| Habitat News
Another Mortgage Gets Burned
On October 26, Josefina Garcia and daughter came to the GAHH office where she and Executive Director Chris Lehman “burned” her mortgage.
Chris and Josefina Watching the Flames Josefina also shared with us some of the story of her journey to home ownership. Josefina came to the US from Mexico when she was 17. Unfortunately, she found herself a widow with two young children at age 22. Friends encouraged her to look into Habitat’s program but she was reluctant at first thinking, as other families have said, “such a program is too good to be true.” When she did finally apply, she couldn’t qualify due to lingering debts from her late husband’s illness. But again, with the encouragement of friends she was able to make arrangements on those debts so that when she reapplied she was accepted into the program. Even though she was often working three jobs to support herself and the children, with the help of family and friends she met the sweat equity requirements. She moved into her home just before Christmas 1994. Now three of our partner families have been able to see their mortgages payments completed and the mortgage burned. We will be seeing more of these in the next few years as our early families complete their obligation. We congratulate them all! |
