Life for Cindy* and her three children is not easy. Having lost her husband at a young age, Cindy struggles to make ends meet. Her job at a local market brings in $1200 a month now that she has had her hours cut back for the summer. Hopefully in the next month or so she expects to return to full-time work. To help, her two teenagers also work and pitch in. To gauge how difficult things are and how close to the edge the family lives, Cindy has no credit cards or bank accounts. Her employer will cash her check as long as she spends at least 10% of it in the store.

In the meantime, the family’s stability has been seriously rocked as their rental was recently sold and the family had to move in with friends and place their belongings in storage. With affordable housing in short supply in this Northeast city, the $850 rental they recently found was an unexpected gift.

The problem? In order to rent the family must come up with the first and last month’s rent as well as a security deposit…not so easy when you have no safety net protecting you.

Thanks to our generous donors, the Good People Fund was able to quickly write a check to the landlord and within a few days this family of four will be settled in their new home. Safe for now and with perhaps a better feeling for the upcoming New Year.

* a pseudonym