Habitat Wake Happenings

Today is the last day of our fiscal year and, oh what a year it has been!  Thanks to God’s faithfulness, an incredibly generous community, and such loyal partners this ministry of Habitat Wake has reached our highest level ever for serving families in a single year!  We are indeed blessed.

Tom Gipson, Habitat Wake Advisory Board member and long-time supporter, was this week's Tar Heel of the week! He has made amazing things happen with the Home Builders Blitz, and we're so thankful for all of his work. Tom and Steve Thomas, formerly of This Old House, were on-site Thursday during Builders Blitz week to see our progress and speak with the builders about their experience.

We have an indeed had a blessed year!  Our fiscal year ends at June 30 and we will have served 119 families this year.  We had planned to serve 102 families, so here’s to the 17 additional families we were able to serve thanks to a faithful God, a super generous community, very committed volunteers, and to diligent work from a talented staff team!

It’s all about perspective.  This week, 130+ AmeriCorps volunteers from throughout the country have descended upon the Northeast End community in Wake Forest with the task of building three homes from framing to finish, 2 homes from painting to finish, and providing much needed exterior repairs to 10 owner-occupied homes—all the while living with co-workers in a freshman dorm at NC State.

Last Saturday (the day after Valentine’s), we celebrated the culmination of a very special partnership between Coastal Federal Credit Union and the Koledji family building a home near Triangle Town Center that the Koledji’s will purchase and realize their long-held dream of becoming homeowners in the U.S.

Habitat for Humanity of Wake County is excited to announce the selection of Mark Systems' Integrated Homebuilder Management System (IHMS) as our enterprise software suite. Mark Systems’ IHMS will be an ideal match for Habitat due to their capability to combine and leverage resources and knowledge, share information across a broader extent and create efficiencies that were not previously available. This new service will allow our organization to save more money that can be better spent towards building more homes for the families we serve.

This past week, Habitat for Humanity of Wake County was featured in the North Raleigh News as part of an exciting announcement. Habitat Wake will begin breaking ground on five new homes in the Wake Forest area this spring. The work will be focused on the Northeast End of Wake Forest, which in general houses families who are of lower income. Wake Habitat is looking not only to build homes but make a lasting impact that will help the whole neighborhood to flourish, through A Brush With Kindness (exterior repairs) and Neighborhood Revitalization initiatives.

It is definitely the season for giving and for that we are grateful. I often say that if our donations were at the December level throughout the year, imagine how many more families we could serve.

Last month, we met an amazing woman volunteering with our A Brush with Kindness exterior repair program.  Her name is Amber May, and she and her husband are students of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.  She revealed that Habitat for Humanity has a very special place in her heart.