Habitat for Humanity

At a construction site ceremony on November 19, Habitat for Humanity raised a wall and raised the funds to erect hundreds more. 

About 100 people attended the wall-raising ceremony at the new Majestic Place neighborhood in East Naples, where volunteers, Habitat staffers, and prospective homeowners joined to symbolically lift the first exterior stud walls of Antonio and Susana Molina’s home off the slab and bring the house out of the ground. Before the crew moved over to the homesite, Habitat for Humanity of Collier County CEO Rev. Lisa Lefkow announced that Habitat’s board chair Janet Miller and her husband Andrew are giving Habitat a $5 million gift, the largest single donation ever received in Habitat Collier’s 46-year history. 

“The Millers have made a historic commitment,” said Lefkow. “Their gift will ensure that the momentum of homebuilding is not interrupted. Never before has the need for affordable housing been greater.” The 23-acre Majestic Place community will be home to 109 families once construction is completed. In all, she said Habitat Collier has provided homes for 2,600 families.

It’s gratifying to be able to feel you are helping the community you live in, said Janet Miller. “It’s the families that sell you on this. Kids get to be kids” when they have a decent place to live. Without Habitat housing, “residents pay almost half their income for housing – and the rent goes up every year. Habitat has a proven model that works,” she said. Andrew Miller amassed the funds that allowed them to contribute to Habitat on such a scale through his firm, Miller Capital Advisory, a commercial real estate firm.

The group gathered under a canopy on a bright, sunny day and also heard from Habitat clients whose lives had been changed by the homes Habitat helped them purchase. Susana Molina, with her husband Antonio and two of the eight children in their blended family standing with her. Until their new home is finished, the family, including a dog, is living in a rundown two-bedroom, one-bath duplex in a sketchy neighborhood.

U.S. Army second lieutenant Franco Perez, serving in the field artillery, spoke of the difference it made to him when his family was able to move into their new Habitat home. Debt-free, with a paid for bachelor’s degree in criminology, he said, “Habitat changed my life.” 

Mercedes Vargas, a widow and single mother, is further along in the process. She is at the point of signing closing documents and could move in as soon as January. 

“I stand before you as a future homeowner right here,” she said.

Each Habitat homeowner must invest hundreds of hours of “sweat equity” working on their own or another Habitat home, go through financial education, and demonstrate they will be able to make regular mortgage payments. 

Lefkow stressed that Habitat homes must be earned, and it is critical for the long-term viability of the program that homeowners can and do pay their mortgages to keep a flow of funds for future homes. “This makes a tremendous difference in people’s lives. Often, they are paying over 50 percent of their income for housing, for truly substandard conditions,” said Lefkow. “The application process is exhaustive – it’s like a mortgage application on steroids.”

Susana Molina said they had already more than met their goal for sweat equity, doing work such as painting, caulking, and cleaning on other Habitat homes. As the wall-raising ceremony progressed, work continued on houses all along the street, in many stages of completion. At different addresses, workers were digging foundations, forming up slabs, nailing on siding, and covering roofs. One prospective Habitat homeowner, Norma Casillo, worked on a home at the opposite end of the row from the Molina’s job site, daubing paint on the exterior. With limited English, she said she had put in 50 hours of work so far and was smiling as she painted. 

For more information, to volunteer or contribute to Habitat, call 239-775-0036 or go online to www.HabitatCollier.org.