A home to call their own

SUQUAMISH — Before the furniture is moved in and the boxes are unpacked, Gloria Ramirez plans to run into her new South Street home and let the enormity of all 1,248-square feet of space envelop her.

That size might seem quaint, even tiny to many North Kitsap residents. But for the Ramirez family, which currently resides in a miniscule apartment with one bed for its five members, it is enormous.

“Everything is so tiny now. It’s so small, the children don’t have a place to play,” Gloria said, through translator and family friend Jalilly Christenson. “Now, we’re going to have a place where we can move around, where the children can play safely. We may even get a pet.”

When the family does unpack its belongings in the new home in December, members will be experiencing the chance that 29 families before them — and five in Suquamish — have been given: a Habitat for Humanity home.

It has been a long road for the Ramirezes, who have waited for their chance to have a place they can call their own home for more than a decade.

Christenson, a Prudential real estate agent and the family’s Habitat sponsor, met Humberto and Gloria when their oldest daughter, Gisela, was still a baby and they were just expecting their second child. They had come from California, and before that, from the Nayarit region of Mexico, located along the west coast of the country. Humberto had been working at a local Bainbridge Island restaurant before his current job with the Crystal Cleaners, also of Bainbridge.

Once they submitted an application to Habitat, a Christian-based group, all they could do was hope they’d be contacted. Christenson remembers the day well.

“We prayed at the apartment before we left, we prayed before the meeting (at the Habitat office) and we prayed after,” Christenson recalled. “Everything was pray, pray, pray.”

Their prayers were indeed answered — but unbeknownst to many, the road to a house was by no means free.

Like all Habitat recipients, the Ramirez family has to provide 500 hours of community service to Habitat Kitsap, go through budget counseling and complete a first-time home buyers’ class. The home is also not free as the family must buy it from Habitat through a no-interest loan. The mortgage payments they make will go toward the construction of new Habitat homes.

“We always say, ‘It’s not a hand out, it’s a hand up,’” said Habitat Volunteer coordinator Barb Gabriel, of East Bremerton.

“We can’t have a home under regular conditions,” said Humberto Ramirez, translated by Christenson. “With Habitat, there is no interest payment. And that’s the reason we can afford a home.”

Habitat involves just about everyone they can in the community on a project. In fact, the only government help on the $55,000 home was buying the property and bringing in sewer and water pipes.

From there, various contributions from churches and businesses help foot the bill. For instance, Prudential raised about $15,000 for the Ramirez home through an annual rummage sale.

And then there are the countless volunteers, who help with the entire project of building the home.

“It takes the the whole community to end poverty housing,” said Kitsap Habitat Director Lori Oberlander.

The Ramirez home began with a dedication July 9. For a month, crews laid the foundation.

From Aug. 9-13, the most intense portion of the build occurred. Known as the “blitz,” crews worked virtually non-stop from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. for five days, to complete the framing, roofing, insulating and most of the siding. The work takes a lot of time and many hours, but the volunteers happily chug along in support.

“This family has the hearts of all the volunteers because they work so hard,” Oberlander said. “They really put in the sweat equity.”

On Aug. 9, the opening day of the blitz build, Humberto Ramirez said a few words to the volunteers to begin the day of hard work.

“Thanks for coming to help me build my house,” he said.

Their three children — Gisela is now 10, Webster 7, and Vanessa, 5 — came to the site for the first time during the blitz build Aug. 10. They stared at the place that’s becoming their new home with big smiles.

“For the first time, the children will be able to have their own bedroom (in the house),” Christenson said.

“I don’t have the words to express my gratitude,” Gloria Ramirez said through Christenson.

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