Luckily, we are on higher ground, so we'll be one of the houses out of the water first when it recedes. What I can say is that we're the best of the worst.

You don't see any houses any more. I saw only four rooftops that were covered by water; everything else was covered by mud.

Our houses are at least 12 feet under water. All you can see on TV are rooftops. And the bridge we came across, the I-10 twin span, is now split.

We've had six or seven houses and two mobile homes destroyed but there were no serious injuries. They were lucky.

The only limiting factor is water but with more town houses and flats, there won't be space for lawns to be watered and if the water becomes scarce, the price will go higher and everyone will only use that quantity that is needed. The answer is technology.

Our philosophy was to maximize the water views, to keep the open space that's typical of carriage houses and to keep the feeling of a Tuscan farmhouse, which is obviously what the architect in 1910 tried to do.