The Buy-In Resource Library: Ideas for Better Buyout Programs
By Nick Wrubel and Kelly Leilani Main
Want to learn more about buyout programs? Today, we are excited to launch the Buy-In Resource Library: a collection of resources we think are helpful for people who are looking to learn more about the current state of research, knowledge, and practice on buyout programs. This is an open source library that we hope will continue to grow - if you think something is missing, feel free to leave a comment at the bottom of this page and help our library grow!
Buyout Basics and Buy-In’s Better Buyout Programs
A property buyout refers to the process through which a local government purchases private properties from willing owners and converts them to open space to mitigate future flood damages. Buyouts can prevent future losses and permanently insulate both people and local governments against flood risk. In practice, however, researchers have shown that these programs are often slow, inequitable, and inefficient.
Buy-In reimagines the role of buyouts in disaster mitigation by combining deep expertise in buyout program design with innovative ideas and data. We incorporate the latest research on buyout program design, climate adaptation, and floodplain management to understand how we can better serve our community and governmental partners. To expand our impact, we have created a freely accessible library consolidating the resources that we rely on, which you can access freely on our website. Below, you will find a summary of some of the research conducted on buyouts, framed through Buy-In’s three program areas: People, Housing, and Land. We are also building a Technical Assistance Library for buyout program managers who want to learn more about the details of buyout administration - if you aren’t already subscribed to our newsletter, be sure to sign up to stay updated when our new library is released!
People
In theory, property buyouts help vulnerable people to escape endless costs from frequent hazard exposure while mitigating against increasing flood insurance payouts and federal disaster recovery spending. In practice, buyouts are often slow and inequitable. It takes five years on average for applicants to receive their payout, forcing residents to consider investing in short term repairs, selling to private buyers, or waiting in limbo for the hope of a buyout. In addition, insurance payouts often don’t reflect the full range of costs homeowners face during the moving process, nor the compounding financial impacts that recurrent disasters place on households.
Program managers and researchers are reconsidering how buyouts can prioritize the needs of communities. Robust community engagement can help program managers build relationships with community members in high-risk neighborhoods and collect applications in advance of funding. Trust and communication with residents are pivotal; the Harris County Flood Control District, for example, regularly communicates with and collects applications from residents in high-risk neighborhoods, allowing them to quickly implement new funding. Buy-In’s Community Partnerships Program innovates in this way by conducting household level surveys in partnership with existing neighborhood organizations to figure out who is ready to move.
Housing
Inequities in buyout programs persist after a transaction is completed as well. Many participants struggle to find affordable housing in their neighborhood that is outside of a floodplain, particularly in urban regions with skyrocketing housing costs. Buyout programs exacerbate these issues by reducing overall housing stock, and fail to account for inequities in housing markets by relying on fair market value for calculating payouts. Vulnerable neighborhoods are often predominantly communities of color and experience low property values, both of which stem from redlining and other housing injustices. Thus, “unfair” market value widens the wealth gap in buyout relocation outcomes. Research shows that buyouts disproportionately burden marginalized participants, who relocate further from both their original communities and other participants than wealthy households and lose crucial support networks and employment opportunities. Nationwide, buyouts also predominantly target low-income neighborhoods and communities of color within wealthier and whiter regions, raising questions about who such programs are benefitting.
Ideally, a buyout program can safely help people relocate while protecting their home equity by allowing them to reinvest in properties that are safer from future climate impacts and forecasted losses in flood-prone home values. Likewise, program managers and researchers are increasingly recognizing the importance of “wrap-around services,” which compensate participants for extra costs. To expand available funding for such services, new and existing sources are being tapped creatively to supplement limited federal funding, such as utilizing local funds or even public-private partnerships with foundations and non-governmental organizations.
Land
Buyouts can provide crucial flood mitigation benefits by transitioning developed parcels into natural landscapes. Floodplains generate valuable co-benefits by absorbing stormwater run-off and preventing further flood impacts. However, short-sighted planning, limited funding, and low participation often prevent these from being realized. Property buyouts are voluntary, and not everyone is equally eager to move. Buyouts tend to occur in clusters rather than whole neighborhoods, leaving a patchwork of open spaces behind and reducing flood mitigation benefits. Without active management, these spaces can become blighted, raising safety concerns and transforming neighborhoods. Funding post-buyout maintenance, or partnering with local residents, can prevent blight and even create new community amenities like parks, community gardens, and walking trails. For example, in Charlotte Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, the local buyout program converts flood-prone parcels into green infrastructure that absorbs flooding, improves water quality, and has created an extensive greenway system for walking, biking, and education. By expediting transactions like through Charlotte Mecklenburg’s “Quick Buy”" program, communities can better facilitate neighborhood-wide relocations and prevent patchwork outcomes with low ecosystem benefits.
On a regional scale, buyouts often occur simultaneously with new floodplain development, shifting hazard vulnerability between communities rather than reducing it. Buyout programs can utilize climate data to better prioritize the most at-risk neighborhoods and ensure communities adopt the necessary land use, building, and zoning regulations to prevent additional irresponsible permitting for new housing.
Conclusion:
Property buyouts will be an increasingly pivotal strategy for adapting to climate impacts. The ideas, data, and research discussed here present exciting avenues for innovation in this field, and we hope that we have provided a useful overview. If you know of a resource that should be included in our library, we would love to hear from you! Feel free to drop a comment in the discussion forum below and we will add it to our website.
Author
Nick Wrubel is a recent graduate of UC Santa Barbara, where he studied Economics and Environmental Studies. His thesis, which focused on the socioeconomic impacts of property buyouts, made him interested in exploring the field further after graduation. In the future, Nick hopes to continue learning about how climate data and tools can be used to better support equitable adaptation to natural hazards.
