Foudation Begins

Ready for Concrete

Habitat for Humanity duplex is under way

Jody Patten, of Routt County Habitat for Humanity, reports her organization already is hard at work on pouring concrete for the foundation of a new duplex residential building in Riverside.

“That’s thanks to a recent $15,000 grant from the Wells Fargo Housing Foundation, our single largest private donor to date,” Patten wrote in a news release this week. 

A crew from the National Honor Society at Steamboat Springs High School will be getting its hands dirty alongside two or three of the new homeowners Wednesday after school.

The families who will someday occupy the homes include an active duty military family with two youngsters and a mother of two teenage boys. They were picked via a “blind” family-selection committee process that scored their housing needs. Both families live in rental homes they stand to lose because the owners plan to move back to town and both spend well over 50 percent of their incomes on rent and earn below 50 percent of area median income ($30,000 for families their size). Both families have committed to working 300 to 350 hours on building their own homes with Habitat.

When their homes are complete, each will pay a down payment and a monthly mortgage of $400 to $500 based on the cost to build each 1,100-square-foot unit. Those payments go back into Habitat’s “Fund for Humanity” to help build more homes.

Routt County Habitat Project Done for Winter

Routt County Habitat for Humanity finished the foundation at its two-duplex unit at 2750 Honeysuckle Lane and closed it up for the winter.

Using a $15,000 Wells Fargo Housing Foundation grant, $25,000 from the city of Steamboat Springs and Routt County community housing funds and contributions from private donors, Habitat started the project that will provide homes for two local families in the Riverside neighborhood in west Steamboat.

Habitat Executive Director Jody Patten said in an email that the organization is trying to build each 1,100-square-foot duplex unit for less than $100,000 but still has quite a bit of fundraising to do through donations and grants.

She has said Habitat would like to have the families in their new homes by Thanksgiving 2012. Habitat will solicit volunteer help to build the house in April.