MOSES LAKE — Catholic Charities Housing Services, based in Yakima, operates multi-family housing in 19 communities including Moses Lake, George, Royal City, Warden and Mattawa. Some of those residential properties are for seniors, some for farmworkers, some for anyone who needs an apartment to rent. 

But for those residents who are ready to move beyond renting, CCHS has programs to help them get into a home of their own. 

“We have two different models that allow families access to homeownership opportunities,” CCHS Vice President and Director of Housing Services Bryan Ketcham said. “They're both sweat equity-based, a component where there's buy in and commitment from the families.”

Sweat equity means the family that’s going to live in the home contributes a part of the work to build the home, Ketcham explained. That not only gives the family a stronger sense of ownership but also helps keep the cost of the construction down. 

Through the Individual Self-Help program, CCHS pre-qualifies the family, pre-packages a very low-interest, zero-down loan through USDA Rural Development and gives the family a credit at closing. In exchange, the family puts in 250 hours of labor in the actual construction. The mortgage is typically a 33-year loan, Ketcham said, although that can be adjusted. The interest rate depends on the borrower’s income; homeowners recertify their income every year and the rate is adjusted accordingly.

Around 2012, CCHS debuted an expanded version called the Mutual Self-Help Program. In this program, a group of six to 12 families will band together and build an entire neighborhood. The sweat equity is greater in this program; families put in 65 percent of the labor, or 30 hours per week.

“That’s a heavy lift for a lot of families,” Ketcham said. “It requires real commitment on their part. It takes about a year to build these homes.”

The skilled work – electrical, plumbing, roofing – is done through subcontractors, but the rest is up to the residents-to-be, Ketcham said. And if they don’t know how to do something, they learn.

“We're teaching the families how to do the footings and foundations,” Ketcham said. “They're tying rebar, they're cleaning the forms. They're doing the framing, the flooring, installations, the cabinets, the painting.”

The families all work together on all the homes, according to CCHS’ website, and no family moves in until all the homes are finished.  

“By the time the families complete construction, they'll have anywhere from $35,000 to $50,000 worth of equity in their home,” Ketcham said. “In order to qualify, 40 percent of the participants have to be very low-income families … so to go from zero assets to $50,000 in assets at the end of this program is transformative for these families.”

So far, the single-family programs have been concentrated in Yakima and Benton counties, but CCHS is working on expanding into Grant County. There are already multifamily complexes in Royal City and Mattawa, and CCHS has property adjacent to both that it hopes to use for single-family housing. CCHS acquired the Royal City property in 2020 and the Mattawa property in 2021, according to county records, but Ketcham said the agency has been planning the development since 2016.

“That's like the business that we're in: acquiring and developing land and then utilizing it for helping families with low incomes stabilize their living situations,” Ketcham said. “Our vision is that families that live in our multifamily sites can graduate into homeownership, so there's a pathway out of poverty.”

For more information, visit catholiccharitiescw.org/housing.

    A child cuts the ribbon on a Catholic Charities Housing Services home.