North of Sullivan Street, you’ll find a housing project called Nash Row. There, a house rises up from a half-block of concrete rubble. It’s a durable, energy-efficient three-bedroom, two-bath home with a spiral staircase leading to the second floor, split-zone cooling, two outside decks with privacy screening, corrugated metal awnings, and other aesthetic details that mix the old and new.
This is a far cry from what this space used to look like.
“Trashed to the bones,” is how Susan Hanson remembers it. “It was basically a roof and a middle floor.”
Hanson, a former Miami town council member, is the president of the Globe-Miami affiliate of the international nonprofit Habitat for Humanity, and a member of the building committee. This house north of Sullivan Street is part of the group’s Nash Row project, including restoration and new homes.
“People think we give houses away,” she says. “That’s not what Habitat does.”
Habitat for Humanity originated in the late sixties with a vision of a world where everyone has a decent and affordable place to live. The organization’s model is centered around “partnership housing,” providing housing to those in need by building and selling new and rehabilitated houses at affordable costs while offering these new homeowners opportunities for low-interest-rate mortgages. Their mortgage payments are used to build more homes for other families.
In 2018, the Globe-Miami Habitat for Humanity affiliate – which has been active for more than two decades and has built over a dozen homes in Miami, Globe, and Claypool – was looking at a run-down corner in Miami, where vacant, dilapidated buildings had become normal.
“It was just awful,” Hanson says, “but then we start thinking, ‘What if?’”
“Instead of a single family home on a single lot, the Board had this great idea,” she adds. “Let’s transform a whole section of downtown.”
They acquired the worst lot first – a burnt-out house on the western end. They tracked down the out-of-area owner through tax bills and letters, and asked the owner to sign over the debt and release the property.
The big building to the west was next. The owner lived in town and sold Habitat the lot. Next, the current property came up for a tax sale.
Habitat secured all the buildings and bulldozed out the burnt stuff. They dubbed the middle lot “the shell” and used it as a supply area for construction. Rezoning was required with the county and town, which took about a year and a half. They’d been at it for a while when Covid hit. The team of Ron Ray and Neil Willkett, local carpenters, completed the build.
“Habitat typically does things in a neutral color palette so the family can come in and make it their own,” Hanson says. “Everything is durable, ecological, economic, and energy efficient.”
The Nash Row home is appraised at well over $200,000 and will be used as a fundraiser for the subsequent builds. The current plan calls for four homes. A small HOA will be formed to ensure the multi-family complex stays clean and beautiful.
The Globe-Miami organization has a goal of producing one home per year, either a new build or a refurbish, but many things slow that rate down – from Covid to contractors, to a lack of qualified applicants.
They operate with a seven-member volunteer board that builds the homes with donations, fundraisers, and existing homebuyer mortgage payments. The board is made up of local community members, most of whom were raised here.
Land values have increased, affecting Habitat’s ability to simply buy lots. People often leave substantial bequests in their estates, including land, but much of it is unusable, like the side of a hill. Still, in cases like this, Habitat will try to sell the property to a neighbor and use the funds for another build.
It has been three years since the last build was completed. A working mother and her kids moved into the home in Claypool for $140,000.
“It’s getting harder to find people,” Hanson says. “We’re trying to change the perception. We are not Section 8, we are low to mid-income families with a housing need that are wanting to own their own home.”
The average cost of a Habitat build in Gila County is $110,000 to $185,000.
In addition to having good credit and sufficient income to cover a mortgage and utilities, applicants also need a small down payment to cover escrow fees. Habitat homebuyers or family members are required to volunteer 500 hours of labor on a build, even if it’s simply cleaning the build site after painting or landscaping. If their home is already built, they put their effort into the next build.
The next three builds for the Globe-Miami group are two-bedroom, two-bath homes that can accommodate a variety of family configurations. Pre-built walls produced by a Tucson affiliate will be utilized to reduce cost.
“We like seeing the dead bones, nothing there, and seeing what could be,” says Hanson. “Making it happen, and then watching the family move in, is how the Board approaches each build.”
Anyone who is interested in applying for a Habitat home can request an application via private message on the Globe-Miami Habitat for Humanity Facebook page. Or call Susan Hanson at (928) 701-1414 to have an application emailed or mailed.
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