<p>Adults with serious mental illnesses (SMIs) in the United States are increasingly residing in non-urban settings such as suburban and rural communities. A variety of positive and negative factors of non-urban settings (e.g., access to nature; lack of overcrowding; a culture of social support and cohesion; stigma fueled by decreased opportunities for informal interactions with individuals with SMIs) suggests that non-urban residents with SMIs may have a qualitatively different understanding of community than their urban counterparts. Using principles of Constructivist Grounded Theory and Framework Analysis, the aim of the current study was to explore how suburban residents with SMIs define their communities and to enhance the transferability of a Structural-Functional-Experiential (SFE) model of defining community by incorporating their experiences into the urban-based model. Fifteen racially/ethnically diverse adults with SMIs receiving Assertive Community Treatment in Montgomery County, MD were interviewed between January and July 2019. Semi-structured interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and analyzed using ResearchTalk’s “Sort and Sift, Think and Shift” methodology. Participants’ definitions of community aligned with the majority of their urban counterparts’ definitions including structural communities defined as people and places, functional communities that enhanced support, help and socialization; and experiential communities that included shared experiences and the importance of feeling safe. Within the SFE model, participants shared some notable differences in their definitions of community including virtual spaces (structural); reciprocal help (functional); and fostering positive feelings and shared interests (experiential). Implications for community-based practice with suburban residents with SMIs and transferability of the SFE model in non-urban settings is discussed.</p>