Unexpected damages and repairs are part of being a homeowner. Older houses need enhanced and maintained, safety precautions need to be installed and sometimes you just want to change the overall feel of your home.
JoLynn Powers chats about how the HomeOwnership Center assisted with her family’s home improvement project.
About three years after purchasing their 1965 brick ranch house, Jolynn Powers and her husband, Thomas, woke up to a homeowner’s nightmare.
JoLynn: I woke up at around 2 a.m. to the sound of water dripping, but I couldn’t figure out where it was coming from because it was just pouring the rain down outside. I eventually realized it sounded like water was dripping on the drywall above our bed. I reached up and touched the drywall and my finger went through the ceiling. Tom went up to the attic and put out three buckets to keep the water from ruining more of the drywall inside the house.
The Buckhannon couple quickly realized that the water leak had been running down the rafters and caused extensive damage to other parts of the house.
JoLynn: The drywall behind the walls in the bedrooms had dissolved and then when we pulled up the carpet in another bedroom the leak had caused the hardwood floors to rot. All from the same leak. It had been doing that for years. After some investigation we realized the roof had been leaking long before we purchased the home.
The couple was not expecting significant damage to their home and realized they needed to get funding assistance immediately because a wet West Virginia winter was approaching, and they didn’t want further damage to their home.
Having worked with Woodlands Development Group (WDG) as an AmeriCorps member, JoLynn knew of the HomeOwnership Center and reached out to see if we could be of some support. WDG is a local non-profit housing developer and a partner organization of HOC.
JoLynn: I talked to Tawnya Holbrook at the time, and I explained our situation and that we needed some help. She was able to see if we qualified for a Home Improvement Loan to have the roof replaced. She worked with us through the whole process to make sure our needs were met. We also received the loan quickly, which was great because we were able to get the roof fixed before winter.
JoLynn found HOC to be accessible and quick that she is considering reaching out again once this home improvement loan has been paid off.
JoLynn: The next plan is to pay off the loan we currently have and then take out another home improvement loan to replace the windows and doors on the house. The house just needs general improvement because of its age, and we plan on retiring in the house, so we’d like to get the house to be efficient and well maintained before we retire.
JoLynn: Since working with Tawnya was so easy and the HOC was so flexible with us I’m willing to use them. I just found the organization to be accessible to all levels from first-time home buyers to folks like me who needed help with a home project.
If you’re interested in our Home Improvement Loans, give us a call at 304-636-9115. For more information on our home improvement loans, click here.