Outlined below is a brief summary of what is involved in sponsoring a Habitat house. Keep in mind that this is only a summary, and potential sponsors are encouraged to meet personally with a member of the Habitat staff to discuss the process in a more personal and detailed way. Habitat often finds it necessary to vary the program to suit special circumstances.

Greensboro Habitat for Humanity offers two types of House Sponsorship:

Full Sponsorship
This program provides that sponsors will donate the full cost of the house and also supply the construction volunteers needed for the project. As the house is being built, it will carry the sponsor's name on the front of the house. Currently, the cost of a sponsorship for one house is $60,000.  Habitat requests that a portion of the money be on deposit with Habitat before construction begins. The construction period is approximately 3 to 6 months and requires an average of about 15 volunteer workers each workday. To assist the sponsors in organizing the project, Habitat will provide a Sponsor Tool Kit that will lead the group through the entire building process. The manual also identifies the leadership roles that will be needed and suggests ways to make the project easy to manage. When a sponsor commits to full sponsorship, Habitat will schedule meetings with the sponsor leadership to review the project in detail.

Sponsors are encouraged to find skilled volunteer leaders, however Habitat is prepared to supply the skilled leadership where needed from our regular volunteers. Habitat construction staff will also supervise the building process and will be responsible for obtaining the building permits and filing the building inspection requests with the city. Sponsors will also be given a list of hand tools that will be needed for the project (included in the Sponsor Tool Kit). Habitat will see that the house foundation is in place.

The family that will purchase the house will be selected by Habitat and will work with the sponsoring group.

Partial House Sponsorship
This program involves many variations of partial financial volunteer support for building a house. Habitat is prepared to tailor-make a program that will suit most any group. In most cases we can find partners who will provide the balance of the money or volunteers to make this program possible. Sometimes it takes longer to put the package together, but we encourage all potential sponsors by saying that we should be able to work out a program that will suit most special situations.

However we will never turn down a financial donation of any size, nor will we turn down one individual or group that wishes to volunteer. We just could not refer to these types of contributions as "Sponsored Houses." For example, we schedule many organizational or corporate "Habitat Work Days" during the year. Currently, our volunteer build days are Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday.  Arrangements can be made for occasional Sunday workdays when a sponsor desires. These work days are wonderful team building outings for corporate groups.

As specific questions arise, call the Director of Development and Communications at 275-4663.