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Family Stories

J. is a single mother with three children, after moving into her Habitat home, she was able to return to school to obtain her nursing degree. She was then offered an excellent job opportunity in Georgia. Her children will be going on to college at Georgia state schools as the State of Georgia offers free college tuition to student s who maintain a B average. She was able to sell her Habitat home at a profit and now owns her second home in Smyrna.

G. is a single mom of three, she moved from renting a cramped apartment to owning her own Habitat home in the same neighborhood. Her rent had been $575 per month. Her Habitat mortgage including taxes and homeowners insurance is $330 per month. G. is currently completing her divinity studies to become a minister. M. is currently completing her sweat equity requirement of 500 hours. She is a single mom with two sons. She lives with her parents at present. Her 9-year-old son sleeps on the living room sofa, he has no bedroom of his own. M. sleeps in the basement, her bed is located next to the furnace, her baby sleeps in a portacrib next to the bed. She feels owning her own home will bring "stability and a sense of security" to her family.

J. and M are the parents of two children and were recently approved as a partner family. J. is a recovering alcoholic. He started a community youth group at the local church in his neighborhood and the group has become so large that J. needs to transport several van loads of kids to every meeting or event. The roof of their rented house leaks so badly that all the ceilings are covered with mildew and must be cleaned daily. The children have respiratory problems and M suffers from chronic headaches. M. is a single mom with two young teen-age daughters. She had to relocate the family to another state to escape a violent and stalking ex-husband. The only housing she could afford was public housing with high crime and overwhelming rodent problems. After moving into her Habitat home she called her auto insurance agent to provide her new address and was informed that she qualified for a $250 deduction in premium because she had moved to a low crime area.

T. and M. with 5 children are working hard toward completing their sweat equity hours. Their current rental has heat problems. They must all sleep in one area to keep warm. Water leaks into the kitchen, hallway and their one bathroom. There is no yard for the children to play and the apartment is located above a business so the family must be extremely quiet during the hours the business is open. About owning their own home they say," it would be a dream, we could grow old there and pass it down to our children."

A. is a single mom with one daughter. She supports herself by running a state approved day care in her apartment. She states, "Living in your own home means being a part of the community family that reaches beyond your immediate residence. Homeownership is being aware of the long term benefits of your presence and influence in the community."

M. and J. are the parents of three. They have just started their sweat equity hours. J. is recovering from colon and prostate cancer and credits his wife's nagging to saving his life. They want to own their own home in a community with good schools as they have several children with special needs.

T. was a single mom with two children. She lived in the worst neighborhood in her city. Her room, which she shared with her children, was in the unheated attic of her mother's roach infested rented home. Drugs dealers and prostitutes operated 24 hours a day. A co-worker wrote us on her behalf." Children should be with green grass, swing sets and the sound of the ice cream truck. Not in bondage with drug dealers, curses and hopelessness." T. was recently married and now lives in her Habitat home on a quiet street and her yard has a swing set for her children.

T. and L. are the parents of three children and at the time of their application, were working a total of five jobs to make ends meet. It took them 2 years to complete their sweat equity hours due to their limited free time. The mortgage on their Habitat home was less then the rent they had been paying and they were able to drop two of the jobs and spend more time as a family. Asked what part of her new home was her favorite, T. replied" I have no favorite parts. Its all good."

C. is a divorced mother of three. She worked hard to complete her sweat equity, stating that she had " done work I didn't think I could do. There was a lot of hard construction. A lot of shoveling and ditch digging. We also put up siding. I don't think I ever want to see another patch of dirt again." A year after closing on her Habitat home C. suffered a stroke. Her neighbors worked together to help the family during that difficult time. She is now fully recovered and will soon remarry.

C. is a single mother with two sons. Her oldest, suffers from severe asthma, having several attacks each week. He has had only one attack since they moved into their Habitat home. His mother credits her new home for her son's improved health. Their other apartments always had old carpets, chipping paint on the windowsills and old plaster walls and ceilings. She states that her son's improved health has also affected his schoolwork and he will complete his first semester at a local community college this month.

T. is a 29-year old single woman living in the Parkside section of Camden. She has two young children, a boy 8 years old and a girl 2 years old. . She is currently renting a twostory house that is approximately 100 years old. There are no screens on any of the windows and some of them cannot be opened. Sometime the oil heater does not work, produces strong odors and leaks smoke throughout the house. Sometimes T. has to leave the house and stay with her mother because it is too cold. For this she pays $370/month. There are electrical problems such as circuit breakers tripping, faulty light
switches and a light switch located directly over a puddle of water in the basement. Other problems are: the basement door is nailed shut, rain water leaks into various rooms, ceiling tiles fall, kitchen sink leaks into the basement, rats run through the house and a there are a limited number of unusually small closets. T. certainly has inadequate housing.

T. is a 30 year-old single woman who at the time she filed her application was living in a mobile trailer village in Browns Mills. She has three young children, two boys aged 11 and 7 and one girl 4 years old. They were living in a small two-bedroom 1979 trailer. The living room, dining room and kitchen are combined. The two boys were sleeping in one bedroom and T. and her daughter were sleeping in the other. There were weak spots in the flooring in the boys bedroom and hallway that had to be covered with plywood to prevent a serious accident. There were also holes in the walls in T.s bedroom from the
washing machine vibrating around. The windows were very drafty and had to be covered with plastic sheeting. Water pipes would freeze in the winter and the toilet did not flush properly. Some sections of the kitchen cabinets had dry rot and some of the doors had come off and were set aside because special skills and tools were needed to reinstall them. T is now a member of the Habitat family living her own home.

J. & P and their three children are living with his sister and her family in a single family, three-bedroom residence. The five of them share one bedroom. The sister also has children - two sons, ages 5 and 7. The very crowded house is entirely too small for all these people and their belongings. The front entry is jammed with boxes being stored there. Both mom and dad work outside of the home.

M. & G are a family that formerly lived in Haiti, but now are living in a 4 Bedroom house in. They are a family of 10 but most of their children are grown. Three of the children would be living in the Habitat home. Currently, they are renting a Rancher from a family member however, there are other adults and children living in the house. At times, there may be 6-7 adults and 10-16 children living there. The living conditions are totally inadequate for the continuous flow of adults and children in and out of the home. SS is a single mother of one son. She and her son share a bedroom in her grandparents
home in Camden. She fears for her sons safety and will not let him play outside. During the Habitat home visit she showed members of the FSC bullet holes in the sidewalk in front of her home where a boy was shot and killed 2 summers ago.