Home Repairs
Most recent repair
We completed repairs to a retired veteran's house. Since his wife's death several years ago, the house has fallen into disrepair.
Elizabeth City Habitat for Humanity receives $12,000 grant from Lowe’s to improve home safety and health outcomes in Elizabeth City
Elizabeth City, NC 7/18/2022 —Elizabeth City Habitat for Humanity has received a $12,000 grant from Lowe’s to help complete 2-3 Housing Plus projects in Elizabeth City. The funding is part of Lowe’s partnership renewal with Habitat for Humanity that includes a donation of $2.5 million to support 100 local Habitat organizations undertaking home repair and rehab projects across the U.S.
“This grant will enable us to complete repairs for our low-income seniors,” said Elizabeth City Habitat for Humanity President Erica Ramjohn.
Projects in Elizabeth City will focus on repairs for low-income senior homeowners. These repairs will not only provide safer homes for these residents but they will also enable them to remain in their homes independently. While making the repairs, the affiliate will also provide modifications such as step-in showers, grab bars and accessible door handles.
Access to quality, affordable home repair and modification services continues to be out of reach for low to moderate income households across the nation. With the support of this funding, Elizabeth City Habitat for Humanity will be able to further its efforts of helping families in Elizabeth City address critical health and safety issues in their homes.
“Over 17% of the population in Elizabeth City is over 65 and many of those residents live in poverty,” said Vice-President Jane Elfring. “They don’t have the money that is necessary to complete repairs and often small repairs become big ones as a result.”
Lowe’s and Habitat began their partnership in 2003. Since then, Lowe’s has supported many of the global housing nonprofit’s efforts, including the Women Build Program and Habitat’s Neighborhood Revitalization program. Lowe’s has also supported Habitat’s Cost of Home national advocacy campaign and sponsored local Habitat builds and employee volunteer days, in addition to providing affiliate grants and donated products. Lowe’s commitment through 2022 will bring the company’s total contributions to Habitat to more than $84 million.
Home Repairs
July
On July 29, volunteers began to make repairs to a deaf homeowner in Elizabeth City. Her requests were modest: replace mailbox and storm door and repair leak in bathroom. The first two items were easy but we discovered two other problems: the leak in the bathroom caused the floor to sag making it useable. We also noticed that the electric box outside the house had some loose from the house and called B&M Contractors to repair it.
The bathroom floor had to be removed down to the floor joists and literally crumbled in our volunteers' hands. Once a new subfloor by Rick Boyd of the Traveling Tool Guy was installed, we began to repair the sheetrock around the new step-in shower and vanity. Plumber Tim Thompson is helping with bathroom repairs and Carpet Connection installed the new vinyl in the bathroom. Additionally, new accessible doorknobs were installed throughout the house and small repairs to made to the sliding patio door.
Volunteers from the Berea Church Handyman Ministry installed new handrails so she could safely exit through her patio door and to her laundry room.
Final things to do will be installing new smoke detectors specifically designed for the hearing impaired. Donations from Riverside United Methodist Church have paid for these items
To date, nearly 200 hours have been donated to this project.
Completed Repair Job
In 2022, we completed repairs for an elderly woman who is caring for her two grandchildren. She asked us to repair the rear of her house where squirrels had eaten through the siding. One had died inside. While doing our inspection for issues that needed to be repaired, we discovered that her two-story porch had foundation issues resulting in a 1.5 inch drop. Initially, we didn't think we could repair this but Wilburn Miller offered to bring his 22 ton jacks and the porch was leveled in about two hours.
She also needed new steps from her back porch, railings on her steps to the garage and some electrical work. The Berea Church Construction Ministry installed the new steps and railings and Michael Madden completed the electrical work. While this work was progressing, we purchased and stained replacement siding, removed the old siding (including the dead squirrel), and installed the new siding.
Ken Bateman of Bateman's Tree Service took down three trees in front of the house to remove this danger to the house. Inside, we installed new smoke detectors, accessible door handles, a handrailing to the second floor and an interior door to a home office area.
