Habitat for Humanity dedicates two homes on Coleman Street

On October 21, Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville dedicated two homes on Coleman Street in the city’s Locust Grove neighborhood. 

“Me and my husband, we grew up in a refugee camp,” said Rahmo Mohammed. “We never thought in our life that we would have a place to call at home.” 

Mohammed and her husband paid $349,900 for one half of a single family detached structure built by Habitat within the last year. That’s about 19 percent below the assessed value of $431,900.  

“Habitat made a true dream come true for us as a family and in the future we are looking forward to having this beautiful house that was built and we thank everyone who is involved and  made it happen for us, truly,” 

The Mohammeds as well as Najeeba Popal have gone through Habitat’s homeownership program, which has three criteria for eligibility. The family has to be in a less than desirable housing situation, willing to put in hours volunteering for Habitat doing construction or some other task, and have to be able to pay an affordable mortgage. 

“Rahmo and Salah and Najeeba have been pedaling hard to get here,” said Dan Rosensweig, the CEO of Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville. “And they’re not planning to stop any time soon. They’re planning to move forward with grace. Collectively they’ve put in more than 500 hours of sweat equity and both families made it really clear to us after the requirements were done and after they purchased their homes, and after they’ve settled in, they want to continue to move forward. They want to continue to pay it forward by volunteering with Habitat and helping other families achieve the blessings that they’ve had today.” 

Popal said she’s been working for six years to make her way through the process while also raising three children. She said there’s a lot of responsibility with becoming a Habitat homeowner. 

“Because of my income, it is not some sort of stable,” Popal said. “It is up and down. I had to focus on that as well.” 

Popal said she enjoyed the time working on the house and contributing to other builds. 

“No hard times will exist all the time or for always,” Popal said. “We are grateful for today. How hard it was, or whatever it was, we did that but it wasn’t me. It was all a group of people, all a community, they worked together to make this moment and I won’t forget that.”

Rosensweig noted that these homes are part of Habitat’s intentional strategy to work with the Charlottesville Redevelopment and Housing Authority and families who receive housing vouchers to open up places to live. 

For instance, Popal had been on a housing voucher to help cover her rent at Kindlewood which is operated by the Piedmont Housing Alliance. She is also a member of that entity’s Board of Directors. 

“And as the unfortunate situation in Market Street Park this month has shown us, we need more of that,” Rosensweig said. “We need more spots where people can move into so that nobody in this community should ever have to spend a night outside.” 

Popal agreed. 

“Everyone deserves to have, each little kid,” Popal said. “Either if they are a refugee, they are immigrants, or they are citizens, they deserve to have a place to call home and sleep with no worry where our next move will be.” 

Thanks to Angela Guzman at Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville for providing me the audio so I could produce the story. 

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