Property buyouts are once again being considered as a cornerstone of managed retreat from coastal areas and floodplains in the United States due to flooding that is being made worse by climate change. Federal buyout programmes, however, are frequently criticised for being inequitable and difficult to access. We studied five top US state, county, and municipal buyout programmes to see what they might teach us about revamping future federal policy. Our goal was to determine whether and how subnational buyout programmes overcome these restrictions. Our mixed- methods research developed case studies using interviews and document analysis, contrasted subnational techniques with a review of critiques of federal buyouts, and held focus groups with subnational buyout managers and experts to pinpoint the programmes' shortcomings.
