By Ray Birch
AUSTIN—Seeking to not only help the underserved but also to drive what it sees as much-needed collaboration within the CU community, University Federal Credit Union spearheaded what it is said is the first-ever CU partnership on a Habitat for Humanity home build.
UFCU here worked alongside other local Texas credit unions on the construction.
Called The House That Credit Unions Built, the project was first introduced to the community on International Credit Union Day.
“From what we are told by Habitat, this is the first-ever credit union effort of this type,” said Heather McKissick, DE, UFCU senior vice president of community impact. “We have seen credit union leagues in the past work on similar projects, but this is the first time a group of credit unions have collaborated on this kind of effort.”
Joining UFCU on the project have been A+ Federal Credit Union, Amplify Credit Union, Austin TELCO FCU, Greater Texas Credit Union, Velocity Credit Union, and the Austin Chapter of Credit Unions.
McKissick believes that just as more credit unions need to collaborate on business services, such as IT and back office operations, so too do they need to join forces on community efforts to raise the effectiveness of their work and boost visibility.
“Housing affordability has been a big part of our social impact efforts,” explained McKissick. “We loved the idea of doing the build, and we thought it would just be a great way to not only demonstrate our concern and interest for community, but also drive greater collaboration among cooperatives.”
The build took 11 weeks and the 2,000-square-foot home cost $100,000 to construct. The funds came from donations from the credit unions, as well as from their employees. McKissick said the home was built for a single-person homeowner.
“It's not a family home,” she said. “It's a small one-bedroom home with a bath, a kitchen and a small living room. It's a relatively modest property. It is configured for this particular homeowner who is disabled—it has all the ADA compliant components.”
Making Up Deficit
McKissick said approximately $25,000 was not covered by the corporate donations.
“So, we solicited our employees across all of the credit unions to contribute, because most of them also have a matching program. That deficit was made up by the staff.”
Based on their level of giving, credit unions received “time slots” for the construction and showed up with staff to raise the house.
“Those who contributed more money received more slots,” explained McKissick.
The build was slowed down by approximately two weeks due to the pandemic, said McKissick, noting the health crisis placed limitations on how many workers could be on site at one time and how close together they could be.
“There were city ordinances we had to work with,” she said. “People could not get too close together.”
With the Habitat goal to have the house constructed in 10-11 weeks, the credit unions had to first rely on professional builders to raise the walls and frame out the house.
“Had we had more time, and had we not had the COVID restrictions, we would have used volunteers for that work,” explained McKissick.
Doing Things ‘Differently’
Located in East Austin, the home was “unveiled” to the community in a unique way, also due to the health crisis.
“Typically there are a series of events—like a wall raising and then as the home is constructed the home and the owner are introduced to the community,” she said. “But due to the risk from the virus we had to do things differently.”
Doing things differently included having the CEOs from the participating CUs, as well as some staff, sign the studs inside the house, with some leaving personal messages.
“Typically, when this all is over, there is a big party in the home’s yard, and the community is invited,” explained McKissick. “But this year that was replaced with a parade of decorated cars driven past the home by staff of the participating credit unions, waving pom poms and shouting congratulations to the homeowner.”
