WARREN, Ohio – Thursday morning, Theresa Johnson will wake up as the owner of the Tod Avenue Southwest home where she’s lived for 24 years.
“I’m going to jump for joy, jump for joy,” she said. “… I’m excited about it – very wonderful.”
Sunshine of Warren-Trumbull Area Inc., a nonprofit organization, presented the new keys to Johnson Wednesday afternoon. She signed the paperwork earlier that day.
“It was beautiful,” Johnson said. “It was a feeling that I thought would never take place – not that I didn’t pray about it because I do believe in Jesus Christ.”
Presenting the keys and turning a renter into an owner marks the fulfillment of a promise made in Sunshine’s early days.
“This, quite frankly, is the proudest moment I’ve ever had in my career, and I am so happy. … It’s never too late to do the right thing,” said Melissa Lynn Holmes Phillips, Sunshine executive director, who wasn’t affiliated with the program when it started.
When the program was established in the early 1990s, renters were told they could buy the homes they rented from Sunshine after 15 years. But that didn’t happen.
Phillips said the agreements weren’t set up to accomplish that, and the funding through which that initiative was established didn’t include a mechanism to enable it.
“This program was a cutting-edge program when it started,” she said. “The guys at the city of Warren, the original folks who had done this, they used new federal grants, the Low Income Housing Tax Credit Program, and they did something that really no one else in the state had done.”
But mistakes were made, and it took a while for agency and city officials to unravel them, Phillips explained. She called it a group effort. It involved attorneys, title searches, city administrators, council members, Trumbull County commissioners and 7 17 Credit Union.
“I’m so glad we’re here 30 years later,” Phillips said. “This is where we should have been 15 years ago, but here we are. And I think what’s so important is we did this together.”
She expects several more tenants who have been renting from Sunshine for at least 20 years to become owners. And their mortgage payments will be less than their monthly rent. The mortgages run for about 3 years.
The option to buy those is only available to those who have been renting for at least 20 years, and the offer lasts until November. Sunshine, which owns 180 homes, has shifted its focus to being a landlord.
Mayor Doug Franklin called Johnson’s ownership of the home a proud moment for the city.
“This is an important day because we kept a 30-year-old promise that had long been a promise that had been overlooked and unfulfilled,” he said.
Both Franklin and Phillips credited 7 17 and John Demmler, its CEO and president, for their work with Sunshine to allow the renters to become homeowners.
Franklin said he called Demmler following a highly charged council meeting where the issue was discussed.
“Within 24 hours, he got together and put together a framework with his team to really make this work financially,” Franklin said. “And believe me, this was complicated because of the complexities of the project that happened 20-something years ago. We unraveled and sorted through all of that, and they did all the heavy lifting.”
Demmler credited Johna Scherzer, 7 17 first vice president of retail lending, for her work.
“Mayor, when you came in and you kind of explained everything to us, my heart kind of felt the years worth of waiting that people had for getting into their homes,” he said. “And we wanted to make sure that everyone that wanted to buy their home could buy their home.”
The credit union made a commitment that everyone was prequalified, he said.
“This is one of the most amazing things that I’ve been part of in the three years that I’ve been at 7 17,” Demmler added. “We’re focused on building home ownership across the whole region, and seeing it happen here like this is inspiring for me to keep going.”
Councilwomen Helen Rucker, D-at large, and Honeya Price, D-6th, also thanked those involved in allowing long-time tenants to buy their homes. Rucker said it’s something she’s been fighting to make happen for years.
“We have other people, and they will receive their fees as well,” she said. “We won’t let this go until it’s done.”
Pictured at top: Theresa Johnson at her Tod Avenue Southwest home.