ABSTRACT: Master Planned Communities (MPCs) present new features to the housing development scene in Australia based around what has been called ‘lifestyle consumerism’. As part of this, property developers involved in MPCs have associated the idea of community with their product through extensive marketing campaigns, and have expressed the aim to foster the formation of community in their developments. This paper considers the implications of developers wishing to foster the formation of community and presents the proposition that one aspect of this involves the commodification of community. ‘Commodification of community’ as used here refers to the development of community as a commodity. This process is shown to involve an idealised or mythical form of community. Following (Maffesoli 1996, p. 148) ‘myth’ is used here “…in the sense in which something that has perhaps never really existed acts, effectively, on the imagination of the time.” The possible impact of the commodification of community on attitudes to community formation in a master planned community is considered. The paper is based on a project currently being undertaken investigating community building in a master planned community in South East Queensland.