These are the areas where Harvey-damaged homes are being turned over by investors

LISTED: The Houston areas where investors are the busiest post-Harvey

Flood debris is piled up outside a home in Bellaire in October 2017.

See the neighborhoods where investors are buying up Harvey-damaged homes to flip them into sought-after rentals... less Flood debris is piled up outside a home in Bellaire in October 2017. LISTED: The Houston areas where investors are the busiest post-Harvey

Flood debris is piled up outside a home in Bellaire in October 2017.

See the neighborhoods where investors are buying up Harvey-damaged ... more Flood debris is piled up outside a home in Bellaire in October 2017. Photo: Michael Ciaglo, Houston Chronicle Photo: Michael Ciaglo, Houston Chronicle Image 1 of / 98 Caption Close These are the areas where Harvey-damaged homes are being turned over by investors 1 / 98 Back to Gallery

A new Houston Chronicle report published this week details how investors big and small are buying up homes damaged by Hurricane Harvey in order to flip them for profit.

According to the report, some 5,500 home have been purchased so far and turned into sought-after rental properties.

MONEY TALKS: Who's buying Harvey-flooded homes in Houston? Mostly investors

Those renters, according to Texas law, don't need to be told by landlords that they are in danger of being flooded out, either. With flood insurance, the investing entities and their interests are largely taken care of.

While these out-of-state investors (from the west and east coasts) see the work as helping rehab some of Houston's hardest hit areas, others are of the mind that they are hampering work by local government to buy out flood-prone properties so no more damage and displacement is done.

"All we're doing is perpetuating a cycle of flooding," Harris County Flood Control operations chief Matt Zeve told the Houston Chronicle.

These homes, while they have new bells and whistles and those cool USB outlets, are still prone to flooding because the infrastructure still hasn't changed around them.

HOUSTONCHRONICLE.COM: In Houston's flooded neighborhoods, real estate investors see an opportunity

When another hurricane on par with Harvey comes knocking on Houston's door, and it eventually will, these detractors think that the cycle will start all over again. And it might not even take a torrential Harvey-esque rain event either as we have learned over the years around here.

In the slideshow above we rounded up the neighborhoods in the Houston metro area that are seeing the most activity by investors. It's food for thought as the Houston area and the Gulf Coast prepares for the opening of yet another hurricane season.

Craig Hlavaty is a reporter for Chron.com and HoustonChronicle.com.