In honor of Women’s History Month, we sat down with some of the dynamic women on staff at Habitat NYC and Westchester, including our CEO, Sabrina Lippman, VP of Housing Services, Charlotte Bell, and Grants Manager, Monique Fournillier, to reflect on the importance and impact of supporting women in building equity, legacy, and resilient communities through stable housing.
How does stable housing impact women and their families?
Sabrina: “Eighty percent of families that we serve here in New York City and Westchester are led by single moms of color. So, these are women that have been doing all the right things. They’re working two or three jobs. They’re taking care of our elderly or our children. They’re cleaning our parks. They are bringing us our coffees. Yet they make too much income to qualify for government assistance and then don’t make enough to be able to go out to the market and achieve the dream of homeownership. And so, when Habitat steps in and works with these families to be able to provide them with an affordable mortgage so that they can have their first-time home, it completely transforms their life.
Up until the late 70s, women weren’t allowed to have a mortgage in their name. They weren’t allowed to have a credit card in their name. They had to have a husband. So, when you think about the progress we’ve made so far, it is of critical importance that we help and support hardworking women in the city to be able to own their own home, to build generational wealth and equity, because that is what transforms the lives of their families, but also generations to come.”
Monique: “Everyone should have access to stable, affordable housing as it heavily impacts both physical and mental health, childcare, education outcomes and more. In New York City, where two thirds of the population rents, over half of all households are rent burdened and the majority of those households are severely rent burdened, meaning they spend over 60% of their income on rent.
Last year, The National Women’s Law Center released a brief that noted 74% of households served by HUD rental assistance programs were women-led households and that households with children headed by women comprised 30 percent of households receiving HUD rental assistance. And while our mission focuses on homeownership opportunities, the population we serve mirrors the HUD rental assistance population demographics.”
Charlotte: “Women take on a lot. That’s been the case certainly from my own personal experience, what I see in my work, and what I see in my day-to-day life. Women take on a lot of roles and responsibilities in communities. So, when we support our communities—when we have affordable healthcare, when we have quality education, when we have access to affordable quality food, and when we have access to affordable quality housing—we are supporting women. All of those things are a part of a healthy foundation of society, and when you have those things, you allow women and people in our communities to flourish and to be able to accomplish what they set out to do and live lives with dignity and purpose.”
What role do women play in transforming and building communities?
Monique: “Women have always been integral to community building efforts, even as our access to equal rights within the community remains uncertain.
Historically, women have been cast as caregivers with the expectation that we will act as “managers” of the next generation’s upbringing and stewards of the current generations’ wellbeing. In other words, we’re expected to teach children how to be thoughtful community members and to provide a stable place to grow. Ironically, women have managed these responsibilities while contending with political disenfranchisement, income disparities and barriers to obtaining independent credit, and thus, mortgages, prior to 1974.”
Sabrina: “Women overwhelmingly are invested in the communities they’re in. They are committed to perseverance. When they purchase their first Habitat home, not only are they able to build generational wealth and equity for their own family, but they also become invested in the communities that they move into.”
What motivates you to do this work?
Monique: “Do you know how in movies sometimes people go back “home”, and they can see the marks their parents made of their height throughout the years? I love it, but like a lot of New York City residents and immigrants overall, I unfortunately don’t relate to it. It doesn’t seem like a big deal, but it’s meaningful to have that kind of consistent access to stable housing, and if I can help make that more relatable to more people, I’m down.”
Charlotte: “I think going back to the foundation of our communities, of our homes, of ourselves—land, property, housing—is so essential. Once I started working in housing as a tenant organizer, I just felt so motivated to work with communities, residents, local organizations, and local agencies to improve housing conditions for the majority of New Yorkers, but certainly on a wider scale. And to come up with solutions. There are solutions, and I think that it’s not such a far-fetched idea to think that everyone can have and should have affordable quality housing. Just understanding how essential that is just keeps me motivated.”
Sabrina: “I’m a born and bred New Yorker, Latina from a low-income family in Queens, and I saw what it took for my mom to work full-time alongside my father, who owned a small business. By the grace of God and sheer luck, we were able to purchase a home in the early ’80s in New York City. I attribute a lot of my ability to do this work to the fact that I had stability and housing growing up, and so many families don’t have that now.
What motivates me is all those families that deserve an equal chance—that it shouldn’t just be by sheer luck. The right to housing is not a privilege; it’s a right, and everyone deserves a decent, safe, affordable place to live and access to owning their piece of New York.”
