Help Crystal Remediate The Mold From Her Home

Hi, my name is Suzanne and I'm fundraising for my dear friend Crystal who has been coping the best she can despite 9 months of taking hit after hit to her situation.

Crystal is a single mom to her autistic 9 year old son and is on low/fixed income (SSDI) as a result of chronic medical conditions. She works part time, as much as she's able to despite her health conditions.

After leaving escalating DV in January of 2022, she rented two rooms out of a private home. Despite a written lease, the so-called "landlord" broke the lease 7 months early, giving Crystal 30 days' notice in May of 2022, effectively making Crystal and her son homeless. It would not have been safe for Crystal to fight to stay. It would have created a hostile living situation as the landlord also lived in the home.

With all the apartments in a two hour radius either waitlisted several years out (Crystal still applied) or well outside of her affordable budget, Crystal bought a pre-owned RV on an "as is" basis at a local dealership. She even made the smart decision to get an extended service plan which has already come through for her once. Unfortunately, however,  the service plan doesn't cover pre-existing conditions.

Crystal recently discovered previously existing, extensive water damage in two of her slideouts of her trailer. The dealership is stating that they've "gone above and beyond" by replacing the floor in the one slideout and they're not helping with the other one.

The dealership's attempt at "fixing" the floor stirred up mold spores.

While you and I wouldn't likely be affected,  Crystal, on top of all of her other medical conditions, is HIGHLY ALLERGIC to the mold that's been found (as confirmed by the mold report provided by ServPro after they conducted sampling). 

She and her son have had to move out of the trailer and are currently cramped together in a friend's small guest room, but this is not a long term solution.

Her friends who took her in can't house her and her son long term.

Despite being really handy and very DIY savvy, Crystal cannot remediate the mold because of her serious allergy to it. 

Prior to finding the mold, she was growing more and more sick and had been in and out of her local urgent care and then the emergency room several times in the past 5 weeks. 

The quote she received to have the mold properly remediated and her air quality restored to what's safe for her is just shy of $7000.

She'll also need to purchase lumber and supplies to repair the slideout floor once the mold is addressed. Right now, she can't even go in and out of her trailer to access her belongings. She's had to ask friends to do so if/ when they're available. 

Crystal, who has only 6 classes remaining until she earns her B.S. degree in Psychology and who wants to go on to get her Master's degree is the hardest worker and one of the best moms that I know. 

She has repeatedly told me throughout our 10+ year long friendship that she just wants to be able to give her son a good life and to be able to get her own situation stable enough that she can form a non profit and give back to other people. 

If you knew Crystal's life story like I do you would know that even prior to this she has already endured more than anyone's fair share of trauma. She is struggling to hold onto hope and is struggling to remain strong when the hits just keep coming. 

For as long as I've known Crystal she has NEVER asked for her life to be made easier. She would just really like it if she could catch a break from situation after situation that has caused trauma and made her and her sweet son's lives significantly harder. 

If she could have the mold taken care of she would be able to move herself and her son safely back into the trailer, which is otherwise no different than a "tiny home." Her and her son have their own bedrooms, a kitchen, bathroom, living room, and proper utility hookups. 

Not only will the trailer provide housing, but it will increase Crystal and her son's long term financial success as well. Crystal intends to pay off the trailer in 2 - 3 years, much faster than her 12 year loan calls for. 

Once paid off, she'll have an asset (instead of having paid into an apartment, for example, that she doesn't own therefore  washing money down the drain). 

Because she's on land (owned by a friend) with proper hookups, once the trailer is paid off she and her son can continue to live in the trailer and save money each month. Her eventual goal is homeownership.

While Crystal can afford her monthly bills and the RV payments, she is not able to come up with $7000 on her own for the mold remediation. 

It was because of how well Crystal manages her money and how hard shes been working, that she was able to come up with a down payment for the RV in the first place. 

She's living frugally and putting in the effort to build up her emergency savings again. Having discussed her finances with her, I can attest that Crystal is going above and beyond to sacrifice so she can build a strong financial future and outcome for her and her son. 

I know Crystal would do anything she could to help a friend in need and while I'd gladly do anything for her, I can't do it alone.

Please help me restore safety to Crystal's home by donating towards her mold remediation services. Please help give Crystal hope for a better future for her, and most importantly, her son.