Habitat for Humanity renovates a home in time for the holidays

RAPID CITY, S.D. (KOTA) - Habitat for Humanity seeks to better the community all year round by building, and rebuilding homes for families in need.

Tuesday marks Habitat for Humanity’s final house built in Rapid City this year, and it is just in time for one woman to be in her own home for the holidays.

Habitat for Humanity typically builds homes from the ground up, but one local couple decided to donate the home, making it one of the largest donations in local history. While they don’t typically renovate homes, making it an exciting step forward for the Black Hills area non-profits.

“As Habitat’s looking for more opportunities to build affordable homes, we have to find any opportunity we can to get those homes built. In this case it was a home that needed to be stripped down to the studs, we had to put new insulation, electric, plumbing in it. We’re really excited to get the home do a complete renovation on it and get it very close to what a brand-new home would be,” says Black Hills area Habitat for Humanity’s executive director, Scott Engmann.

The home was donated and renovated for Melody Jacobson. The decision to fully renovate the home came from the need for improved efficiency and making sure the home was of a quality that the organization felt was suitable for her.

The home was ripped down to the studs and roof trusses. They even went as far as making the rooms different sizes to be more suitable to the homeowners’ needs. Habitat for Humanity strives to make sure all the homes they create feel comfortable and new to the recipient.

“I was really fortunate that even though I was done with my hours of service, I still continued to come and help, so I got to see the whole house from start to finish, from when we were working on it,” says Melody Jacobsen, the home recipient.

Melody herself put over 100 hours of volunteer work into her own home.

Through partnerships, donations, and countless hours of hard work from volunteers—Habitat for Humanity strives to continue to give back to South Dakota.

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