WHY WE BUILD!

Opportunity - Hope - Stability, -Dignity - Community!

Supporting Habitat for Humanity improves the health and welfare of children and families, positively impacts your local economy, offers a hand up for working families, and impacts long-term housing stability and dignity.

Our housing programs are a hand-up to affordable homeownership and home maintenance and repairs. Local families achieve long-term stability. Their children are more likely to finish high school and go to college. And Habitat home owners have the lowest foreclosure rates in the nation!

Habitat for Humanity of Summit and Wasatch Counties, Utah is a non-profit housing agency committed to filling the need for decent, affordable, healthy and energy efficient homes for local working families.

How We're Meeting Local Housing Needs:

• Little Green Houses: Ownership of New, Healthy, Energy Efficient Single-Family Homes
• Rehabs: Rehabilitation of Existing Homes
• A Brush with Kindness: Home Repair & Maintenance in partnership with low-income home owners.

Our Commitment to Energy Efficiency:

We are committed to building homes that are healthy and energy and water efficient. The new Habitat home recently completed in Park City has received LEED Platinum certification, and its owners are realizing a 48% or greater annual energy savings and live in a healthy house. Most importantly, because of Habitat’s model of working with volunteers, homeowners, local businesses and contractors, the cost of achieving LEED certification was significantly reduced.

Our Current Projects:

• Construction of a 2nd two single-family home in Old Town Park City began in July and is scheduled for completion July 2013.
• ReStore, a home improvement thrift store, is opening in Park City to turn donated construction materials and home furnishings into revenue that will fund housing projects. Support of ReStore will help Habitat to establish a sustainable income stream, ensuring long term stability.
• Habitat accepts applications throughout the year to assist qualifying homeowners with repair and maintenance needs.

Why is Affordable Homeownership so Important?

With the support of our mountain town communities and donors like you, Habitat’s healthy, safe, energy efficient and affordable housing services are becoming available to more people. Habitat serves community members between 30 and 60% of AMI. Habitat is the only local affordable housing provider reaching those whose incomes fall between 30% and 45% AMI. These statistics help underscore the pricing gap that largely drives our local affordable housing needs:

• Local employees, such as teachers, firefighters, local government, essential service workers and hospitality workers earn about 57% of AMI. This income can support a home purchase price of $230,500 – but houses in this price range make up 3% or less of local housing stock

• 50% of workers in Summit County commute from outside of Summit County (including 8,788 public and private sector workers) and earn below 61% of the local area median income. Most live elsewhere because they are priced out of our local market

• 2011 Fair Market Rent(FMR): $1,050 for a two-bedroom unit in Summit County. It takes two full time minimum wage incomes (earning $30,000 annually) to afford local FMR for a two-bedroom unit

• 3,241 Summit County homeowners are cost burdened (paying more than 30% of income for rent and utilities). These homeowners are most at risk for losing insurance due to poor home conditions and risk health and personal safety because they cannot afford routine upkeep and improvements

• By 2020 there will be a projected 65% increase in senior citizens in Summit County. 57% of seniors who are homeowners currently qualify for Habitat’s A Brush with Kindness program by income

Your contribution today will support our 2013 Annual Campaign, a vital component of our $400,000 annual budget. Fully funded, this year’s budget will provide zero interest home ownership for two families, and low cost, zero interest home repairs to five qualifying home owners to improve safety, health, accessibility and energy efficiency in their homes.