ORLANDO, Fla. -- Two local affiliates of Habitat for Humanity International are getting a record $9.25 million donation from global philanthropist and author MacKenzie Scott, allowing them to build new homes, rehabilitate older ones, educate prospective home buyers and keep low-income seniors safely housed.
Scott, the ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and one of the company’s first employees, pledged in 2019 to give away most of her wealth to charity. She has made several massive gifts since then, including a $436 million donation announced this week for Habitat for Humanity International and 84 of the charity’s 1,100 U.S. Habitat affiliate organizations.
Seven of those affiliates were in Florida, two of them in Central Florida: Habitat for Humanity Greater Orlando & Osceola County, which received $5.75 million, its biggest gift ever, and Habitat Seminole-Apopka, which received a “transformational” $3.5 million.
“The gift will have an exponential impact on our community for generations,” said Catherine Steck McManus, president and CEO of Habitat Orlando & Osceola. “We are trying not only to build more homes, but because this is the most expensive time in history to build, we’re also diversifying how we can make it impact and truly preparing people to become home ready.”
It costs her organization about $25,000 more to build the same house in the same neighborhood than it did two years ago, and there are long backlogs for building materials, McManus said. But because of soaring rental prices, more people than ever are turning to Habitat hoping to become homeowners.
“So we’re really working one on one with them so that either they can get approved for the Habitat program or they get a more cost-effective rental home in the meantime,” she said. “Because it’s not just that apartment homes are ridiculously priced right now, but [landlords] also look at your background, they run credit checks, they want to see all sorts of stuff about you, and in many cases they can charge you more if your credit is not what they think it should be.”
The charity is also helping low-income senior homeowners replace their roofs and make other repairs so that they can safely stay in their current homes.
In Seminole and Apopka, the $3.5 million grant will “continue the quest to bridge the homeownership wealth gap in underprivileged areas,” according to a statement issued by the Habitat affiliate there.
“This amazing contribution validates our work locally in Seminole County and Greater Apopka over the past 30 years,” the statement said. “Even more, it is a testament to the donors and volunteers who have enabled us to build more than 200 houses so far.”
Jonathan Reckford, CEO of Habitat for Humanity International, called Scott’s donation “transformational” and said his nonprofit would use its $25 million portion not only to build more homes but also to work on systemic changes to improve equitable access to affordable housing.
This summer, he said, Habitat International will launch an initiative to increase Black homeownership.
In 2020, Scott donated $5.8 billion to nonprofits working on racial justice, LGBTQ equality, democracy, climate change, food insecurity and poverty. In June 2021, she announced another $2.7 billion to 286 nonprofits across the country, and earlier this month she gave $281 million to the Boys & Girls Clubs of America and 62 of its chapters.
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