CLTs in informal settlements

Frequently asked questions · 6 questions

CLTs in informal settlements

How community land trusts can secure land for residents of informal settlements, how they differ from CLTs in the United States, and what has been learned in Puerto Rico, Brazil, Kenya and elsewhere.

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What are informal settlements, and what do they have to do with CLTs?

Informal settlements, also called self-built communities, are neighborhoods where people have built their own homes on land they do not legally own: favelas in Brazil, barrios in Latin America, slums and squatter settlements in Africa and Asia. More than a billion people live in them. Many have existed for generations and have strong community organizations, but residents can be evicted, and when a settlement is improved, with paved streets, water, sewers or a nearby transit line, rising land values can push them out.

A CLT can secure the land for the whole community, so residents gain lasting rights to their homes and stay as their neighborhood improves. The Caño Martín Peña CLT in San Juan, Puerto Rico, showed that this can work, and communities in Brazil, Kenya and elsewhere have learned from it. See CLTs in the Global South and the CLT Center’s Global South CLT Initiative.

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How is a CLT in an informal settlement different from a CLT in the United States?

Almost everything starts from a different place. A typical U.S. CLT buys land, builds or renovates homes, and sells them to lower-income households who qualify, with a resale formula that keeps them affordable for the next buyer. In an informal settlement, the people are already there. Their homes are self-built, often added to over decades, on land that may belong to the government, a private owner or no one clearly. The goal is not to create new affordable homes for newcomers, but to secure the land for the people who live there and protect them from eviction and displacement.

So the tools differ. The CLT usually acquires land that residents already occupy, often public land transferred by the government, and gives each household a secure, inheritable right to its home. The Caño Martín Peña CLT uses a surface rights deed rather than a ground lease. Rules about resale and income may be lighter, or designed by residents themselves. And the CLT is usually part of a larger effort to bring in water, sanitation and other services. Many organizers in the Global South prefer to call the CLT a tool or mechanism rather than a model, because it has to be rebuilt to fit each place.

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Why not just give each family a title to its own land?

Many governments have tried individual titling, and it can give families real security. But research has found that titling alone does little to reduce poverty, and it can backfire. Once each lot can be bought and sold, land values rise, speculators move in, and new costs such as property taxes fall on families with very low incomes. Some sell under pressure; tenants, who are often the majority, may be priced out. Over time the community can be broken up lot by lot.

A CLT offers a different kind of security. The land is owned collectively, so it cannot be sold off piece by piece, while each household holds lasting, inheritable rights to its home. Residents in Voi, Kenya, chose a CLT over individual titles and a housing cooperative in the 1990s for this reason. See Community Land Trusts and Informal Settlements in the Global South.

Individual titling became popular in the 1990s and 2000s, partly through the economist Hernando de Soto’s argument that formal title would unlock the capital in the homes of the poor. Studies in Colombia, Peru and Brazil found little effect on housing markets, jobs or access to credit, and found that titles can bring property taxes and other costs that push very poor households to sell.

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How did the Caño Martín Peña CLT come about?

Eight neighborhoods line the Caño Martín Peña, a polluted tidal channel in the middle of San Juan, Puerto Rico. Many families have lived there for generations on land they did not own. When the government planned to dredge and clean the channel, residents knew that the improvements would raise land values and could force them out.

Between 2002 and 2004, residents and their allies held more than 700 planning and organizing activities, and together they designed a plan for the district and a law, Law 489 of 2004, which created the Fideicomiso de la Tierra del Caño Martín Peña. The CLT now owns more than 110 hectares (272 acres), mostly former public land, and about 1,500 households are members. Instead of a ground lease, it gives families a surface rights deed to their homes. See CLTs in Puerto Rico.

The land, most of it former public land, was transferred by the City of San Juan and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the largest transfer of publicly owned land to a CLT to date. Instead of a ground lease, the CLT gives families a surface rights deed to their homes. Its success has made it a reference point for communities across the Global South.

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Where else are CLTs being used in informal settlements?

The first was the Tanzania-Bondeni CLT in Voi, Kenya, created in the 1990s when an informal settlement was upgraded. It required changes to Kenyan law, including a separate trust to hold the land. See CLTs in Africa.

In Rio de Janeiro, the Favela Community Land Trust project began in 2018, after some 80,000 people were evicted in the run-up to the 2016 Olympics. Led by Catalytic Communities, it is bringing the CLT, known in Brazil as the Termo Territorial Coletivo, to favelas and working toward national legislation. Communities and researchers are also exploring CLTs in Honduras, Bangladesh, India and South Africa. The CLT Center supports this work through its Global South CLT Initiative.

In South Africa, the Development Action Group and the CLT Center, with support from the Lincoln Institute, are exploring collective land ownership with two informal settlements in Philippi, Cape Town. A June 2026 learning exchange brought Cape Town residents together with practitioners from Brazil, Puerto Rico and Uganda. See “Are there CLTs in Africa and Asia?” under CLTs around the world.

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What does it take for a CLT to work in an informal settlement?

Experience so far points to a few conditions. Residents have to want collective ownership and keep wanting it; in one Kenyan settlement, a CLT failed when the minority who owned most structures pushed for individual titles instead. The law has to allow it, which in Kenya and Puerto Rico meant new legal arrangements. Governments usually have to transfer land, and support upgrading of water, sanitation and roads. And the CLT needs lasting leadership from residents, with funding and technical help for the long work of stewardship.

None of this happens quickly, and the result looks different in every place. The panel Securing Land Rights: CLTs in Informal Settlements, with leaders from Puerto Rico, Brazil and Bangladesh, describes how communities have gone about it.

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