Housing commission gifts renovated home to Metro Detroit mom, children ahead of Mother's Day
PONTIAC, Mich. (CBS DETROIT) – Ahead of Mother's Day, the Pontiac Housing Commission handed over the keys to a recently renovated home to a single mother and her two young children on Friday.
On June 1, Jamillyah Palmer and her 8-year-old and 3-year-old sons will move into a Dutch Colonial in the General Motors Modern Housing Neighborhood.
It'll be the first time the boys will ever live in a house.
"You can give your kids the best clothes and shoes that you can give them, but a home, you can have somewhere to stay, but it's a difference when you have a home, and I feel like we actually have a home," Palmer said.
The two-bedroom house underwent extensive renovations paid for by the Pontiac Housing Commission
"Not even four months within rehabbing our home, we also saw three homes within the community get new roofs, start new painting, so I think that pride was consistent. They wanted to make sure their home look good as the home that was next to them," said Ahmad Taylor, executive director of the Pontiac Housing Commission.
The Palmer family competed with hundreds of others in a lottery.
Under the commission's terms, they will contribute monthly installments not exceeding 30% of the mother's income, with the prospect of full ownership within the next one to two years.
After receiving the keys, the family toured the fully furnished home made possible by Chris Furniture of Livonia.
The housing commission says its goal in the coming years is to rehab at least 100 houses so another 100 families can have a similar experience.
