Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
Eleven years before the mortgage for Habitat for Humanity of Kosciusko County ReStore was scheduled to be paid off, the nonprofit was able to burn their mortgage Thursday thanks to a grant.
Ben Logan, Habitat for Humanity of Kosciusko County executive director, said, “We’re here to celebrate the burning of our mortgage, which I’m super excited for. Usually when we talk about mortgages it’s with the homes that we build and the families that we work with, and hopefully that they become mortgage free in the long term.”
As of Aug. 1, he said Habitat has no mortgage payment and therefore are a 100% debt-free organization.
“We can take pretty much zero percent of the credit because our friends from the Kosciusko County Community Foundation are here and they’re the ones who helped make this possible through, obviously, the most recent grant initiative through Lilly Endowment that we are a part of,” Logan said. “It’s not because they just love going around randomly paying off mortgages for organizations, but it’s because they want to invest in a partner in housing for the long term, for the sustainability of what we’re doing, and hopefully what we’re doing even more of in the near future because of what this makes possible.”
Stephanie Overbey, CEO of the Kosciusko County Community Foundation, said, “The Community Foundation is thrilled to be investing in affordable housing here in Kosciusko County and in the capacity building, the sustainability of Habitat as a wonderful housing partner. We’re just excited, we’re excited to see all of you here to celebrate and let’s get that thing (burned).”
As Logan held up the copy of the mortgage for the mortgage-burning ceremony, after a countdown Overbey was given the honor of lighting it on fire over a bucket.
Afterwards, Logan explained Habitat bought the building at 3970 Corridor Drive, Warsaw, in April 2021. He became director in May 2021.
“So we were about four years into this mortgage and it was a 15-year loan,” he said. “It’s one of those things where, were we going out of business because of it? No, of course not, we’re doing fine. But, as any one can see with their house payment, to not have that and have the freedom and flexibility to do what we need to do in the future, especially when housing is a game of long timelines, large numbers and all that, it’s just a huge sustainability piece in our ReStore and ultimately in Habitat.”
In the first five years of the six-year-old ReStore, it raised $300,000, but that’s after paying the mortage, which was about $42,000 a year.
“It’s one of those things that, what can we do even more of with that freed-up, unrestricted funding that the ReStore provides,” Logan said.
The Community Foundation is not in the business of randomly paying off mortgages, he reiterated, but with the ReStore being Habitat’s largest source of unrestricted revenue, they found that getting rid of the mortgage - the ReStore’s largest single line item that wasn’t payroll - more could be done with the revenue the ReStore generated.
“It really came about because of this specific Lilly grant initiative from Lilly Endowment and it’s a pretty wild thing for us. We’re very blessed to have the Community Foundation, obviously, writing grants with us and on our behalf to really invest in affordable housing here locally,” Logan said. “It is a very unique situation and Habitat and the board and the staff feel very blessed to be a part of it.”
ReStores can be found all over the country, and they are Habitat’s version of nonprofit home improvement stores.
“We take in donations like furniture, cabinets, appliances, building supplies, home decor and a lot of other things - not clothes, not books, not toys - and we take that, we clean it, we test it, we process it and we sell it. The money that we are able to make from that after expenses - again, unrestricted revenue for Habitat to invest in itself, invest in important staffing, infrastructure and even overflow into building homes and doing more in our program. So it’s a great operation here,” Logan explained.
The ReStore is behind Harbor Freight and is open Thursday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. This weekend there’s a 20% off all furniture to celebrate Habitat being 100% debt free.
“You will be so surprised what you find: Things that they don’t make any more, things that ‘they don’t build them like they used to’ and we have a lot of that,” he stated.
Habitat for Humanity of Kosciusko County just finished a home at 421 Lyon St., Warsaw, for Brianna Adams and her two sons. It was dedicated last week.
The roof is on the home in Mentone and is getting closer to the mechanicals being added. That home will be in the Homes on Parade with the Builders Association.
The Women Build home is in the excavation and foundation stage now. It’s getting prepped for 25-30 groups of women to come and help build it from Labor Day to Thanksgiving.
Anyone who wants to get involved can visit the Habitat for Humanity website at kosciuskohabitat.org.
“You can sign up to volunteer, you can donate, you can request a free donation pick-up from the store. Again, we’re just trying to move the needle on housing and all of the things that I’ve mentioned are moving in that direction,” he concluded.
