>>It's like your dream come true.

Like, I cry when they say,"Oh, you are approved for a house."

>>Yeah.

It's so exciting.

My mom was very poor.

I, we were very, very poor and my dad had more money.

And so there's something to me about, like, bringing parts together.

I don't know that, that just feels good.

I feel like I am very fortunate at this point in my life and I was not always.

>>At Habitat.

We seek to make this a place where everybody can find a decent place to live.

We really operate in three different areas.

One, building is what people mostly know us for.

That's building homes and building communities.

Two, is rebuilding where we work with residents who live, live in existing communities and help them realize a better future for themselves.

And then we also work in something called housing system development, where we try to look holistically to do all that we can to change the conditions that cause housing poverty in the first place.

This is truly a national emergency.

There are 19 million people in the United States who live in trailers, but they don't have the right to the land underneath their trailer.

So what happens when a mobile home park is sold?

Well, either the new landlord comes in and either jacks up rents or they change the land use and turn it into something else, luxury housing and the people who live there are, are in real, real bad shape because their trailers don't move.

And, even if they did move, there's no place to go.

>>My name is Karen David and I live in Village 1 in Southwood.

My names Cathy Butler-Cisneros and I also live in Village 1 in Southwood.

What you're hearing in the background right now is some houses right back there getting their first, their first floor.

(construction noise) Karen and I met at the planting day.

Habitat bought a bunch of gorgeous plants and a nice tree and a bunch of us came out and and planted it.

And it was really hot as heck.

>>Yeah, it was.

Yeah.

>>But it was really fun.

>>Yeah, we had fun.

>>We hung out and chatted.

>>Yeah.

>>We were really one of the pioneers in mixed income development.

A lot of people thought it wouldn't work.

They thought that market rate homeowners wouldn't look to buy in a neighborhood.

that was, that was mixed.

They felt like the financing was gonna be too challenging.

But, in reality, although it's been hard, it's worked.

>>First of all is to get the right information, the right, right information about the Habitat program.

What is this program?

How this program, program invite the families, low income families to be part of this process.

And also that is a learning process for market rate families that comes from all over the country here to Charlottesville.

And, secondly, is when they come here is the way of communication.

How the different cultures, American culture, Latin American culture, Middle Eastern culture, could come to a place that communication and love for family and community is going to really be the, the standard of this place.

>>Well, when you move into a fully formed neighborhood, say you buy a home that someone else has moved out of, the culture of that neighborhood is pretty set.

And you've gotta try to figure out what that is.

And the opportunity here was everyone was moving in within a 12 month period.

And so they could do a lot of self-determination and dream big about the kind of neighborhood they wanted to live in.

>>We have areas, green spaces, recreational spaces that market rate families and Habitat program families come together to design those, those spaces.

And it's very interesting because what this family really cares about is how they live in a place that works for everyone.

That is, that is our main goal.

A lot of people when they come to Southwood, they recognize the scope.

This place is huge.

It's 123 acres.

It was originally 317 families.

It will be a neighborhood of a of a thousand to 1100 residences without resident displacement.

It will include new folks who come from the affordable spectrum and the market rate spectrum.

And there'll also be a neighborhood commercial center where resident businesses can incubate.

But what we're really most excited about was the process, is the how, not just the what.

And that's what we did for many, many years.

We worked side by side with the residents to really help them unlock their own hopes and dreams and strengths and abilities.

And so they were the ones who designed every square inch of this neighborhood from home design to open space to roads.

It's really theirs.

They designed it, they built it, and it's going to be theirs long term through the generations.

>>Habitat did a really nice job of like bringing some elements.

So there was, like, some structure and, like, and some visuals and put us in little groups and then our groups would present.

And it was, it was fun.

>>So you have to choose, oh, I like this name for this road, or I, we want this green space here or this green space there.

Everybody can count, you know, their opinion, everybody can say thing, "Oh, I don't like this."

or maybe it's different ideas.

>>And you get to hear what the other...like, oh, you don't like it because of this.

And then you go, "Oh, right."

>>Yeah.

>> "I see that."

>>You're right.

Yeah.

>>There's good conflict and bad conflict.

Good conflict is is sort of the fertilization for great ideas.

So you can use this, well, I, I want my neighborhood to be like this.

Well, I want my neighborhood to be like that.

And together you end up with a neighborhood like this.

So if you can communicate in a positive way, those conflict of ideas don't put people at conflict and it creates better environment.

Challenge to communication is who's gonna be in charge of gathering?

Who's going to be in charge of filtering information?

How is that gonna happen on a bilingual basis?

Those would be the challenges to communication and that's what Habitat is sort of taking the lead on.

>>There's some problem solving going on.

Yeah, it's, it's been a little bumpy.

There was a bumpy meeting last night, I would say.

I think we're doing our best to get ahead of it.

There's this Neighborhood Advisory Committee that they're starting.

There's this thing called Community Conversations.

That's another way of kind of talking through things.

One of our neighbors started a Facebook group and then there's like meeting people at the mailbox.

>>When we recently moved, I think you came to, to say, “Hi.” >>Yes.

>>And I was guessing where does this woman live?

I never know, you, yes.

>>Until the other, until last week or whatever.

Yeah.

>>You know, it's like any group of people, they have to get to know each other a little bit first.

They have to, to understand where, where they can come together and, but people tend to come into these neighborhoods really committed to, to trying to live differently than we have for the last a hundred or so years.

And it's, it's really inspiring.

>>The benefits of cross race, cross-cultural, cross class for me are, well, one thing is like right out my door, my neighbors over there making tamales and tortillas on her porch.

And I had other neighbors that taught me how to make pupusas and some other neighbors made us baleadas.

And for, I'm like getting to use my Spanish, which is, like, so rich for me.

My husband, I'm gonna cry.

My husband being a Latino man that felt really lonely in this town.

>>What I like is they make everybody the same.

Living in a mobile home and now we live in a new, brand new neighborhood.

all mixed together, you know.

It's, it's awesome.

>>We believe that neighborhoods can be these, these incredible places of, of belonging.

Rather than neighborhoods that keep people apart, we, we believe that neighborhoods should bring people together.

In June, 2024, an incredibly despondent woman who lived at the Carlton Mobile Home Park came into our office 'cause she had gotten a letter along with her other neighbors saying that the mobile home park had been sold and the land underneath their trailers in 60 days would be sold.

In six weeks time, a number of partners Habitat, the Piedmont Housing Alliance, Legal Aid Justice Center, the City of Charlottesville, and, most importantly, the residents themselves came together to craft an offer.

The state statute simply requires an owner of a mobile home park to consider an offer from residents or a group that they petition for.

But it doesn't, it doesn't require them to accept it.

The owners, the Bolton family, accepted our offer, so now we move forward together.

We have now built or built in 14 different mixed income communities in this neighborhood.

And we're proving one by one that, that these communities are much better, more durable when people of of from all walks of life are able to live together and share in a common destiny.

>>Oh.

>>It's, it's so good.

>>Oh, that is sweet.

>>Like the first night I cry.

The first night.

Yeah.

And we come all together and pray and say, "Thanks God for this new home."

>>Aw.

>>And thanks for the people who help and donate.

Thanks Habitat, you know, too.

Yes.

>>Nice.