What is a Community Land Trust?

Community Land Trusts are nonprofit, community-based organizations that hold land in trust and make that land available for community purposes and public benefit (such as community gardens, commercial space, affordable housing). For most CLTs, affordable housing is the highest priority.

A land lease agreement defines the arrangement between the family that purchases and owns the home and the Community Land Trust that holds the land beneath the home in trust. CLT land leases for homes:

Are typically 99 years in length
Are renewable
Are inheritable
Allow a family full access to the land
Require owner-occupancy
Include a nominal land lease fee
Include a Resale Formula that determines resale price, ensuring affordability for the next homebuyer
Determine income level of initial and future buyers

The Resale Formula in the lease tries to balance two things:

The need of the individual household to get ahead and build wealth through homeownership.
The need for homes to remain affordable upon resale.

In return for having a homeownership opportunity that otherwise wouldn't exist, the homebuyer agrees to limit the price at which she will resell her house to another moderate-income homebuyer.

The CLT model is unique in that the community subsidy that makes the home affordable (which PCLT administers and which provides the means to hold the land in trust) remains with the home upon resale.