EAST MISSOULA - Two families are going to have new homes in East Missoula after the Missoula City Council recently approved $190,000 to the Affordable Housing Trust Fund.
Habitat for Humanity will now use that money to relocate two modular homes to East Missoula as the organization and its local partners continue to look for solutions to the housing crisis in Missoula County.
"Many, many people are being displaced and priced out of their homes,” noted Habitat for Humanity Executive Director Heather Harp.
Harp told MTN News that as housing gets harder to come by, the nonprofit is innovating, "we're able to do this in a quarter of the normal time, and really, really importantly at only one-fifth of the normal cost of today's median home cost."
A modular home project in East Missoula involves buying extra modular homes from Homeward. "They bought eight or ten of these things,” Harp noted.
Harp added the East Missoula homes will be similar to a project that Homeword did in Missoula and since the homes are already built, they just need the foundation to lay on.
"All we have to do is move them into place, and they're done,” Harp said.
The two homes will go to two men, a retired house painter, and a diesel mechanic.
"The two gentlemen who are going to be the lucky recipients --lifelong East Missoulians, they are literally over the moon to be able to move out of a trailer that is well past its prime, and move into a brand-new facility, and be able to call it their own,” Harp said.
