The need for affordable housing is evident in both Sheboygan and Ozaukee Counties, as well as across our borders. Therefore, Habitat for Humanity Lakeside fulfills its mission both locally and globally.

The world is experiencing a global housing crisis.

• About 1.6 billion people live in substandard housing and 100 million are homeless.
• Each week, more than 1 million people are born in, or move to, cities in the developing world.
• One billion people (32 percent of the global urban population) live in urban slums.
• If no serious action were taken, the number of slum dwellers worldwide would increase over the next 30 years to nearly 2 billion.

Clean, decent, and stable housing provides more than just a roof over someone’s head.

• Stability for families and children.
• Sense of dignity and pride.
• Health, physical safety, and security.
• Increase of educational and job prospects.

The transformational ability of good housing.

• Clean, warm housing is essential for prevention and care of diseases of poverty like HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, diarrhea, and malaria.
• Children under five in Malawi living in Habitat for Humanity houses have 44 percent less malaria, respiratory or gastrointestinal diseases compared to children living in traditional houses.

Housing is a great means of wealth creation.

• Home ownership is a form of wealth accumulation through equity and forced savings from mortgage repayment.
• Housing construction creates job opportunities for migrants to cities and stimulates the creation of small business.
• The process of securing land tenure helps to increase access to credit.

Good housing attracts economic investment and development.

• Contributes to thriving school systems and community organizations.
• A catalyst for civic activism and a stimulus for community-based organizations.
• Safe homes and neighborhoods help to build social stability and security.

Housing must become a priority

• The percentage of people without access to decent, stable housing is rising.
• Increasing the housing supply across the globe is essential.
• Adequate housing is vitally important to the health of the world’s economies, communities, and populations.
• If we are to succeed in the fight against poverty, we must support the expansion of housing both as policy and as practice.

Why Habitat Works

• Self-help model
• Community focused, community supported
• A hand up, not a handout
• Efficient, affordable solutions, appropriate to needs
• Training that results in buyers’ readiness for homeownership