Read the CIF Handbook

Access the CIF Toolkit

Community Investment Funds (CIFs) are professionally-managed investment funds with three essential characteristics: local sourcing of capital, local investing, and local decision-making. A successful community investment fund benefits investors and the community, through a positive rate of return and an influx of non-extractive capital to local businesses and development projects (such as renewable energy infrastructure, affordable housing, or community spaces). CIFs make local investing easier for retail investors looking to put their money somewhere where they will earn a monetary return and experience the positive social benefits of having a well-resourced local economy, without having to do due diligence on individual businesses and projects. 

NC3 is dedicated to providing high-quality and accessible information about creating and managing CIFs, in order to seed investment funds in more communities. We see a wide and diverse network of CIFs, tailored to their regions’ specific needs, as the future of community investing. To that end, we have developed the CIF Handbook and CIF Toolkit.

The Handbook (released in 2020) illustrates a wide range of approaches you might apply to build your own CIF. It is not a call to action, but a manual for those who have already been called. In it, we:

• explore short profiles of 10 funds that showcase the wide range of models and experiments underway 
• describe the basic steps a community needs to take to develop a CIF
• provide a comprehensive legal primer on the types of community investment funds currently possible
• Point readers to a list of books, articles, organizations, law firms, and others that can assist you in your effort to launch a CIF​

The Toolkit (released in 2021) is a collection of resources to help you develop your own community investment fund. It includes explainer videos and downloadable worksheets to get you started, including a Team Builder Matrix, Investment Thesis Worksheet, Fund Calculator, Operating Structure Checklist, and Financial Modeling Guidelines. The Toolkit acts as a complement to “Chapter 2: Steps to Create a Community Investment Fund” of the Handbook.

These resources illustrate the belief that inspiration should fuel the launch of community capital funds, but perspiration will be needed to keep them running. At the same time, we know that the field will not scale if we are sweating alone. Thus, as a community of practice, we endeavor to share our learnings so that all of us can spend less time building models and more time building community. To join a listserv of CIF practitioners, fill out this form. ​