Update on our Project - There will soon be one less homeless family!

This is a story about God’s provision and many answered prayers. I wrote recently about our friends Will and Karen (not their real names) that we met a few months back when Will was standing on the side of the road with a sign that said simply, "We don't know anyone in Texas. Need to pay for our motel." 

Click here to read the full story if you’re interested. 

In a nutshell, Will and Karen were living in a daily motel in north Austin when we first met them. Since then, Will has begun working at Walmart in the Tire and Lube Express department as a technician, and we managed to raise enough money (over $13,000 so far) to purchase a mobile home for them and get it moved to a nice mobile home park in north Austin.

On Christmas night, we were talking with them about the prospect of raising enough funds, because we hadn’t had as much success as we had hoped. We spoke at length, then prayed about the situation. THE VERY NEXT DAY God showed up and orchestrated everything, including:

• 
  
• Finding the right mobile home for their needs
  
• Negotiating an incredible price (worth around $18k – paid $10k including decks, propane tank, skirting)
  
• Meeting with the manager of a great local mobile home park, and finding out that they would accept the home we had found
  
• Raising an almost-unbelievable amount of money, largely through individual donors, some local but most via social media (92 separate donations to date). Fully half of the funds we raised came in ONE DAY!
  

Everything on the above list happened between Dec. 26th and Dec. 29th. As God continued to open doors, we realized that our initial discouragement was intended to make us all more fully lean on Him through prayer, faith, and trust.

Since then, we managed to get Will and Karen fully approved at the mobile home park, so we’re working on getting their new home moved, hopefully sometime next week.

God continues to bless our efforts for this family, including the fact that the mobile home park offered an incredible rent deal for our friends. The normal rate is $434/month + utilities, but the manager got them a special that gives them a rental rate of $199/month for the first year, $299/month for the second year, $399/month for year three, then the normal rate for years 4 and 5. I learned that ALL mobile home parks require an initial five-year lease, which was interesting news to me.

Part of moving a mobile home is making sure that it’s ready to be moved, which includes:

• 
  
• Removing the underpinning (“skirting”)
  
• Removing the decks
  
• Removal of an large propane tank (not needed because the park has central propane)
  
• Cutting the electric line
  
• Cutting and capping the plumbing and septic
  
• Cutting and capping the gas line
  
• Getting the A/C downcharged properly and safely transported and rehooked by a licensed technician