Rey Iriarte and Ashley Velez, along with their two sons, have a truly special reason to celebrate this Christmas season. The family on Monday moved into their new home built by Habitat for Humanity.
“This Christmas is going to be awesome because now we’re not strict and limited on what we can do. Now we can decorate the front of the house, the inside of the house, make it more Christmassy for the holidays,” Iriarte said.
Iriarte has helped Habitat for Humanity build seven homes before it came to build his own family’s.
Iriarte said not only will the home give the husband and wife duo something to pass on to their kids, but the family can take pride in the role they played in building the house.
“This is a better investment. I know I’m paying for something for myself. When I was renting, I was just filling somebody else’s pocket right in the apartment. I wasn’t even getting anything out of there. Now, I’m going to get something,” he said.
Velez said that when they were planning the home, one priority was to have space to decorate more with pictures and for their kids to be able to play.
But they also were focused on providing a safe place to raise their children.
“When we lived over (in our last place), a lot of the time you’d hear police sirens and everything. But here the first few nights have been peaceful and quiet and we get to relax, which is like a big chip has literally lifted off our shoulders,” she said.
Jeremy Stephens, Executive Director for the local Habitat, said this completion of this build marks the most that Owensboro-Daviess County’s chapter has built in a calendar year with eight homes finished.
“We could not do this without good companies run by good people who want to invest in their community, and so I would love to give a shout-out to both Wells Fargo and the City of Owensboro. Without both of their partnerships this would have never happened,” he said.
Velez said that her father had worked at Wells Fargo for several years.
“Once [Stephens] told me that they were sponsoring, I was in tears,” she said. “I knew from there that my dad was watching over us. He knows that this is for us.”
