For four Saturdays in July, HawaiiUSA joined Habitat for Humanity Leeward Oahu to build their largest home to date.
As part of HawaiiUSA’s Volunteer Work Day program, the credit union partnered with Habitat for Humanity Leeward Oahu to help build a new home located in the Kanehili Hawaiian homestead in Kapolei. The nearly 2600 square foot home is being built for Sarah Kawailima, her six children, and her only grandchild. The rising cost of living in Hawaii has encouraged Sarah to see her dream of owning a home come true. After 16 years, Sarah was able to work with the Department of Hawaiian Homelands and Habitat of Humanity to build her ‘ohana’s “legacy home” from the ground up.
Every Saturday, since June 2021, numerous volunteers have taken part in building Sarah’s home. HawaiiUSA’s employees and their families were scheduled for four Saturdays this past July to help make Sarah’s dream home a reality. Each weekend, HawaiiUSA employees showed up in full force to help paint, move drywall, and even feed lunch to everyone working onsite.
“We’ve been really blessed to be working with HawaiiUSA Federal Credit for the past four weeks. They’ve been awesome!” said Jo Bautista, executive director of Habitat for Humanity Leeward Oahu.
Habitat for Humanity’s mission is to eliminate poverty housing and homelesness by building adequate, basic housing. Since 2015, Habitat for Humanity Leeward Oahu has built over 14 homes and helped more than 50 people achieve their dream of home ownership.
