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Board member pitches town-held land lease to cut starter-home prices on Stow Road
Summary
A board member proposed that the town keep ownership of the Stow Road land and sell only structures (a ground-lease model) to reduce purchase prices for starter homes; members discussed tax, maintenance, and legal review implications and compared the idea to community land trusts.
During discussion of preferred housing types, a board member proposed a land-lease model in which the town retains the land and homeowners purchase only the structures, arguing the approach would remove the land-cost component and lower house prices by roughly "$160,000 an acre" in the example offered.
Members explored implications: assessors would still value land, homeowners would pay property tax on structures, and the town might need a small lease payment to fund upkeep for shared infrastructure (wells/septic). Speaker 5 and others compared the proposal to community land trusts and said it would require legal review; the board asked staff to investigate examples and the potential fiscal and maintenance impacts before advancing the model.
The motion-oriented output was to task staff and volunteers to gather comparative examples, seek legal counsel on how the Affordable Housing Trust conditions would apply, and return with options and cost estimates.
