Lal Gurung, born in Bhutan, spent 18 years in a refugee camp in Nepal before emigrating to Vermont in January 2011. A little more than three years later, after spending a significant portion of his life living in a plastic tent, he became a homeowner in Burlington's South End, thanks to an innovative shared equity program from Champlain Housing Trust.

The program, which provides a generous down payment that stays with the house if it is sold, has made homeowners out of more than 1,000 families  since it was launched in 1984 by then-mayor of Burlington, Bernie Sanders.

"This was something the Sanders Administration came up with as a way to halt gentrification in the Old North End, and give people a stake in ownership," said Chris Donnelly, director of community relations for the Champlain Housing Trust. "Burlington became the first city in the country to put public money into creating a community land trust."

Today, the nonprofit Champlain Housing Trust has an annual operating budget of $10 million, with 80 percent of its income from fees and rents that people pay to live in its housing, or from developing new housing. The other 20 percent of the budget comes from grants and donations.

"Most of it is people paying rent," Donnelly said. "In our portfolio we have about 2,200 rentals of all shapes and sizes."

The Trust's rental housing is kept affordable, with rent and utilities that add up to about 30 percent of the renters' incomes.

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