Land & Power
Consulting:
Helping Finance Community Ownership of Housing

Get Started

Are you a Community Land Trust looking to expand your movement led acquisition strategy? Contact us for a free 20 minute consultation.

Are you a Community Land Trust looking to expand your movement led acquisition strategy? Contact us for a free 20 minute consultation.

Are you a Community Land Trust looking to expand your movement led acquisition strategy? Contact us for a free 20 minute consultation.

Reach out.

Reach out.

Reach out.

Land & Power Consulting will help you finance your movement led Community Land Trust acquisition and organizing goals.

Land & Power Consulting will help you finance your movement led Community Land Trust acquisition and organizing goals.

Land & Power Consulting will help you finance your movement led Community Land Trust acquisition and organizing goals.

Land and Power (L&P) was created in the beginning of 2019 to provide expert advising to membership-based housing organizations and Community Land Trusts (CLT), on how to best collaborate and implement effective acquisition financing strategies. Based on years of housing organizing victories in Oakland and Los Angeles California and East New York gaps were identified in the financing architecture of CLT acquisitions, particularly the availability of liquidity and the velocity of project financing. Land and Power was founded to fill those gaps and successfully created the first California municipal fund exclusively for CLT acquisitions and helped finance the City of New York’s first CLT acquisition. Most noteworthy was L&P’s role in collaboration with the Oakland Community Land Trust in creating the Moms4Housing acquisition strategy and facilitating the purchase of their property. 


L&P has advised on the creation of public acquisition funds throughout the state of California, resulting in statewide legislation for the prioritization and financing of the CLT model. 


The organization is here to help regional CLTs throughout the nation build effective and permanent funding mechanisms of both private and public capital, that will allow for a scaling up of housing stock and infrastructure.

Land and Power (L&P) was created in the beginning of 2019 to provide expert advising to membership-based housing organizations and Community Land Trusts (CLT), on how to best collaborate and implement effective acquisition financing strategies. Based on years of housing organizing victories in Oakland and Los Angeles California and East New York gaps were identified in the financing architecture of CLT acquisitions, particularly the availability of liquidity and the velocity of project financing. Land and Power was founded to fill those gaps and successfully created the first California municipal fund exclusively for CLT acquisitions and helped finance the City of New York’s first CLT acquisition. Most noteworthy was L&P’s role in collaboration with the Oakland Community Land Trust in creating the Moms4Housing acquisition strategy and facilitating the purchase of their property. 


L&P has advised on the creation of public acquisition funds throughout the state of California, resulting in statewide legislation for the prioritization and financing of the CLT model. 


The organization is here to help regional CLTs throughout the nation build effective and permanent funding mechanisms of both private and public capital, that will allow for a scaling up of housing stock and infrastructure.

Land and Power (L&P) was created in the beginning of 2019 to provide expert advising to membership-based housing organizations and Community Land Trusts (CLT), on how to best collaborate and implement effective acquisition financing strategies. Based on years of housing organizing victories in Oakland and Los Angeles California and East New York gaps were identified in the financing architecture of CLT acquisitions, particularly the availability of liquidity and the velocity of project financing. Land and Power was founded to fill those gaps and successfully created the first California municipal fund exclusively for CLT acquisitions and helped finance the City of New York’s first CLT acquisition. Most noteworthy was L&P’s role in collaboration with the Oakland Community Land Trust in creating the Moms4Housing acquisition strategy and facilitating the purchase of their property. 


L&P has advised on the creation of public acquisition funds throughout the state of California, resulting in statewide legislation for the prioritization and financing of the CLT model. 


The organization is here to help regional CLTs throughout the nation build effective and permanent funding mechanisms of both private and public capital, that will allow for a scaling up of housing stock and infrastructure.

Success & Media

Our Work In East New York

Organizing the funding for the first privately purchased Community Land Trust acquisition in New York City.

Our Moms 4 Housing Strategy

Our role in a major movement victory that established the foundational principles of our method.

Building CLT Acquisition Funds

Our work in creating a multi million dollar fund solely for Community Land Trust acquisitions.

Vision

Financing

To create self-sustaining private and public funding pools that can allow regional CLTs to compete in the private real estate markets.

Movement

Utilize a movement-based strategy to expand the campaign for the de-commodification of housing led by strong and vibrant CLTs.

Infrastructure

Build lasting alliances between CLTs, progressive funders and membership-based organizations for the purpose of property acquisition.

Our Team

Justin Tombolesi

Founder and Lead Consultant

Justin Tombolesi founded Land & Power Consulting in 2019 as a response to what he saw as the missing component in movement based Community Land Trust acquisition strategies: funder and investor organizing. Justin has pulled from years of experience in housing organizing and financing work particularly in movement based Community Land Trusts and membership organizing.  



He was head of acquisitions for the Oakland Community Land Trust (OakCLT) where he negotiated the purchase of residential buildings under threat of displacement by leveraging public and private capital. He also designed and implemented through local organizing a $12 million public acquisition fund and a private community-controlled investment fund to purchase properties exclusively for Community Land Trusts. He was also a lead organizer at the California statewide membership organization the Alliance of Californians For Community Empowerment (ACCE) and has years of experience managing successful local electoral campaigns and working for a City Council office.   



Justin received his B.A. from the University of California at Berkeley in History and Interdisciplinary Studies and is currently completing a Juris Doctor program at the New York University School of Law. 

Benjamin Schaub

Development Consultant

Ben Schaub (they/them) is a queer leftist organizer living and working in Brooklyn. Their first introduction to the housing justice struggle was in working with homeowners targeted by the subprime mortgage crisis of 2008. After their experiences with the Occupy Wall Street movement as an early college student in New York, they became motivated by a vision of what creative cross-movement coalition building can look like.

They have spent the last decade working on struggles for housing liberation with organizations including the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE), Oakland Rising, and the Trans Law Center. Before coming to Land and Power, Ben spent two years working on the Emergency Rental Assistance Program (ERAP) for New York State. They firmly believe the better of all worlds is possible, and that with the right organization of both money and people into strong grassroots coalitions, we can and will win.

They studied at the University of San Francisco and UC Berkeley. They have held research positions in law and politics at Berkeley, USF, and the University of Cambridge.