The FLS bought up land they divided up into plots that were big enough to qualify for the 40 shilling franchise that gave people the right to vote.

It registered as the Ipswich and Suffolk Permanent Benefit Building Society in February 1886 to provide mortgages for people buying land through the FLS.

[1] The Ipswich & Suffolk Building Society originated in October 1849 as part of the forty-shilling freeholders movement, a project which aimed to make home ownership an option for ordinary people, rather than just the landed elite.

[2] In January 2004, after almost ninety years based in Upper Brook Street, Ipswich, the society moved its headquarters to a new venue at the Ransomes Europark.

There are two in Ipswich, as well as locations in Hadleigh, Aldeburgh, Halesworth, Haverhill, Saxmundham, Woodbridge, and Sudbury.