All-female crew helps single mom achieve homeownership dream

Lancaster Lebanon Habitat for Humanity held its Women Build Lebanon Week, when a team of women came together to put together a house on Walnut Street in Lebanon City.

The home will go to Estefanye Morales, a 27-year-old single mother of four children who will be the first person in her family to own a home, according to the Habitat for Humanity website.

Morales was one of the four women working on her house on Wednesday. She said she has loved working on a team of women and has enjoyed watching her future home come together.

She said they’re aiming to have the project done in the spring, at which point she and her kids can move out of their rental and into the around 1,800-square-foot home with four bedrooms and two and a half bathrooms.

Morales currently works as a certified nursing assistant while also earning the required sweat equity hours to be matched with a home. Homeownership, she said, is something she’s excited to take pride in.

“To me, it means accomplishment and strength, and just to keep going, and it’s something that’s mine that I own,” Morales said. “I already pay all utilities where I’m at, so anything that’s wrong, I have to cover it too, but just knowing that this is my own, I’m putting money into my own house that will be mine forever — it’s just an amazing feeling and just a great accomplishment.”

She said this is the third home she has worked on, and she wants to keep volunteering even after she’s settled in her house because she loves seeing the results.

Tiffany Franck, Habitat for Humanity development administrator, said the Lebanon and Lancaster projects mainly focus on rehabilitating existing older homes.

“We take them down to the shell of the home and then rebuild them up to new home standards while keeping the integrity, particularly of our historic homes,” Franck said. “This home here at Walnut has a lot of historic features — the front doors, there are originally pocket doors in this front room here, so kind of keeping as much of that as possible. A nod to the history, but also bringing it up to today’s living standards.”

On Wednesday, the team donning pink hard hats worked on the framing of the home and putting a proper foundation under the addition previously added onto the back.

Franck said Women Build Lebanon Week was an opportunity for the organization to highlight women already working in the construction field and get more women comfortable volunteering on jobsites.

“Women are often underrepresented in the construction field, so it’s a great way for us to highlight local businesses that may have women, have hired women to be on their construction sites, encouraging women to know that that’s an option to check out that for employment, but as well as to get women comfortable being on the construction site,” she said. “It’s just a really safe place for women to come out, and no skills are needed. All skills are welcome. We’ll teach you everything you need to know on site. Whether you’re here for one day or the whole week, women often walk away feeling more confident.”

It’s also an occasion to celebrate the women homeowners who are the most common demographic Habitat for Humanity helps in Lancaster and Lebanon Counties. Franck said about 60% of the families they are helping are single female heads of households, or single mothers.

“This is a great way for us to give them a shout out, to honor the hard work that they’re putting in to better their families, to break cycles of generational poverty and turn that into generational wealth,” she said. “Owning a home is the single greatest tool for wealth building in the United States, so what an honor it is for us to play a role in helping them access safe, affordable, warm, dry housing.”

Traci Unal, a commercial market executive for Northwest Bank and a member of the Lancaster Lebanon Habitat for Humanity board, said she finds the volunteer experience empowering. It teaches people skills and puts good into the community.

She said she’s been on worksites with homeowners several times throughout her 30-plus years working with Habitat for Humanity.

“It’s truly surreal because you’re experiencing it with them,” Unal said. “You hear their story of how they were connected to habitat and learn about them and their family and how it’s going to affect them and how they’re going to have that asset that’s going to empower them in the future and help them with their children and their legacy as they move forward.” 

She said Habitat for Humanity is always looking for more volunteers. Information about volunteering or applying for a home can be found online.

The Lancaster Lebanon Habitat for Humanity has served over 300 families in its 39 years in the two counties.