Well, just the call last night that my family has been waiting for. Just found out that we are one of the 4 families selected this year to get a house through Habitat for Humanity.
We are very excited.
I am sure you have all heard of Habitat, but don't know if anyone knows the details.
Basically, we get a house at cost, which is around $54,000. There will be no interest on our mortgage. Nice. The houses they build are worth about $80,00 or so, so when we move in we will instantly have almost $30,000 in equity. Oh yeah, and our payments with tax and insurance will be less that $350 per month.
For now, the main thing we need to do is to put in our "sweat equity". My family ( along with help form friends and family members ) have to put in 150 hours of work on other houses that are currently being built for other families, than they will begin to start on a house for us, which requires us to put in another 150 hours. So, all total, we need to put in 300 hours of work, but we can have up to half of that come form people volunteering for us. The work sites provides the tools (you can use your own too if you want) and a contractor (site supervisor) to guide everything along. I'll be working almost every Saturday for 8 hours for quite a while now to get in my hours. My wife will be doing plenty too, as long as we can find childcare. I have one friend who will be volunteering with me as well, and hopefully I can recruit a few more.
To even qualify for the program we need to put in 12 hours of work to show that we had the initiative.
Well, I guess this is long enough already, but I would like to add one last thing. I think it would be great if anyone here would consider doing some volunteer time for Habitat. I am not saying this as a way to help me specifically, but just get a hold of your local Habitat group and put in a few hours. No experience is needed. Of course, if anyone wanted to come to Erie and help my family, that would be great too, but really just getting involved in the organization at all would be a great thing. If not for this org., my family would never be able to get as nice as a house as we will have.

That'* cool!

Habitat is an awesome program. Locally, the surplus donated goods are sold at their store to build cash for more builds and new materials. I've used that store before. They have a team that 'salvages' old buildings slated for demolition. They've got a garage door opener down there right now that I'm thinking about.

The experience will be very fun and rewarding for you. The sense of pride and ownership is HUGE after you participate at that level. Keep us updated!

Yeah, we have one of those stores here too. Actually, that is one way we can build up hours is by volunteering to work in the store, which they call the "restore".
And, yeah, I like the idea of helping build my own house. Will certainly add to the pride of ownership.
Plus, I'll be learning some skill to help when the time comes for upgrades and repairs. They offer classes on home maintenance, and the time spent in the classes counts towards your hours.
I would love to have a Bonneville Club Day for Habitat where everyone went and did some hours on a certain day all around the Country. Sort of a National Pay It Forward.

Congratulations!! If I were in your area, I'd be on your crew....

Once I get a real job going (still on temp work, dammit) I will definitely look into our local chapter for you though....

Very cool. I don't know if people can volunteer in a different city and have it count for me, but that isn't my main goal,. I would just like to see the Club reach out and help the Organization, and ultimately the families involved. I am not saying that the club officially endorse a charity, heck, we could organize work days for other programs too. just my two cents.

I am definately happy for you and your family. My aunt and uncle got a house through habitat for humanity a few years ago and I went to Caro to help. I was only supposed to be there for a couple of days but I enjoyed helping so much, I stayed the whole summer and worked on four different houses. I absolutely enjoyed it. Congrats again.

Find out and let me know.
I used to do work for H4H but one of the last houses I worked on had a BMW and a Mercedes in the driveway two months after it was done. That kinda pissed me off.

Yeah that would have pissed me off too. Man I am pretty poor too but I had to get my house the old fashioned way. Get in to debt like hell for it.

yeah that would be pretty cool to show up for a weekend meet. One day for the meet and the other day for the community service.

LOL - would be cool to see 40 people show up for a 6 hr day... 300hrs all done!