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When Shaya Schreiber started searching for a home in Madison, Wisconsin, her options were limited.
Student loans made the single mother of two ineligible for certain affordable housing and a market-rate home was beyond her reach. Then she found the Madison Area Community Land Trust.
The trust helped her purchase a three-bedroom house on the west side of the city. The organization paid $160,000 for the home and more for necessary improvements. Then Schreiber bought it from the trust for $135,000.
“I wouldn’t have been able to afford a house otherwise,” she said.
Community land trusts are a form of social housing where a nonprofit controls the land through a long-term ground lease and sells the home to low- to moderate-income buyers at a discount. Such arrangements often limit the value of the homes on resale, to ensure permanent affordability.