Habitat for Humanity and Community Land Trusts: Leveraging Limited Resources Through Partnership

In 2019, Trust Montana and Gallatin Valley Habitat for Humanity partnered to create the first permanently affordable Habitat-built home in the state. The partnership has created a replicable model for Trust Montana, and other CLTs around the country, to use. Trust Montana now partners with Habitat for Humanity of Missoula to preserve the affordability of their homes, and has worked with Helena Area Habitat for Humanity to bring new permanently affordable homes to the market in Red Lodge and Helena.

Trust Montana staff is available to visit communities in Montana to share information about the CLT model, including how it can work in conjunction with a local Habitat for Humanity group.

Call Dawn at 406.898.7636 for more information.

After decades of Habitat for Humanity affiliates around the world working with partner families to create affordable housing through a wealth-building model that allows many homes to be re-sold on the regular market at an unrestricted price, Habitat affiliates have begun to look to the community land trust model to ensure their homes remain affordable in perpetuity. The Shelter Report from 2017 outlines the ways in which Habitat affiliates have increasingly found it necessary to restrict the resale prices of homes with the CLT model. Developing homes via the Habitat model that incorporate ground leases is an effective solution to the challenge of ever-increasing building costs and shrinking federal subsidies. Habitat affiliates can use the CLT model to avoid having to buy back and re-subsidize homes to keep them affordable. 

Together, Habitat affiliates and CLT organizations can increase the stock of homes people can afford by leveraging one another’s resources and expertise.

Partners