The Australian CLT Manual
By Louise Crabtree, Hazel Blunden, Peter Phibbs, Carolyn Sappideen, Derek Mortimer, Avril Shahib-Smith, Lisa Chung
This Manual was funded by the Western Australian Department of Housing, the City of Port Phillip, the City of Sydney, Inner Melbourne Action Plan, St Kilda Community Housing Ltd and Mount Alexander Community Land Ltd. The authors wish to thank the funding agencies for supporting the Manual and the Steering Committee for their dedication, time and effort in helping bring this Manual to completion. The team wish to especially thank Grace McCaughey (Mount Alexander Community Land Ltd) and Gary Spivak (City of Port Phillip) for their efforts in supporting the Manual’s creation.

MIT Community Innovations Lab: A Guide to Transformative Land Strategies
The report synthesizes the practices and strategies of transformative community land organizations under three primary themes: participatory comprehensive planning, partnerships across grassroots and mainstream organizations, and community and cooperative financing. These findings are relevant for activists, practitioners, planners, policymakers, and educators - and the many working between these roles - who are invested in the transformative potential of the CLTs and other community land ownership models.
People Powered Homes: How London CLT and Citizens UK Organize to Access Land for Affordable Homes
London CLT grew out of the community organizing efforts of London Citizens, who have been building the capacity of people to participate in public life since the early 1990s. We continue to work hand-in-hand with organizers, community leaders and member organizations of London Citizens. Our shared approach is rooted in traditions of broad-based organizing which remain central to all our strategies. Most of our CLT campaign groups are supported by a paid organizer, employed by Citizens UK, as well as London CLT staff. However, we believe that the relational way we work and the attention we put into the politics of CLT campaigning are relevant and useful to all community-led housing groups, including unstaffed campaigns.
SHICC Financial Guide: Tools to Boost CLT and OFS Financing in Europe
The regional cooperation programme SHICC (Sustainable Housing for Inclusive and Cohesive Cities) seeks to promote the model of the Community Land Trust (CLT) and of the Organisme de Foncier Solidaire (OFS) in Europe. As part of this project, Fonds Mondial pour le Développement des Villes (FMDV) is in charge of analyzing and supporting sustainable financial models with a view to their dissemination.
This Financial Guide has been designed to act as a practical tool. It is based on a mapping of funding sources mobilized by CLT and OFS in Europe, which highlighted the barriers and funding gaps that must be overcome to help spread the model. It is available in both English and French versions.
Starting a Community Land Trust
Written by John Emmeus Davis in 2007, Starting a Community Land Trust: Organizational and Operational Choices, is a manual that seldom says what the “right” decision should be. Starting a community land trust is not a process of lifting a box of pre-measured ingredients off the kitchen shelf and following a predetermined recipe guaranteed to produce the same cookie-cutter product every time. Different communities – large or small, urban or rural, prosperous or poor – have different conditions, priorities, politics, and needs. The right process and the right decisions for starting a CLT in one community may not be right for another. But the list of decisions is mostly the same. To support and to spur such decision-making, this manual points out those choices that matter the most in the early days of planning a CLT. It presents the range of options for making each decision and reviews the pros and cons that should be weighed in selecting one course of action over another. Starting a CLT starts with basic questions of why, where, when, and who. The how comes later.
US CLT Technical Manual
The National CLT Network (now Grounded Solutions Network) published this 482 page manual (edited by Kirby White) in 2011. This remains the most current edition of the CLT Technical Manual, replacing the predecessor Legal Manual published by the Institute for Community Economics. The manual provides a comprehensive, practical guide for the ongoing operation of CLTs, as well as for future CLT start-ups. And it contains the model CLT ground lease, which has been utilized by CLTs around the US (and around the world).
INDIVIDUAL CHAPTERS
- Preface
- Table of Contents (annotated)
- Chapter 1: Origins and Evolution of the CLT in United States (from the CLT Reader)
- Chapter 2: Initial Choices
- Chapter 3: Incorporation and Basic Structural Considerations
- Chapter 4: CLT Bylaws Considerations
- Chapter 5A: Model Classic Bylaws
- Chapter 5B: Model Classic Bylaws Commentary
- Chapter 6: Tax-Exempt Status for Community Land Trusts
- Chapter 7: Launching Operations
- Chapter 8: Implementing Restrictions on Ownership
- Chapter 9: Enforceability of the CLT’s Pre-emptive Right
- Chapter 10: Legal Issues Regarding CLT Ownership
- Chapter 11-A: Model Ground Lease
- Chapter 11-B: Ground Lease Commentary
- Chapter 12: Resale Formula Design
- Chapter 13: Establishing and Collecting Fees
- Chapter 14: CLTs and Condominiums
- Chapter 15-A: CLTs and Cooperatives (with model ground lease)
- Chapter 15-B: CLT-Coop Ground Lease Commentary
- Chapter 16: Nonresidential CLT Ground Leases
- Chapter 17: Property Tax Assessments
- Chapter 18: Project Planning and Pricing
- Chapter 19: Subsidy Structure
- Chapter 20: Financing CLT Homes
- Chapter 21: Marketing, Buyer Assistance, Buyer Selection
- Chapter 22: CLT Real Estate Transactions
- Chapter 23: CLT Post-Purchase Stewardship
- Chapter 24: Planning for Sustainability
- Chapter 25: Dealing with Worst Cases
- Appendix A: Glossary of CLT-Related Terms
- Appendix B: CLT Definition from Housing and Community Development Act of 1992
- Appendix C: Sample Memorandum of Ground Lease
- Appendix D: Assignment of Purchase Option