dunno if it just me, but I had to add PREFIX a few places to get 'perl INSTALL_BASE=$HOME' to work 
From a1e02fbdaba3725730418a837b506e713904ada5 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: David Bremner 
Date: Fri, 29 Aug 2008 15:18:24 -0300
Subject: [PATCH] add missing $(PREFIX) to install path

---
 Makefile.PL |    6 +++---
 1 files changed, 3 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-)

diff --git a/Makefile.PL b/Makefile.PL
index 979483c..1f27394 100755
--- a/Makefile.PL
+++ b/Makefile.PL
@@ -50,9 +50,9 @@ extra_clean:
        $(MAKE) -C po clean

 extra_install:
-       install -d $(DESTDIR)/etc/ikiwiki
-       install -m 0644 wikilist $(DESTDIR)/etc/ikiwiki
-       install -m 0644 auto.setup $(DESTDIR)/etc/ikiwiki
+       install -d $(DESTDIR)$(PREFIX)/etc/ikiwiki
+       install -m 0644 wikilist $(DESTDIR)$(PREFIX)/etc/ikiwiki
+       install -m 0644 auto.setup $(DESTDIR)$(PREFIX)/etc/ikiwiki

        install -d $(DESTDIR)$(PREFIX)/share/ikiwiki
        for dir in `cd underlays && find . -follow -type d ! -regex '.*\.svn.*'`; do \
--
1.5.6.3