Forest Row is a neighborhood of eighteen families on a twenty-one acre site located two miles from downtown Great Barrington, Massachusetts. The homes are clustered on five acres in two quadruplex, three duplex, and four single-family buildings. The rest of the site is predominantly wooded. Construction of the buildings began in 1986 after the Community Land Trust received a Planned Unit Residential Development (PURD) permit from the Town of Great Barrington.

Residents own their own homes, much like a condominium, while the Community Land Trust retains ownership of the land itself. Homeowners lease the land on a 99- year basis. The Forest Row Land Use Plan broadly determines how the land may be used within ecological guidelines. The Forest Row Association, made up of homeowners, manages specific uses of the land by Forest Row members. Homeownership at Forest Row is reserved for year-round residents. Families purchase the replacement cost of their units adjusted for deterioration, but do not purchase the land value. This keeps the cost of land out of the purchase cost and so keeps Forest Row homes more affordable than comparable units in the region.

Original financing to build Forest Row came from loans from committed local members of the Community Land Trust and from local bank financing. No government subsidy programs were used in the development of the neighborhood. In addition, in order to help first time home buyers purchase homes at Forest Row, a group of Berkshire second home owners created a pool of low-cost second mortgage funds to help with down payment costs. This pool, managed by the Community Land Trust, was known as The Fund for Affordable Housing. Later The Fund incorporated separately as a charitable organization to help create affordable housing. The Fund employed the skills of its board of directors to build one of the single family homes at Forest Row and offer it to a local family at below replacement costs.

Forest Row is an example of how first-time homebuyers, concerned residents, and the professional community working together can create permanently affordable homeownership opportunities in a region without relying on government subsidy programs.

For more information on Forest Row, and to access the legal documents to create a similar project in your community, go to the Community Land Trust page of the E. F. Schumacher Society.