Stories - Housing Can't Wait

Impact Stories

Everyone deserves a safe, affordable place to call home. The stories of the people we serve prove what’s possible when communities come together to create opportunity. From first-time homebuyers overcoming financial barriers to seniors gaining the security to age in place, these real-life experiences highlight the transformational power of housing. Each impact story is a testament to resilience. To hope. Click below to explore how lives are being changed every day.

A Room of His Own

Kalynn Kirchoff had some major bumps in the road on her journey to home ownership. In 2020, she was diagnosed with melanoma cancer. In 2022, the apartment she and her son, Calan, lived in flooded.

Finding a Way

Denise Franklin lived more than 30 years in subsidized housing and then, in her parents’ home with her daughter. Now she works as a nurse and owns her own home thanks to Beyond Housing, the redevelopment and housing authority of Bristol, Virginia.

Three people, wearing work gloves and casual clothing, are lifting a wheelbarrow full of debris into a large blue dumpster. Dust rises from the contents of the wheelbarrow as they work together to unload it. The backdrop shows a red brick building with boarded-up windows.

UNIQUE WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM PROVIDES AFFORDABLE HOUSING AND COMMUNITY-BASED REVITALIZATION TO SOUTHERN WEST VIRGINIA

Fahe Member Coalfield Development opened their doors in 2010 with the goal of building resilient rural communities in southern West Virginia with thriving social and financial economies.

A healthcare provider in blue scrubs smiles while using a stethoscope to listen to a patient's heartbeat. The patient, seated and also smiling, appears relaxed in a clean and modern medical exam room.

Dayspring Health Turns Vacated Superstore into Whitley County’s One-Stop Shop for Healthcare

With support from Fahe CDFI via the Uplift America Fund and New Markets Tax Credit Program, Dayspring Health transformed an abandoned building that once housed Walmart into a state-of-the-art healthcare facility, and established a comprehensive source for healthcare in Whitley County, Kentucky.

A Home for Christmas

When Chassidy Gorrell’s marriage abruptly ended, she and her three children were cast into a harsh and unsettled reality. With nowhere to turn and nothing to call their own, Gorrell searched for affordable housing and a place to call home.

Keys That Unlock Tomorrow

A single mother of three, Colley had been living in an overcrowded home with her ex-husband’s family, her children sleeping on the sofa as she struggled to provide a safe place for them. Affordable housing felt out of reach, and past financial setbacks during a difficult divorce had left her credit damaged, making homeownership seem impossible.

This image shows an older couple standing proudly in front of their home, smiling and arm-in-arm. They’re posed on the front porch, framed by white railings and a clean, well-maintained house exterior. Their expressions radiate warmth, stability, and a sense of belonging—capturing a moment of pride and comfort in their place of residence.

From Rescue to Respite

There was no time to think. The walls buckled, and the trailer split like kindling, water rushing through the gaps. It swallowed their furniture, their photographs, the life they’d built together. Clinging to each other, George and Sherry tried to stay upright in the torrent, their feet scraping for anything solid beneath the rising current.