Homeowners

Make It Right construction is underway in the Lower 9th Ward. The first 6 homes are completed and displaced Lower 9th Ward families now call these Make It Right houses "home."

Homeowners in the Lower 9th Ward face many obstacles to rebuilding that make recompensing the dollar value of their destroyed homes woefully insufficient. Some of those obstacles include dramatically increased construction costs, utility costs, insurance costs and property taxes. Many homeowners in the Lower 9th Ward are retired and/or disabled and unable to work. Property tax exemptions and other conditions that made homeownership affordable before hurricane Katrina are unlikely to be adequate in the future. The unique challenges among homeowners in the Lower 9th Ward require that Make It Right consider carefully how to make MIR homes truly affordable. The process of homeowner counseling will help to achieve this end.

Homeowner counseling is the process through which Lower 9th Ward residents who work with MIR will choose, finance and prepare to own their new homes.


MIR has begun the project with a pilot group of households. These households will go through the entire MIR process, beginning with contact by a local community partner, working through homeowner counseling, selecting home designs, securing financing and ultimately moving into the first MIR homes. The homeowners who participate in this pilot process will help MIR shape the process for those to follow.