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Please help us survive!

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Our family has been living in our car for seven months now, with occasional breaks in a motel room or at a friend's house.  We were kicked out of our home May of 2017 when the landlord wanted to remodel our townhouse so they could rent it out for a price beyond what we can afford. We were evicted from our prior residence for the same reason.  Due to some traumatic situations in the city we were living in, and being unable to find housing because of the eviction, we decided to move to a different city, a better one. I used to live Olympia, so we came here.  The kids are going to school here and they seem to like it.    We are hoping to to find a place here. I'm disabled and in pain most of the time, and I do get disability, but it's not enough to live on.  I'm paying most of my important bills out of my disability , but I have bills that I can't always pay.  As a result, my husband and I are looking for work.  I've had one interview so far, but that's it.  He's had several. We are in our forties but haven't worked in over seven years now (except bell ringing at the Salvation Army  one month last year). I'm on disability because of an accident in April of 2011 that left me permanently disabled and having to relearn how to walk again. He left his job to care for me while I was injured, and to help me regain my strength.  I've been a fall risk for years, but I have improved quite a bit in recent weeks. I was using a walker until we had to stay in the car - there's no room for us to carry that around.   Now, I mostly just limp. I deal with chronic pain due to my injury and due to illness. Everyone in the family suffers from really bad anxiety, fears of things like making phone calls or interacting with people bothers all of us at one level or another. We are getting help, but it's made finding work or a place to live that much more challenging.  We transferred our voucher from the housing authority to Thurston County, and I'm looking at Craigslist daily. As I write this, we have plans to meet with a landlord today or tomorrow.  I haven't been having much luck lately, between the eviction on my record, not so great credit and no rental history (the best I had recently was five years, but then they evicted me).    We can't afford the application fees only to be told no.  I try to talk to people about it, but I usually get a no very quickly.   Rarely do I get past that.   I generally have to look for private landlords that take a housing voucher. I try to keep our lives as routine as possible.  Our oldest is on the spectrum, so routine is key.  We keep our car clean, we do regular laundry, we shower (this is more work than you would think) , my kids go to school regularly, and even though it's not great sleep and we are sleeping in the car, we do sleep somewhere relatively safe at night.  We do have a lot of challenges.  I often have to drive quite a bit, from one side of town to another a few times a day (mostly on the days I schedule showers) , so we go through a lot of gas.  We are in need of warm clothes as the weather cools down, and we need various hygiene supplies at least a couple of times a week.  We do get food stamps, but it doesn't last us the whole month, nor does it pay for hot food.  I have bills I can barely cover with all of the extra expenses that come with being homeless.  We need to to pay for medications, as well. We don't have room in the car to buy things in bulk or an address to receive mail at, so we try to only buy what we can use.   We would certainly welcome help with the deposit on a place,  or even a night at a motel to get a break from sleeping in the car.   I want to give a very thorough explanation of what we are going through, and I hope I have at least given you a good start.   I hope you will consider helping us get by.  I will post more about the situation in the near future. Thank you.  Please feel free to share this post with friends!
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Donations 

  • Nanza Nanza
    • $40 
    • 5 yrs
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Organizer

Cherrie White Mayer
Organizer
Olympia, WA

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