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Success Stories

A mother and three daughters pose around a dining room table. There are lace curtains and blue wall in the background and some dishes on the table in the foreground.

“This is Home” – A Family Finds Their Forever Home in Calais, Maine

One of the first rooms Heather Gagne and her daughters began redecorating in their new home is the dining room, shown in the top photo. They have been busy repainting and making other updates. Raising a family in coastal Machias, Maine may sound lovely, but for Heather Gagne recent years proved stressful. There were few housing options in the Downeast community, and Heather was glad to find a rental home to…
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Find Stories

Use the filters below to find additional stories about how our programs have helped rural communities across the nation.

Search Results: 145 Stories
woman standing beside new shower in bathroom

Investing in Safe, Affordable Housing on a South Dakota Reservation

Biological needs – sleep, food, water, air, shelter - form the base as they are of the greatest importance in maintaining life. Once a person has met the biological needs, the next concern is safety. In one of the poorest counties in the nation, Buffalo County, USDA Rural… [Read More]
South Dakota
GrantsHomeownershipTribal

Lifetime Renter Achieves Homeownership

Rural Development has a multitude of programs that help communities expand upon their existing assets and assist in creating an infrastructure to help improve the lives of rural residents. For Linda Pickett, the opportunity to own a home has long seemed to be a distant reality.… [Read More]
Tennessee
HomeownershipHousing
rural development, rural development mississippi, homeownerhsip, neighborhood revitalization, yazoo city

Neighborhood Revitalization in Rural Mississippi

The Esther Stewart Buford Foundation (ESBF) is a local nonprofit and Community Development Housing Organization located in Yazoo City, Mississippi. They have partnered with Rural Development to administer Self-Help Housing grants from Rural Development for over 15 years. It came… [Read More]
Mississippi
HomeownershipHousing
Checking out their new front porch.

New Home for Family Made Possible

Tyler Vacha and his family made a major life decision when he accepted employment with the Center for Rural Affairs at Lyons, Nebraska. After relocating to the area from Des Moines, they began searching for homes in the Lyons area that would fit their family's needs. After… [Read More]
Nebraska
HomeownershipHousing
Photo of Zuni Housing Authority building and sign out front.

New Homes Dedicated at Zuni Pueblo New Mexico

USDA Rural Housing Service Administrator Tony Hernandez joined State Director Terry Brunner to dedicate three homes at Zuni Pueblo and three apartment complexes in Gallup as part of National Homeownership Month celebrations. “Throughout my travels, I’ve seen how rural… [Read More]
New Mexico
GrantsHomeownershipHousingTribal

New Senior Housing Development in East Tennessee

Senior citizens in the Greeneville, Tennessee area have been eager to call the brand new Barton Greene Apartments home.  “I was lucky enough to be able to move into Barton Greene, back to my home town.  The house I owned in Cleveland, TN was just too much to maintain… [Read More]
Tennessee
HomeownershipHousing
Maung Family

Overcoming Barriers Provides Maung Family with a New Home

Although Nyo Maung and his family have limited knowledge of the English language, they did not let that barrier prevent them from pursing the American dream of homeownership.  The Maung’s worked with a language interpreter to file paperwork and  finalize the process of… [Read More]
South Dakota
Homeownership

Patience and Faith Pay Off for First-Time Homeowners

For the past nine years, Ernest & Janette Sanchez, along with their six children, were living in a small home that they shared with their in-laws. Having to live with three other families in a four-bedroom home, their living condition were extremely overcrowded to say the… [Read More]
Hawaii and Western Pacific
Homeownership
The Moons receive the keys to their new home

Purchasing a Home with a Historical Past

Justin and Krista Moon knew they wanted more children and that the home they rented was already jam packed. While looking at houses they found a craftsman home built in 1930 that had a piece of history with it.  A well known architect had designed and lived in the… [Read More]
Nebraska
Homeownership
The Wright House Apartment

The Wright House At The Right Price

When a mobile home park in Shelburne, Vermont went up for sale, community leaders came together to ensure affordable housing would still exist downtown. After six years of hard work, affordable housing is accessible once again in Shelburne. “Wright House is a little living… [Read More]
Vermont and New Hampshire
HomeownershipHousing

Additional Success Stories