West Tallahatchie Habitat for Humanity

Applications for our homes are run in cycles dictated by the housing opportunities we have available and the number of partner families we have already selected (it is important to note that in the official Habitat definition used by our affiliate, a “family” is a living unit made up of one or more people).

To obtain the most current information on the status of the application cycle, please contact the current Affiliate Coordinator at (662)345-6200. The Affiliate Coordinator is in charge of coordinating the application cycle, and can give you the most current information. It is important to note that there are three primary indicators that we look at when selecting a family: Need, ability to pay, and willingness to partner. Each of these is broken down below:

Need: Habitat makes the best use of its resources by serving those who have a housing need: living in a house that is beyond repair, stuck renting from a landlord that does not take care of the property, living with parents or grandparents, and have a want and a need for a better housing situation.

Ability to pay: Habitat strives to serve a particular slice of the Delta’s inadequately housed families. All Habitat houses are sold, albeit for the cost of materials only and on a no-interest, no-profit mortgage. This means that Habitat must select partner families who hold steady jobs or have other sources of income that allow them to pay their mortgage, taxes and homewoner’s insruance without additional significant financial burden. By the same token, Habitat seeks to select partner families who do not have other options on the open housing market – those for whom a traditionally-fianced, commercially-built home would be out of reach.

Willingness to partner: Being a Habitat homeowner is all about partnership. Habitat partners with homeowners to organize and instruct groups of volunteers, pays construction supervisors, raises capital and orders materials, and adminsitrative and support personnel to faciliate the homebuilding process. Homeowners can count on Habitat to recruit quality volunteers to do good work to build them a simple, decent and affordable home with no labor or administrative overhead, and to finance the home on a long-term, no-interest, no-profit mortgage. In return, Habitat counts on homeowners to participate in the construction of their home and help in the office and attend, with a dish to share, our weekly potlucks when work groups are in town. The partnership is about opportunity: Habitat staff has the opporuntity to meet and bond with community members, while the partner families get to learn how to build and maintain their home and meet and bond with volunteers from all around the world.

With that said, it is also important to note that any family who meets (and continues to meet) the requirements of partnership will eventually get a Habitat home.

In general, the actual application process works as follows:

• Month 1: Applications become available, and signs are posted at high-traffic locations in our service area. Keep your eyes out for signs at banks, libraries, gas stations, courthouses, and the Tutwiler Community Center. We will post as widely as the places we post will allow us to. When you see the signs, you will need to contact the Affiliate Coordinator, or a designated representative, to pick up an application. We usually like to meet prospective partner families, explain the application process in person, and answer any questions – rather than just passing out stacks of applications. We will often host a community meeting for all those who are able to attend, and then meet individually with any other applicants who cannot make the meeting.
• Month 2: Applications are collected and reviewed by the affiliate staff. We check for completeness only at this stage. Applicants will be notified by mail of any missing documents and associated verification, and affiliate staff will work individually with each applicant to ensure they have a completed file.
• Month 3: Applications are referred to the Homeowner Selection Committee of the Board of Directors, who meet to review each individual file. After careful review, tey will narrow the field to a selection of applicants.
• Month 4: Individual home visits are conducted with the selected pool of applicants, and any additional applicants as necessary, to provide adequate and full guidance to the Board of Directors.
• Month 5: Partner families are selected and all applicant families are notified of the outcome of their application. There is no “waiting list” – families who are not selected in a given year, but do qualify or think they may qualify in another year, must re-apply each time the application cycle opens if they wish to be considered. Our affiliate typically builds 1-2 houses in any given year.
• Month 6: All applications, including those the affiliate was not able to accept, are filed and held for a one-year period. Remember, however: to be considered in the next application cycle, the partner family must submit a new application.

If you have any questions, or wish to discuss anything listed on this page, please contact the Affiliate Coordinator from the Contact Us page.