Group helps families to own homes
Moses Lake Chamber of Commerce ambassadors and other city officials help raise the back wall of the Torgeson family's new home in Pelican Point Wednesday. Hayden Homes is building the house for First Story, a non-profit that helps families secure affordable housing.
MOSES LAKE - Jared and Kristina Torgeson will get to call themselves first-time homeowners later this summer when construction on their Pelican Point home is completed.
The three-bedroom, two-bath structure is being built by Hayden Homes on behalf of the public, non-profit organization First Story. The Torgesons are the fourth Moses Lake family to become homeowners with the help of First Story.
Claire Duncan, First Story executive director, said their homes go to qualified families through a zero down payment and zero interest 30-year home loan.
Duncan said First Story has helped move 45 families into homes in Washington, Oregon and Idaho since the non-profit's start in 1998. Without the program, these families would not have had access to affordable housing or had the chance to become homeowners, she said.
"We believe everyone has the right to home ownership," she said Wednesday. "If folks are ready and prepared, then we want to give them the opportunity."
Construction on the Torgesons' home began last month, she said. The couple and their two daughters, MaKenna and Laela, should be able to move in by August, said Duncan.
Families go through an extensive application process, Duncan said. She is confident, she said, in the Torgeson's decision to become home owners.
"They are fist time homeowners, and they have been working hard for home ownership," she said. "They've been saving up, staying debt free and they're just a young family raising two girls."
Duncan said she knows the Torgesons will be successful homeowners and the role of First Story is to give them that chance.
Moses Lake mayor Bill Ecret said meeting the need for affordable housing is a challenge Grant County faces. Over the past two decades, landlords have removed units from subsidized housing programs in order to increase rent, he said.
"Although the need for affordable housing has grown, such units have disappeared," he said Wednesday.
Ecret said organizations like First Story have found a way to help reverse that trend by helping families become home owners. By doing so, First Story is also helping strengthen the communities these families belong to, he said.
"Parents can be closer to jobs and children can live closer to the schools and after school programs that the city prides itself on," he said. "They've made it possible for the community to grow and develop."