Jobs bring chance to own a home

THE LETTER came on a Saturday.

It demanded neither money nor time, but instead offered both.

Recipient Nneka Powell's first reaction was that, like so many other mailbox offers, this one was just junk.

"I thought it was a scam," she said. " 'Cause I was taught, like everyone else, that nothing is free."

But the letter was from her employer, Crozer-Keystone Health System, and the offer for $5,000 toward purchase of a home in Chester was too good to throw away.

"I folded that up and put it right in my pocketbook," Powell, 34, said. "And on Monday, I called first thing."

Powell's curiosity led her to become one of a dozen employees taking part in an initiative aimed at promoting home ownership in Chester to employees of Crozer-Keystone and Widener University, two of the city's biggest employers.

Under the Employer-Assisted Home Program, a limited number of eligible employees from each institution will be granted $5,000 forgivable loans from their employers to buy a house within Chester's city limits or in neighboring Upland Borough.

Each loan is forgiven at a rate of 20 percent a year. Thus, a loan is completely forgiven and, in essence, becomes a grant, if the employee is still living in the house five years after purchase.

"For someone to give you $5,000, like, this is a great job," Powell said. "All the years I've been working, I haven't found a job that's done anything like this yet."

The concept was introduced by the Chester Economic Development Authority (CEDA) in 1999 as a way to increase home ownership in the city, where, according to the last U.S. Census, only 48 percent of residents own homes.

But when the program was shopped around, employers weren't interested, said CEDA housing director Lisa Gaffney.

"At first, people considered it more of a charity, as opposed to a benefits program," Gaffney said. "But it really is a benefit, just like health care or public transportation."

Widener spokesman Daniel Hanson agreed.

"Like any other organization, we're competing with other companies for good employees," he said. "We want to be employers of first choice and we want to offer benefits and incentives for our employees not only to come to Widener, but to stay at Widener once they're here."

Dominique Trotter, a nursing assistant at Crozer-Chester, now has $5,000 and five years' worth of reasons to stay at her job after purchasing her first house this month at age 22 with assistance from the program.

"It feels good. It's nice to know they're willing to help out," said Trotter, a Chester native. "I think it's about time for Chester.

"I thought it was interesting that they were willing to help bring back Chester a little bit by trying to get more people to move in and buy houses."

Hanson said that revitalizing Chester doesn't just mean bringing new businesses to town, but also strengthening the community.

"People who own their own property have a larger stake in the community they live in and they want to see it grow and prosper," he said.

Powell, who works as a medical assistant and surgical scheduler at Crozer-Keystone, said that the home-ownership program would allow her to return, with her three children, to the community where she grew up.

In 2004, Powell's husband was killed in Chester, and she made it her mission to fulfill his last wish - that their family move to Wilmington.

"But Delaware is not where I'm from, and I wasn't comfortable there," she said.

With the economy in crisis, Powell also found the commute to Chester financially straining, she said.

"Most of the time now, I'll probably be walking to work," she said. "That's just another thing that's convenient."

The Franklin Mint Credit Union also is a partner in the program, offering Crozer-Keystone and Widener employees complimentary credit counseling, free pre-approvals and a .125-percent mortgage-rate discount.

That's another benefit for people like Powell and Trotter who typically don't qualify for income-restricted home-ownership programs offered by city and state agencies.

"You want the best from your job. You want to work, you want to gain and you want to grow," she said. "I've been here for a while and I've been growing and growing.

"I see a future with this job, this job that helps you out. Things are finally looking good for me." *