Building Homes, Changing Lives

Searching for Homes That Need Repair

2012-02-07T16:13:00.000-08:00

As the Preserve a Home program develops its A Brush With Kindness (ABWK) throughout Ventura County, we continue our search for more homes that need some "TLC". ABWK is Ventura County Habitat for Humanity's program that helps lower-income homeowners complete simple, exterior home improvements. In the past 6 months, we have "brushed" 3 homes and the 4th is nearing completion. But that's not enough, we need to find more families and homes to serve. We are accepting applications from all throughout the County, but for this next particular wave of ABWK homes, we are specifically looking for owner-occupied homes in the Nyeland Acres/El Rio area and/or in the City of Ventura's westside.

The ABWK program is simple in nature. Habitat for Humanity provides the donated volunteer labor and the homeowner pays for the necesary materials to repair the home's exterior through a zero interest loan. Yes, you read correctly, a zero interest loan. You don't see too many of those nowadays, especially in construction. These loans can range up to $5,000 and payments are individually tailored for each famliy based on financial need. However, to qualify for this program, homeowners must meet a minimum criteria.

As part of our search, we will be having a presentation on the ABWK program and how it works at the Nyeland Community Center (3334 Santa Clara St.) on Thursday February 23, 2012 at 7:00 pm. We will feature some cool before and after pictures of the homes we have transformed and answer questions as well.

Do you have a home that can use some work? Or do you know of someone that can benefit from this great service? For further information, details on how to qualify or to download a Pre-Application, please visit our website or call (805) 485-6065, ext. 202.

Hungry for Sharky's?

2012-01-23T21:06:00.000-08:00

Last month, we had the opportunity to start our "Brush With Kindness" home #4 in Simi Valley. We were fortunate enough in having some hard-working young men and women from the CLEAR Program, as well as students from Agoura and Westlake High Schools participate in this latest Preserve a Home project.

We also had the good folks from Sharky's Woodfired Mexican Grill help us out. They had the clever idea of celebrating their holiday party by volunteering for us about a week before Christmas. How cool is that?

The crew from Sharkey's worked hard all morning as they prepped the home for the primer application. They power-washed, caulked, spackled and left everything ready so the painting volunteers could do their thing the following day.

And making good on a promise made, I have posted their group picture on this blog. For one reason or another, I never got around to posting their picture. But as the saying goes, it's better late than not at all.

Gracias Sharky's!

2012-01-17T21:30:00.000-08:00

So here we are, the inagural post for Habitat for Humanity of Ventura County's very own blog page. It's been sometime in the thinking because I wasn't too sure how to share funny, heartwarming and interesting stories and pictures that staff and volunteers come across in our daily tasks of fighting homelessness. On the flip side, there are also difficult and heartbreaking stories that are worth passing along. No worries though, this blog is certainly not meant to alarm, but it is intended to help raise awarness of the homelessness plight that is abounds right here in our own backyard.

In any case all anecdotes, whether they are from one extreme to the other, are worthy of sharing with all our friends and followers of HFHVC. Due to the characteristics and type of postings, I get the impression that perhaps our website or Facebook pages might not be the best forum to share these. Therefore, this informal and hopefully informative space should help us do just that.

As we roll into the new year and build homes #55 and 56, keep an eye out for some wonderful reads, inspiring folks, praise to everyone who helps with our mission and even some real cool stuff for sale at the ReStore. And did you know that a new ReStore is coming to East County (aka Simi Valley)? Stay tuned for details and for the date of the Grand Opening!