Editor’s note: This is the first story in the second installment of The Post’s Aiding Athens series, which profiles non-profit organizations in Athens County. Check out each story for ways in which you can help.
Between loans, interest rates, homeowners insurance, property taxes, credit, assets, bonds and stocks, becoming a homeowner isn’t as easy as simply signing a check.
Three Rivers Housing, headquartered in The Plains, has helped 99 people become homeowners in 20 years. However, funding has petered out, leaving the nonprofit organization’s owner looking for alternative ways to help the less fortunate in Athens, Meigs and Vinton counties.
“The money has kind of dried up,” said Barbara Conover, executive director of Three Rivers since 1993. “Federal and state funds that were once dedicated to helping people become homeowners have become a lot more difficult to get. It’s really hard.”
Conover built 99 homes for the impoverished in southern Ohio through state and federal grants, as well as the work of local volunteers. But on the precipice of her 100th home, the grant money stopped with the onset of the recession.
Through grant money and state programs, Conover was able to lower payments on the two most difficult financial aspects of becoming a homeowner: down payments on houses and interest rates on loans.
“Banks now require 20 percent down if you’re looking to buy a house. On average, it might cost $130,000, so you have to come up with $26,000 down,” Conover said. “Where do people come up with that money? (Two parents) could be working full time trying to raise a family, but they’re not going to be able to set aside money.”
While helping people to become homeowners is still Conover’s passion, her dream is no longer active, as she sold the last house — a blue home across from her office — in 2011.
Now, Three Rivers focuses on renting property at a low price to elderly and impoverished people in the Athens County area. The organization most recently opened a new apartment on Plains Road with six rooms for the elderly.
Prices for monthly rent differ between people based on their economic needs, but the price they settle on includes utilities and cable in the monthly payment. Linda Beasley, one of the residents, said one example of the monthly cost is about $505 a month.
Brad Johnson, a retired Vietnam veteran, took up residence in the new facility as soon as it opened and said he is extraordinarily thankful to the services he’s received from Three Rivers after he was “foolish” with his finances.
“It’s a very nice place, and Barb is a fair and kind human being,” Johnson said. “I’m amazed that there are these kinds of kind people in the world.”
Beasley, who recently retired after 40 years at Kimes Nursing & Rehabilitation Center in Athens, moved into the new apartment building just two weeks ago but said Conover and the rest of the staff have been very accommodating to her needs, even allowing her to bring her dog Me-me.
Beasley has quickly made a friend in Joanne Baughman, another new resident, and said the facility’s atmosphere brings people together.
“I wanted a place of my own, and I wanted it in a vicinity where everyone’s the same age,” Beasley said. “We just met only a week ago, and we’ve become good friends.”
The rentals began as intermediary housing for Conover’s residents looking to become homeowners, but now it’s a full-time operation with volunteers always around to help with various tasks.
Some volunteers have helped to construct two gardens for the residents so they can plant vegetables and flowers in the summer to make their walkway more colorful.
“Before (Three Rivers) got here, this street didn’t even exist. Now, it’s a community,” said Mohammed Farunia, an Ohio University senior studying health service administration who has been volunteering at Three Rivers periodically for the past two years.
The large number of volunteers helps make the organization a more attractive recipient for state grant money, Conover said, and if more people can come out and invest their time, the state will be more likely to invest its money.
What Three Rivers really needs in order to stay in business is more money from state and federal funds that have dried up due to the recession. Conover urged people to call their representatives and let them know how important being a homeowner can be.
“I believe that (becoming a homeowner) helps people,” Conover said. “I think that’s how we empower people and how we create good neighborhoods where everybody looks out for each other.”
To volunteer with Three Rivers Housing or find out more ways you can help, call (740)797-7139.
wh092010@ohiou.edu
