Community Land Trusts (CLTs) are a model of community-based, perpetually affordable housing that has been operating in the United States for the past 30 years and has more recently been established in the United Kingdom. CLTs are also a mechanism for creating affordable home ownership that remains affordable across re-sales and inheritance, and establishes clear and ongoing relationships between homeowners and their community.

Recent AHURI research has shown that Indigenous people are interested in forms of home ownership that allow them to hand their property on to children and are less interested in wealth accumulation (see Memmott et al, in Project 20501 ). As such, CLTs may offer a way of providing home ownership that is both affordable and consistent with Indigenous aspirations.

This research project will investigate the potential of Community Land Trust models to enhance tenure choices for Indigenous households in Australia. The project will be guided by ongoing input from Indigenous stakeholders, involve examining international evidence of use of CLTs by Indigenous people, and establish a replicable consultative methodology for assessing the feasibility and interpretation of the model in a variety of local situations in urban, regional and remote areas of Australia.