Publications & Presentations

Outperforming the Market: Delinquency and Foreclosure Rates in Community Land Trusts
Publication Type: Working Paper
Author(s): Thaden, Emily Publication
Date: October 2010
This working paper examines the rates of delinquencies and foreclosure filings in mortgages that were held by households who owned homes in Community Land Trusts (CLTs) during 2009. A survey was administered to U.S. CLTs, yielding a sample of 42 CLTs that represented 2,173 owner-occupied, resale-restricted mortgages. The survey was designed for comparisons with the Mortgage Brokers Association National Delinquency Survey. Results indicated that CLT loans outperformed MBA loans on all comparable delinquency and foreclosure measures. While findings support the efficacy of homeownership in CLTs to preclude delinquencies and foreclosures, results also found that a minority of CLTs received external funding to expand or support their work.

Outperforming the Market: Delinquency and Foreclosure Rates in Community Land Trusts
Publication Type: Land Lines Article
Author(s): Thaden, Emily and Greg Rosenberg
Publication Date: October 2010
The foreclosure crisis and its impact on the U.S. economy seem far from abating as mortgage delinquencies and foreclosure filings continue to climb. According to RealtyTrac, a total of 2.8 million properties had foreclosure filings during 2009. That foreclosure rate was 21 percent higher than in 2008 and 120 percent higher than in 2007. Research on one alternative housing model, the community land trust (CLT), found delinquencies and foreclosures to be far lower among the owners of CLT homes than the owners of unrestricted, market-rate homes during the market downturn of 2007–2009. This Land Lines magazine article (based on the longer working paper with the same title) summarizes these findings and examines aspects of CLTs that may help to explain the sustainability and success of CLT home ownership.

The Community Land Trust Reader
Publication Type: Book
Editor: Davis, John Emmeus
Publication Date: May 2010
The Community Land Trust Reader brings together for the first time the seminal texts that inspired and defined the CLT. Selections trace the intellectual origins of an eclectic model of tenure that was shaped by the social theories of Henry George, Ebenezer Howard, Ralph Borsodi, and Arthur Morgan and by social experiments like the Garden Cities of England and the Gramdan villages of India. The Reader does not look only to the past, however. Many of its 46 essays and excerpts examine contemporary applications of the CLT in promoting homeownership, spurring community development, protecting public investment, and capturing land gains for the common good. The Reader also looks ahead to challenges and opportunities likely to affect the future development of CLTs, here and abroad.

The City-CLT Partnership: Municipal Support for Community Land Trusts
Publication Type: Policy Focus Report
Author(s): Davis, John Emmeus, and Rick Jacobus
Publication Date: June 2008
Nearly 20 community land trusts are started every year as new nonprofits or as programs or subsidiaries of existing organizations. A growing number of cities and counties have chosen to support existing CLTs, and to start new ones. Two key policy needs drive this new interest, particularly in jurisdictions that put a social priority on home ownership for lower-income families and a fiscal priority on protecting the public’s investment in affordable housing: long-term preservation of subsidies and long-term stewardship housing. Based on a review of three dozen municipal programs and interviews with officials and CLT practitioners, this policy focus report describes how cities are investing in CLT startups, projects, and operations.

Community Land Trust Conference: Building Community... Learning Together
Date(s): August 17 - 19, 2005
Conference Outline and Handout Materials
This conference will bring together some 250 participants representing established and developing CLTs, banks, state housing finance agencies, community loan funds, housing developers, and other organizations from across the country. A wide range of informative workshops, panel discussions, speakers, and networking opportunities will allow CLTs, community development professionals and grassroots organizers to gain experience and knowledge from their peers and experienced trainers.

Community Land Trusts: Leasing Land for Affordable Housing
Publication Type: Land Lines Article
Author(s): Greenstein, Rosalind and Yesim Sungu-Eryilmaz
Publication Date: April 2005
For many households experiencing lagging wages or underemployment, the purchase and financing of a house is increasingly difficult. High land costs are another obstacle to developing and securing affordable housing for lower-income families in some markets. One way to address this second issue is to purchase a house without the land, and a community land trust (CLT) is one mechanism that allows this arrangement. This article reports on a roundtable attended by researchers, policy analysts, technical assistance providers, funders, and community land trust staff members to discuss the community land trust model and related research needs.

Leasing Public Land
Publication Type: Book
Editor(s): Bourassa, Steven C. and Yu-Hung Hong
Publication Date: April 2003
Leasing public land has been advocated as a viable land tenure option for former socialist countries and other transitional economies. However, the debate about land tenure has been influenced more by ideology and preconceptions than by lessons drawn from careful study of existing leasehold systems. This new publication offers a thorough examination of public leasehold systems around the world and presents insightful recommendations for the future role of such systems.

Myths and Realities of Public Land Leasing: Canberra and Hong Kong
Publication Type: Land Lines Article
Editor(s): Hong, Yu-Hung
Publication Date: March 1999
Many scholars and analysts have suggested that public leasehold systems could allow governments to benefit from a share of future increased land value. Some have even argued that other policy objectives, including stabilizing land prices, controlling land uses and facilitating land redevelopment, could also be achieved through public land leasing. This research focuses on Canberra and Hong Kong, which have two of the world's most well developed leasehold systems, examines some of the benefits and problems of public land leasing.

Farming Inside Cities
Publication Type: Working Paper
Editor(s): Kaufman, Jerry and Martin Bailkey
Publication Date: September 2000
Most people think of farming as an activity occurring almost exclusively on rural land. This report, however, takes a look at cities in the United States - especially those affected more substantially by economic changes and population losses over the past several decades - as a new and unconventional locus for for-market farming ventures.

Opportunities and Risks of Capturing Land Values Under Hong Kong's Leasehold System
Publication Type: Working Paper
Editor(s): Hong, Yu-Hung and Alven H.S. Lam
Publication Date: November 1998
Hong Kong's land-leasing system empowers the government to exercise two important land policy measures-regulating land supply and capturing development windfalls. This paper focuses on the evaluation of the effectiveness of this leasehold system especially in the areas of capturing development gains for financing urban infrastructure.

Policies and Mechanisms on Land Value Capture
Publication Type: Working Paper
Editor(s): Lam, Alven H.S. and Steve Wei-cho Tsui
Publication Date: January 1998
This paper reviews government policies on capturing and distributing the profits of land value increase in Taiwan. Based on the political ideology of the country's founding father, Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the government adopted two groups of techniques to carry out value capture policies: land-related taxation and land use regulations.