Yes. Flood risk is Buckingham's weakest point, though the river is a smaller part of it than people assume. The river-and-sea flood zones cover only a thin strip of the town. Rain is the bigger problem. Nearly one postcode in five is at high risk on some measure, so the risk depends on which street you buy on.
The Environment Agency's river-and-sea flood zones cover very little of Buckingham. About 2% of postcodes are in Flood Zone 3, the highest-probability band, and about 4% are in Flood Zone 2, the medium-probability band just outside it. The two bands don't overlap. Both follow the River Great Ouse, which loops round the old town where the first settlement was built, so the river-and-sea risk is concentrated in a narrow corridor.
Surface water is the other kind of flooding, and it doesn't stay in the valley. The Environment Agency has 71 recorded flood events in the area, the most recent in July 2007, with no source or cause logged against it. About 1% of postcodes fall in the Buckingham and River Ouzel Internal Drainage Board's district, where water levels are actively managed. St Rumbold's Well, below the town on the old railway line, is dry for much of the year. The water ends up somewhere else.
The Environment Agency has also mapped how the flood zones grow once climate change is allowed for. On that version, about 6% of postcodes fall in the zones. That is a modelled future scenario. It takes no account of what defences or drainage might be built before then.
For insurance, the exact address matters more than the town. A house up the slope and a house near the river can get very different quotes. Get an indicative buildings insurance quote for the exact address while the survey is being booked, because the insurer's figure is the one you will be paying every year.
The postcode measures fold surface water in alongside rivers and the sea, and they count a postcode if it rates at a given level on any one of several flood measures. On that basis, about 18% of Buckingham's postcodes are at high risk, 17% at medium risk and 30% at low risk. These are much bigger numbers than the flood zones, because a postcode only has to trip one measure to be counted. Most of that extra risk comes from the street drains and the slopes, well away from the riverbank.
Counting buildings gives a more useful picture than counting postcodes. In the Environment Agency's rivers-and-sea mapping, 39 postcodes carry some risk, and those postcodes hold 698 properties. Of those, 60 are at high risk, 52 at medium, 140 at low and 14 at very low. Of the 60 high-risk properties, 38 are homes. Postcodes with no river or sea risk don't appear in that count.
Flood defences cover very little of the high-risk area. About 2% of postcodes are inside the Environment Agency's high-risk modelled flood extent with no defence in the model, and about 1% are inside it with a defence present. A modelled defence means a structure exists in the model. It doesn't mean the house behind it stays dry. The difference between those two figures is small, and it is not a reason to relax.
Sea levels are measured at Portsmouth, the nearest tide gauge, where the record from 1962 to 2023 shows a rise of about 2 millimetres a year. The coast is a long way from Buckingham. The sea level is one flood worry this town can mostly ignore.
On flooding, Buckingham is a poor bet street by street, even though the river is a small part of the problem. The risk mostly comes from rain on the slopes, so look up the exact address and get it priced.