Welcome to Christ Church United Methodist's photographic diary of our past and present Habitat for Humanity projects.

Click on the 'Houses Built' button above for current and past project house diaries.

2008 Project

Another exciting year of building is just around the corner and there are many ways in which you can be involved.  We need lots of hands to help us build, we need hands to prepare meals, we need hands to give and we especially need hands to be folded in prayer.  We will be partnering with Middletown UMC and Covenant UMC and will be working with Sonny Leonberger as our house leader.

Raise the Roof is the last weekend in May.  After that we will continue to work on Fridays and Saturdays (excluding the weekend of July 4th).

Click here to complete and submit the volunteer form online.

If you wish to complete the volunteer form manually, you may click here for a print-ready version. After printing and completing the form, deposit it in the Habitat box in the receptionist's area at the church.

Often you may be asked to meet at the Habitat Construction Center to help load the truck, or to paint. The Construction Center is located at 1631 Rowan Street. For an interactive map via mapblast.com, click here. Or click on the thumbnail image for a larger version:

Christ Church has set a goal of sponsoring a Habitat for Humanity house every year. Currently this requires us to contribute $30,000 towards the cost of the house (representing half of the total costs). If you wish to help us continue our work with Habitat you may send donations at any time in any amount to Christ Church. We thank you in advance for your continued generosity and support of this mission!

If submitting a donation via the Sunday offering plate be sure to clearly indicate that your donation is designated for our Habitat fund.
Or mail your donation to:

Christ Church United Methodist
Habitat Fund - c/o Barbara Schissler
4614 Brownsboro Road
Louisville, KY 40207

About HABITAT for HUMANITY

Habitat for Humanity of Metro Louisville is a non-profit, Christian oriented, provider of affordable housing to low income families. In Louisville in 1985, Habitat began renovating existing dwelling, soon it found this was not an economical use of assets, moreover, it carried the possibility of devastating liabilities. At that point the organization switched to constructing new affordable homes. The house that Christ Church built along with St. John UMC in the summer of 2002 was the 150th house Habitat built in Louisville. Habitat’s motto is A hand up not a hand out. During 2005, Habitat celebrated their 200th house!

In the past applications have been accepted in January, with an average of 450 applicants per year. Now there is a rolling application process. No one knows how many applicants this will produce, but it will probably exceed the previous method.

All applicants must qualify to be accepted as a potential home owner. There is no restriction by race or sex, but there are criteria. The income must not exceed a given standard for a particular sized family. Other criteria are: the family pays more than 50% of their income for substandard housing; there exists employment sufficient to meet the mortgage and basic family needs; any debt does not exceed a level of roughly $3,000 to $5,000; and a background check shows no record of felonious behavior. The single largest reason for rejection is the size of the debt. Ten percent of the applicants succeed in being accepted each year.

These successful applicants are now partner families and must attend a number of training sessions in budgeting, food shopping, food preparation and home maintenance. Each partner family must put in 400 sweat-equity hours on Habitat home construction prior to moving into their own home. As sites and sponsors become available, the partner family who currently has the most sweat-equity hours has a choice of one of two sites. If both sites are rejected, the partner family goes to the bottom of the list and must work up again. At the next opportunity, if both sites are again rejected, the partner family is dropped from the program. Once a partner family selects a site and chooses a type of home from approximately 5 basic plans, construction can begin.

Today a Habitat house costs approximately $54,000. Some materials are donated, others are purchased. Habitat contracts out the concrete block base on which all houses set, the final electrical tie-in, the plumbing, the heating and air conditioning, the finishing of the drywall and the laying of the floor covering. All houses get resilient flooring in the kitchen and bathrooms and carpet in the rest of the house. Each partner family works with the volunteer labor force on their own house to completion. From Raise the Roof weekend to House Dedication takes approximately 13 weeks. The completed house will appraise for $75,000 to $80,000, depending on the neighborhood. The difference between the cost and the appraised value is what volunteer labor contributes.

The partner family upon closing has a mortgage of $54,000 at 0% interest over a 20 year period. The monthly payment of principal plus escrow for insurance and taxes runs about $250. At the time of closing, Habitat takes out a second mortgage equal to the difference between the first and the appraised value of the house. This step is necessary to prevent someone from acquiring an $80,000 house for $54,000 and immediately selling it for profit. After 5 years, the second mortgage is forgiven, and the partner family receives 1/15th equity in each of the next 15 years. Habitat for Humanity in Louisville is particularly proud of the fact they have never had a foreclosure on any house they have built so far.

To give some idea of the progress being made in the lives of the partner families, the following examples are cited:

1. Cindy and Fred Polen received a house in 2000. Since then Fred has qualified for his GED and started his own drywall contracting business. Cindy is in her second year at Jefferson County Community College and is doing exceptionally well academically.

2. Eurana Horton received her house in the spring of 2001. She is now the Administrative Assistant at the Portland United Methodist Center on Baird Street. In addition she has qualified for, and now operates, a free income tax service on behalf of the Center for the neighborhood.

3. Margaret Kulp, who received the house sponsored and built by Christ Church, St. John and Crestwood United Methodist Churches in the summer of 2001, has Started a block watch in the neighborhood which has received raves from the local police and has been elected to the Board of Directors of the Portland United Methodist Center.

The construction of these homes in the various neighborhoods has inspired other people who live there to spend time, effort and money to fix up their own properties. Now Habitat faces competition from commercial home builders for the plots it used to obtain inexpensively from the city.