3%
Buried under cover
97%

What to do about a house in Osceola County

Check the parcel against your state survey sinkhole map, and ask for an inspection if cracks, depressions or sticking doors show up.

Standard Florida homeowners policies cover only catastrophic ground cover collapse; full sinkhole coverage is a separately priced option insurers must offer.

That works out to roughly 1,327 of Osceola County's 1,327 square miles on soluble rock, 42 of them with the rock at or near the surface. With about 468,058 residents (353 per square mile), there is effectively nowhere in the county off the soluble rock, town or country. The figures come from 252 map points about 2.3 miles apart, so a pocket smaller than that can be missed or overstated.

Two things to read before deciding: what Florida insurers have to cover, and why gypsum and salt move faster than limestone.

Counties around Osceola County

The nearest county rated sinkhole country is Indian River County, FL, about 42 miles southeast. 5 of the 6 closest counties land in the same band, so this is a regional pattern rather than a local quirk.

What Osceola County is built on

The largest mapped soluble unit here is the Shelly sediments of Plio-Pleistocene age (beach sand), Holocene in age, covering about 84% of the county. Next is the Hawthorn Group, Coosawhatchie Formation at 9%.

The county also lies over the Floridan shelf, a deep salt or gypsum basin. Deep beds rarely cause surface collapse on their own, but wells and mining into them have.

Against the rest of Florida

Osceola County ranks 60 of 67 in Florida for soluble rock at the surface, and sits above 60% of US counties on that measure.