Ottesen family

Hello we are the Ottesen Family. We live in Elk ridge Utah. I run a doggy day care and my husband works for the city, we have always wanted to make sure our children had a safe home to live in.

As of today after 5 1/2 years of structural house settling. We are being forced to face the reality of closing my doggy day care, selling everything we can’t take with us, buying a 5th wheel and walking away. It is heartbreaking to start back over after building a life in a neighborhood we love, but we cannot afford to fight the government any longer. We are so grateful for any help offered, for our family to start over.

Details explaining everything are below.

We built our home through a organization called selfhelphomes.org which is a sweat equity program funded through the USDA. To make a long story short, when the house was built, the basement was dug in freezing temperatures without the necessary precautions to prevent to soil from frost and was not backfilled correctly. Because of this the foundation of the home is settling and causing structural damage throughout the home.

After living in this community for 5 and a half years and working through a claim with the USDA for construction defects for over 4 years, we are approaching the end of this chapter. We reported the construction defects approximately 4 months after moving in, and watch as our home slowly disintegrated, pressuring the USDA to address the issues.

Unfortunately it was not addressed in the way the USDA has written procedures that are meant to address these types of situations, and now the damage has reached beyond the point of being addressed for a reasonable resolution. The house has to be completely torn down. Unfortunately the USDA is not offering us the compensation needed to repair or replace it, so we are being forced to face the reality of selling everything, closing my doggy day care, buying a 5th wheel and walking away from our home. Without ever missing a mortgage payment, or it being our choice. It’s heartbreaking to our entire family.