ABOUT THE CLT MODEL
A Community Land Trust (CLT) is a nonprofit organization run by a board of local residents. Its purpose is to acquire and steward land in a way that protects long-term community benefit. The CLT owns the land itself, while the buildings on that land—such as homes, small businesses, community gardens, and community centers—are individually owned or rented.
People who live or operate businesses on CLT land (including homeowners, tenants, and business owners) lease the land underneath their buildings through a 99-year renewable ground lease. This lease spells out affordability requirements and other important terms that apply to all CLT properties. Because the lease is both long-term and renewable, it ensures that affordability and community control are protected permanently. This permanence keeps multiple generations rooted in their homes and neighborhoods, and it guarantees that public or private investments in CLTs are not lost over time due to expiring affordability restrictions.
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There are over 200 CLTs across the United States in urban, suburban and rural areas. For us, the most effective CLTs are those that center racial and economic justice, do grassroots organizing, and make housing available to very low-income households. A few examples of successful CLTs are Cooper Square in NYC, Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative in Boston, San Francisco CLT, TRUST South LA, and Champlain Housing Trust in Burlington, Vermont.
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CLTs can acquire land in a variety of ways:
Land gifted by government entities
Land gifted by private property owners
Tax-delinquent or vacant properties, including partnerships with land banks
Bank foreclosures
Conventional property purchases, which can also include first-right-of-first-refusal agreements
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Community Land Trusts were originally created as a tool for collective racial and economic justice during the Civil Rights Movement—to provide both a material foundation and an organizational framework for community self-determination. The first CLT, New Communities Inc., was established to secure farmland collectively for Black farmers who were being displaced. (See Arc of Justice: The Rise, Fall, and Rebirth of a Beloved Community.)
Since then, rural and urban communities have continued to use CLTs to advance collective self-determination as part of broader racial and economic justice efforts. CLTs achieve this in many ways: by providing space and resources for housing, food, small businesses, arts, and culture; and by serving as an organizational framework that enables communities to participate directly in the planning and decision-making around these spaces.
Here in East New York & Brownsville, our CLT promotes racial justice by ensuring that longtime Black and Brown residents are not displaced from our neighborhood.
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The split ownership structure in the CLT model 1) takes land out of the speculative market to stabilize neighborhoods, and 2) removes the cost of land for individual residents, which keeps their housing affordable.
The East New York CLT is committed to deep and permanent affordability and seeks to serve low-income households poorly served by the private market.
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CLTs have proven especially effective at stabilizing and empowering communities during and after periods of acute crisis. For example, they helped protect residents during the 2008–2009 foreclosure crisis. (See: How CLTs fared in the foreclosure crisis – links to two reports and one article published in 2010 and 2011, all by Emily Thaden from the Grounded Solutions Network.)
Two major findings from these studies stand out:
Homes in community land trusts experience lower rates of delinquency and foreclosure compared to homes with conventional mortgages.
The widespread use of comprehensive stewardship practices—including education, prevention, and intervention—likely contributes to these lower delinquency and foreclosure rates, as well as higher rates of successful loan cures in CLTs.