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Affordable housing is one of the most pressing issues facing growing cities across Northern Colorado. As prices rise, many essential workers—teachers, civil servants, and young families—are increasingly pushed out of the communities they help support. What role does homeownership play in stability and long-term wellbeing in a community?
According to Kristin Candella, who leads Habitat For Humanity in Fort Collins, housing is about much more than shelter—it's a foundational tool for community connection. She explains how owning a home builds generational wealth, enables economic mobility, and transforms lives through a sense of rootedness and opportunity. By offering no-interest mortgages and requiring sweat equity, Habitat For Humanity equips homeowners to invest in their futures and thrive long term.
On this episode of The Love FoCo Show, Jeff Faust welcomes Kristin Candella for a conversation about the impact of affordable housing, generosity, and how Fort Collins is coming together to build more than homes—this community is building hope.
Kristin Candella is the Executive Director and CEO of Habitat For Humanity in Fort Collins, Colorado. She leads community-driven housing initiatives aimed at addressing affordability and fostering long-term stability for local families. With over a decade in leadership at Habitat and a background in nonprofit management, Kristin’s work is grounded in both personal experience and professional passion for social equity. A Fort Collins local, she blends deep community roots with a visionary approach to housing justice.
Narrator: This is the Love Foco Show.
Kristin Candella: To take on a project of 48 homes felt totally impossible. It required a lot of faith and a whole lot of, wow, if we step over this threshold, will the community rise up to support us? Huge risk. And guess what? We just raised the walls on the final four homes.
Jeff Faust: That's amazing.
Kristin Candella: The final four homes. I mean, really just can't believe it.
Narrator: Welcome to the Love Foco Show. Our podcast highlights the incredible people who make Fort Collins the place we're proud to call home. Each week, your host, Jeff Faust, sits down with local leaders, community champions, and change makers to share their stories, what they love about our city, and how they're helping it thrive. So whether you're out on the trail, at a brewery, or walking through Old Town, thanks for tuning in.
Jeff Faust: Hey, everyone. Jeff Faust here, your host for the Love Foco Show. So excited for today's interview with Kristen Candella, the executive director of Habitat For Humanity right here in Fort Collins. The work that she is doing is incredible. They're building houses for so many different individuals and families.
You're not going to wanna miss the way that they are building, true lives and and livelihood for folks in our community, but also engaging in community development, getting so many different volunteers on board. And, you know, her leadership and influence comes from a wonderful story of exposure to Habitat For Humanity, informative times of her life, as well as just her own family journey. So I'm so excited to be able to share this conversation with you.
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Jeff Faust: Well, Kristen, thank you so much for giving part of your day to me and being able to sit down and join the Love Foco Show. This whole podcast is dedicated to sharing stories of incredible people doing incredible things.
You're you're one of those folks in our community and so I'm so grateful that that you're sitting down with me. I I can't wait to get into your story and how you're making an impact in our city but I the way I love to start this conversation is to just learn a little bit about, you know, your background and origin story. Like, what is your Fort Collins origin story? I don't know. Have you ever read comic books?
Kristin Candella: A little bit.
So I'm not a big comic book guy either. I but I watch movies.
Kristin Candella: Okay.
Jeff Faust: And they always have like an origin story. Like, where did this person come from? What about their background? Not only landed them in the position they're in, but like, you know, what brought them into, you know, their superpowers and you have a number of them. And so tell us a little bit about your journey to Fort Collins.
Like how did you grow up here? What was your background like? How did you become who you are today?
Kristin Candella: Well, I Love Foco. You know, that's a great start. I love movies. I'm a movie junkie. So origin stories are incredibly important and and my origin story is this community.
You know, I grew up in Fort Collins and I do what people that grew up here do, I say. I went to Beatty, Bolt, Rocky, and then CSU.
Jeff Faust: That's amazing. That is amazing. Now, I have just a really important clarifying question. You said you grew up here, were you also born here?
Kristin Candella: No. I was not born here.
Jeff Faust: So this is what I'm learning.
Kristin Candella: I was not born here. I am a Colorado native.
Jeff Faust: Okay. Okay.
Kristin Candella: But not in an excluding anybody way. I think people got here as soon as they could. Right.
Jeff Faust: And then we don't leave. That's the other thing.
Kristin Candella: I'm not mad at that. I'm glad you're here. I grew up in Denver. I moved to Fort Collins in fourth grade.
Jeff Faust: Okay.
Kristin Candella: And I was only child, don't hold it against me, of a single parent. Yeah. My mom, we moved from Denver, and Fort Collins was a welcoming place. Yeah. It was pretty empty at the time if you can imagine the fountains and old town and no cars on the streets.
Jeff Faust: Well what I've heard is changed a lot.
Kristin Candella: Yeah. You know the sleepy. It was sleepy. It wasn't quite as energetic but there was some charm to it for sure. And you know my origin story I think what's really important to me about it looking back was that my mom was a force for good and she was hard working like so many single parents are just trying to make ends meet.
Jeff Faust: But You have to
Kristin Candella: be. You have to
Jeff Faust: be. Yeah.
Kristin Candella: You have to be. She was an entrepreneur. She sold furniture. She had a store on college. She was the safe place for a lot of my friends, and she bought our first home.
Not that long after we moved here, but long enough where we had jumped around from apartment to apartment and then finally bought our first home. Yep. So that was when I felt like, oh, this is our home. We really live here now and I can walk to elementary school like this is it. Yep.
So I I feel like that's a pretty important part of my origin story was that security that finally happened and that rootedness in a community that felt really neighborly and warm.
Jeff Faust: Yep. Yeah. Well, a big difference from Denver. I mean, Yep. You're you moved here, I think you said fourth grade?
Kristin Candella: Yes.
Jeff Faust: So you have memories of Denver. You have memories of of I mean, it's just a it's a metro. You know, it's it's lovely. I mean, what we'd like to go down to Denver and there's different things that Denver has to offer than Fort Collins. Yep.
But, you know, it it it's a different culture here. And the neighborhoods are, you know, they're just you have an opportunity to live at a slightly slower pace. The friendliness is just, I think, maybe more apparent. Yeah. Than a than a growing metro.
The traffic no matter what people complain about is better. It is better.
Kristin Candella: I grew moved back as an adult. It is better. Yeah.
Jeff Faust: Yes. Yeah. And so tell me a little bit about that, Jerry, because I I grew up. My mom was a single mom as well. A couple of one when I was really really young and my older brother and then older in life as well.
That survivor mentality, that that entrepreneurship, that really rings true for me. I mean, my mom always had side hustles. And she was always like, I I can start this after school thing and and get a little extra cash and we can do this and we can do. Even watching a parent do that, it like builds something within I I
Kristin Candella: think. Absolutely.
Jeff Faust: And now it can be there there's some hardship to that too of course. Yep. But it it provides an opportunity for you like, well, I can learn from this and I can watch this and the sacrifice that I see consistently. Yeah. It's good to honor.
I I feel like it's good to honor that I find myself honoring my mom for the ways that she sacrificed and and did those things.
Kristin Candella: Oh, a 100%. She was never afraid of work and she also was very very welcoming. She didn't have a lot of time outside of working because she had to work so hard to make ends meet. So, you know, the fact that she then took time to welcome in the the teenagers that didn't know where they fit Yeah. Into our home, which wasn't, you know, any kind of special home.
I had all the friends with the big houses. Right? And and that's not what we had. We had this I like to kind of joke about my house because it wasn't attractive. Right?
I mean, and not even by standards at the that day and age. Right? It had the the green sculptured carpet like the deep green. And then the basement had the red shag and the full brown paneling on the walls.
Jeff Faust: I can picture this right now.
Kristin Candella: You can picture it. Right? And it and so
Jeff Faust: But if you make a mess or you spill something, like, it just kinda disappears.
Kristin Candella: That was an asset. Like, it just goes down. It
Jeff Faust: disappears. Who knows what you're stepping on after
Kristin Candella: a couple years.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. You could throw some parties and then like you wouldn't get in trouble. Just would go away.
Kristin Candella: That's a fact. Yes. This came in handy several times.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. I bet. I bet. Oh, man. Isn't it true to like when you have a hospitable heart, like it sounds like your mom had a welcoming heart that when you get the keys to your own place and you've got a young daughter who's elementary middle, you know, eventually a teenage daughter in four That that hospitable heart paired with a home can turn into a an environment Yeah.
Where your friends can rest Mhmm. Where they can receive love, where friendships and and bonding can happen in a different kind of way. Yeah. Then if you're always like maybe meeting outside or I mean there's just something about the home. That that brings that groundedness in a different kind of way.
Kristin Candella: Yeah. No question. Yeah.
Jeff Faust: That's that's yeah. That's really sweet. I bet there's a lot of good memories there and
Kristin Candella: Yeah, many many funny memories. I mean, the to the point where my friends and I eventually pulled up that shag carpet and there was linoleum underneath and then we painted the brown paneling.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: So we gave it new life. Yeah. But there's a certain I think about that now as a parent of teenagers. Yeah. I try to imagine, what if their friends were trying to do a DIY project on my house?
Yes. Yes. Would I have that same warm and welcoming kind of mentality? Probably Yeah.
Jeff Faust: Well, I I I would imagine some of that got placed inside of you from a very young age. Mhmm. So I I I bet you're probably better at it than you.
Kristin Candella: Yes. You realize it's a my house is that hub for people. Yeah. It is.
Jeff Faust: We have like, I mean, all of us. My my wife still to this day talks about some of her childhood friends. Mhmm. Where like the door was always open.
Kristin Candella: Mhmm.
Jeff Faust: And they were always, you know, like the best snacks. Yes. That were there and food will bring a crowd. By the For sure. This is what I'm learning.
And she talks about how her parents were always throwing like holiday parties and they would do they would do the theme parties. So maybe maybe it was less like the regular kind of stop ins but more of some of the events. And I watched my wife today. She's always ready to cook a meal. She's always ready to have someone out and like you can see how that trickles in.
Kristin Candella: It's it's
Jeff Faust: it's trickles down from family to family and and parent to child and Mhmm. Yeah. Yeah. That's that's really sweet. Mhmm.
So tell me a little bit about, like, growing up here in Fort Collins. What did you what kinds of stuff were you up to? I mean, what you know, did you play sports? Were you academically inclined? Where did you find yourself
Kristin Candella: Mhmm.
Jeff Faust: Spending time and effort?
Kristin Candella: Yeah. Well, played softball in high school and, you know, to this day, my family teases me a little bit that I had a lot of pride in being a buckaroo. That I saved that kind of buckaroo jacket from fast pitch competitive softball for far too many years. Yeah. It might be in the garage now.
Jeff Faust: I love that. You should have wore that for the interview. It would have been so good. You
Kristin Candella: know, maybe next time. Yeah. No. I was an outfielder. I like to brag a little bit that I was, you know, fourth in line when batting.
Jeff Faust: Yep. Yeah. Hey. That means you could slug.
Kristin Candella: I it was it was the biggest part I offered to the team. I wasn't very fast. I wasn't a great fielder, but I could hit the ball.
Jeff Faust: So, like, right right field then? I was
Kristin Candella: I was in in left field.
Jeff Faust: Left field?
Kristin Candella: Yes. I was in left.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. Yeah. Those corner outfielders though. Yeah. Like yeah.
Mean, center fields different. You gotta range
Kristin Candella: a lot. Yeah.
Jeff Faust: Corner outfielder, you can get away with
Kristin Candella: That's right.
Jeff Faust: Maybe less range.
Kristin Candella: Yeah. That's right.
Jeff Faust: Easier to throw it to third base.
Kristin Candella: Yes. And your
Jeff Faust: bat will help the team. You will hit the bat. Base hits and Mhmm. Home runs? No.
Kristin Candella: I don't think I got home runs. I was kind of a triple kinda kinda gal, but I I felt really good about that. I should not be talking about this. It's so embarrassing. This is what my family teases me.
Jeff Faust: I love it. This is gonna be memorized like memorialized forever.
Kristin Candella: Oh, no.
Jeff Faust: It's so good.
Kristin Candella: I'm gonna not talk about the Buckaroos anymore. The other thing I was really into, I loved theater. I had been a theater kid since I was little, know, from just doing the the ducky daddle wear a wear a ducky costume, a little literal duck on stage and sing with your little elementary school kids to, you know, doing plays up into CSU.
Jeff Faust: Yep.
Kristin Candella: I always enjoyed it. I just liked the community of it. I I liked the the range of talents people had. You know, the fact that theater people could just make fun out of of nothing.
Jeff Faust: Yes.
Kristin Candella: You know, it was a joy. You know, you'd go to a party and maybe there wasn't partying happening, but somebody was rapping in the corner and somebody, you know, somebody else was singing and turning the the thing into a musical. Just was a great group of people to be part of.
Jeff Faust: Incredibly talented people around us. They just really are.
Kristin Candella: Exactly.
Jeff Faust: I think that's really that's really sweet. That's really special. So tell me the journey again one more time. You said it so clearly at the beginning. You're you're what school to what school to what school can you share that each?
Kristin Candella: I can
Jeff Faust: do it again. Yeah.
Kristin Candella: Beatty Boltz.
Jeff Faust: Okay. CSU. And then CSU, so did you just like growing up here, fourth grade, because like you just growing up in the community, falling in love with the community. Mhmm. Did you like when did you know you wanted to go to CSU?
Was that early? Was that later?
Kristin Candella: In high school? Or You know, that's a great question. I don't know that I knew I wanted to go to CSU. I I actually went to UNC first
Jeff Faust: Okay.
Kristin Candella: And then ended up at CSU after doing study abroad. And growing up here, I think my attachment was to Fort Collins. It wasn't like a student coming in, and my attachment was to CSU. CSU was just part of this bigger, broader, beautiful community. And so Yep.
I wasn't looking forward to moving into the dorms and being at CSU. That that wasn't my motivation. I thought it was just a beautiful part of our community. Yeah. And, yeah, I don't know.
I I don't think I was a a logo at Rocky or a Ram at CSU. I think I was always a I was always a love foco.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. You're just a hometown
Kristin Candella: girl. This is just Yeah. I'm a hometown girl. Yeah.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. Well, I mean, so many people have fallen in love with this community. It's sweet that you have, like, a real history here. Yeah. Growing up and these schools mean something to you.
They mean something to our community and
Kristin Candella: They do.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. Fort Collins is is sick rate. It is a great place to live.
Kristin Candella: It is a it is a really great place and I think such an interesting dynamic of having, you know, been a Colorado native and then growing up here back when it was sleepy. Yeah. I I see that push pull and that tension between what we were and what we wanna hold on to and the desire for what we can become. Right? That that just that that kind of push and pull back and forth of are we growing or are we gonna stay the same or how do we even go backward?
Right? Because we miss that sleepy town and no cars on the road. Yeah. You know? And and I think it's I I love being in the middle of that as we think about who we wanna be.
Jeff Faust: Yep.
Kristin Candella: Because I think that really what is true to Fort Collins for me is that it was a welcoming place. Yeah. It was a friendly place and how you keep that character in the community is more important to me than the number of cars on the road.
Jeff Faust: That's a really important conversation and I I I imagine a lot of great leaders, influential people in our community are having that conversation because as you progress and as you grow and as as things expand, you really do want the fabric and the kind of the DNA of the community. The reason why people love this place in the first place
Kristin Candella: Yeah.
Jeff Faust: To like stay ingrained in in who we are. And that's a challenge. It is. Especially when you have people moving from all over the world. Mhmm.
You know, mean, I'm a transplant. So I came from the Midwest Mhmm. Moved here from Kansas City and Man, I I can even see that push and pull just in the last handful of years Yeah. That I've been here. And I would say like I, you know, it's worth fighting for to keep some of that really true to who we are because it is.
It's it's what makes not not for college just a, you know, beautiful place to live. Mhmm. But really a warm inviting hospitable place to
Kristin Candella: be. Absolutely.
Jeff Faust: Which shapes lives in a different kind of way than just you know nice amenities.
Kristin Candella: It does absolutely couldn't agree more.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. Tell me a little bit I just I'm I'm just find myself curious. I studied abroad as well. Where did you study? What'd you what'd you do?
Where'd you go?
Kristin Candella: I I studied in England. Amazing. And if my grandma had her way, she would tell you that I went to Oxford University, but I did not. I went to Oxford Brooks Polytechnic. Hey.
Jeff Faust: First word counts. First word counts. Take it and run.
Kristin Candella: I I have. I have taken it and run with it. Yes. It was great. It was really an exceptional experience to Yeah. Just to live somewhere else, to see the world differently, to understand our our place in the world as not being the center of the universe. Right? Yeah. I
Jeff Faust: Well, this is one of the challenges. I mean, my wife and I had this conversation with her kids a lot. Like, y'all need to get out every now and then.
You know, I mean, we hope that we can create an environment and we hope that we can be part of a greater city that they love so much that maybe they would like to stick around. But if they don't actively get out of Fort Collins and have their worldview expanded and shaped and actually encounter different cultures and backgrounds and socioeconomic municipalities. I mean, the reality is Fort Collins, there's there's pockets of poverty, we're we're gonna talk about how you're making a difference in those spaces. Yep. The reality is it's it's pretty nice.
Kristin Candella: Yes.
Jeff Faust: And if our kids don't get out, they won't be exposed to some of the things that are like like that you would see on a national or international scale.
Kristin Candella: Absolutely. No question.
Jeff Faust: those opportunities to study abroad, I I think they just they can shape you in a in a great way.
Kristin Candella: No question. I think it should be required and I think a very common thing for someone that grew up here as great as we knew it was was to leave and I did leave. I left for a number of years to live in California before I came back to Fort Collins and I can certainly appreciate it now in a very different way. And also it raises concerns for me as I think about our growth because I've seen it done in ways that do have unintended consequences that leave people out.
Living in California during the .com boom was very instructive.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: Right? You had people that were homeowners that did very, very well and thrived, and then you had people that all of a sudden couldn't stay in the area, students, young people, you know, folks that were really working the community and making it run were all of a sudden driving hours and hours and hours to do their work.
Jeff Faust: And that is a big deal. I mean, that is a really big deal when the civil servants of your community cannot afford to live in your community. We've got to intervene at that point. I mean, have to make sure that the salt in the earth of our community can like actually call this place home.
Kristin Candella: Absolutely. And
Jeff Faust: you don't have to commute forty five minutes away.
Kristin Candella: It it changes your community when your teacher is working three jobs. My son's teacher said she worked three jobs when I went to the parent teacher conference. And I could not imagine what that looked like to be all in as a teacher working with high school students and then working two side hustles. Yeah. It's it's just it changes the DNA of the community when you lose the people that are investing their life in it.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. No. In a in a huge way. And gosh, if you haven't been in a school lately, you know it's already hard. Yeah.
It's all it's already you're dealing with all the pubescent children running around and bumping into each other and there's different smells and there's different sounds and then you've got to lead those classrooms.
Kristin Candella: Yes.
Jeff Faust: And then go home and what do you gotta Grubhub or have a side hustle to Yeah. To make ends meet. Yeah. Yeah. That's that's a challenge.
It is. That is a challenge for sure. What let me poke around that California thing for a little bit because when there's that kind of economic disparity that you explained to the kind of the .com era where there's maybe incredible wealth and then that growing divide between people who can make it and people who can't. Yeah. The the interesting thing is you you can look at the growing economic wealth and forget about neighbors and you can like that creates a big shadow.
Kristin Candella: Yeah.
Jeff Faust: And it it just raises prices. Like I mean all of a sudden housing is gonna go up, rent is gonna go up, people are gonna have multiple homes and they're gonna rent out space to others and and you can you can imagine, I think many can imagine that cascading effect that it can have on a community. To what degree maybe do you see that in our community here in Fort Collins? Not California, not quite .com like era, but there's still an economic divide in our community and Huge. Haves and haves nots and the ability to purchase multiple properties Yeah.
Or the ability to purchase no property. So like I how has you talked about how that was a learning experience for you. What what kind of parallels might you see right now in our current community?
Kristin Candella: Well, it's getting harder and harder for working people to survive. The middle class is diminishing and housing in particular is getting further and further out of reach. You know, people that bought a house twenty years ago are not even in the same ballgame as people that might be trying to buy it now.
Jeff Faust: Right.
Kristin Candella: Right? If the median house price is over $600,000
Jeff Faust: My goodness.
Kristin Candella: Right? And you have to earn, you know, say a $125,000 a year to be able to afford that house.
Jeff Faust: Even interest rates aren't what they were Right. Five years ago or whatever, you know, whatever
Kristin Candella: it Yeah. You you you just can't get in.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: Right? And if you can't get in, then you can't build wealth. And if you are still renting, renting is great for various seasons of life and for all kinds of reasons. But if you can't get in and your rent keeps going up, that dream you might have to own a home gets further and further out for you.
Jeff Faust: That ability to grab like the down payment and build the the nest egg so you can it just yeah. The target keeps moving.
Kristin Candella: The target keeps moving. You know? And as someone myself who felt feel like I bought my house by the skin of my teeth over a decade ago, I think now about the season of life I'm in, in this sandwich generation where I have a mom and she is aging and I have kids that are about to go to college. And I think of all the ways my house supports me being able to protect my family. It's insulation.
Right? I I may have to use funds out of my house to help with my kids' college. I may have to use funds out of my house to help my mom at some point. That house is the hub of my family in so many ways, just where the teenagers can come. Yep.
But it's financial protection, it's mobility.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: Right? And and I I think about it in data, I think about it as my own life experience that generational wealth building, it it just sounds like a term that we say, but it is about your retirement, it's about your kids' college, it is about being able to have mobility for your family. I mean, the data shows it. Homeowners have average savings of over 250,000 and renters have 6,000.
Jeff Faust: Yep.
Kristin Candella: You know, so you multiply that generation to generation and you see how that disparity, how how it just continues to create a bigger disconnect between the haves and the have nots.
Jeff Faust: Yep.
Kristin Candella: Right? It just goes on and on.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. And with the the pace of life, the economies that are somewhat volatile and and job market that I mean, could see that gap widening.
Kristin Candella: Yes. Absolutely. You know? And so I'm the director and CEO of Habitat For Humanity in Fort Collins and the our homes to build have doubled in cost Wow. In the last ten years.
Yeah. And yet we know salaries have not increased at that same rate clearly. Yeah. I know. That would be nice.
That's not what's happened. Not for anybody. Maybe for some people. But, you know, you can't have a doubling cost of a product. Right.
Have a scarcity of a product because it's a great community to live in. Yeah. You know, and and have those costs rise in that way and still provide opportunity for people. It's just there there's a supply issue in our community for sure.
Jeff Faust: Well, let's talk about that because you you just mentioned and man the reason why I wanted to have you on this show is because not only your expertise and your history, I'm learning about how even your personal story played into to all of this as well. But as the executive director of Habitat For Humanity, you're probably doing a lot of things. You're probably doing a lot of things with things that people probably think building houses. I know it's way more I know it's way more than that. But tell me a little bit I wanna I wanna dig into all the ways that you're loving our city, all the ways that you're giving back, and and I know it's a whole team, whole organization behind that.
But before we jump right into that, tell me just help me understand, this concept of generational wealth and maybe even breaking the cycles of generational poverty, how housing can impact that. Because I think I I know what you're saying, but I just wanna I would love to talk a little bit more about it. In your own story, I hear about your mom moving up here, apartments, condos here here and there, and then landing in that spot where she can call this is our home. Yeah. And how I think you said it brought a sense of stability, but then you were also able to use different gifts like your hospitality and your ability to welcome So there's, I mean, even hear a wealth of relational economy there.
That's emotional economy. That's all growing in addition to like real dollars and cents and financial stability. Yeah. And you are talking about that with your own journey
Kristin Candella: Mhmm.
Jeff Faust: On how it it was hard to find a place where can I get and I'm trying to scratch together a down payment and now I I have it? Yep. Tell me a little bit about let's just I I just I would love to tease that out a little bit more about how houses can impact that. You you shared a stat about $250,000 in so what does that mean when you say that? Because I have a home, I don't have 250 k in savings.
So you're not talking about liquidable cash. You're talking about something beyond that. So tell Yeah. Just fill me in on on some of that.
Kristin Candella: Yeah. Most I mean, most Americans generate wealth by just paying down their mortgage.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: That's it. It's sitting in their house. It's not liquid, but it is their savings.
Jeff Faust: Yep.
Kristin Candella: And they can use it if they need to. They can go get a HELOC a loan on their house. They they can get a second mortgage. They can adjust to life circumstances by leveraging their house. And that's really where most Americans are are saving is is inside that house.
And so if you're renting and you see these constant increases in in the cost of rent, then it's very, very difficult to put money away. It's very difficult, as you said, to get that down payment or to ever buy a home. But it it it also can be very difficult to save just because of the inflation and and the the costs of everything these days.
Jeff Faust: It's hard to outpace inflation sometimes.
Kristin Candella: It is.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. It is. And then you talked about being mobile. Yeah. So are you talking like job changes and now you have an asset you can sell so that you can go buy another home?
Or like what do you mean when you say it increases the ability for a family to be to be mobile with their assets or savings.
Kristin Candella: Yeah. I mean, I think I mean mobility in a in a different sense and Okay. You know, it's hard for me not to reference Habitat For Humanity in this, so I think I will. We frequently see that once someone's housing is stabilized, everything else shifts.
Jeff Faust: Okay.
Kristin Candella: Right? If if you if you remember a season where you moved a bunch, you felt nomadic. Yes. Right? Is this a moment when I'm moving every year where I also wanna think about a career change or I wanna go back to school?
Jeff Faust: I'm understanding that.
Kristin Candella: Maybe not. Yep. So economic mobility is both the ability to to use your house as an asset and to to take cash out of it if you need to, but I also think it it shifts your sense of stability where you can literally use that home as a launch pad for where you're really dreaming of going. Yep. Right?
This one thing is secure. Now my physical health is better. My mental health is better. I feel stable. I know my rent isn't going to keep increasing.
So I feel like I can I can manage this? So now what am I really thinking about? I wanted to go back to school. I wanted to do this. I wanted to shift careers.
Once this is taken care of, I can do other things.
Jeff Faust: Those are incredible, like, intangibles to talk about because if your if your day to day is kind of always operating on a pretty high, like, moment of anxiety Yeah. Just like the undercurrent of your life is just a little higher Yeah. Anxiety than than your average it's hard for you to dream.
Kristin Candella: It is.
Jeff Faust: It's hard for you to plan for tomorrow, let alone for five years from now or ten years from now. That makes a ton of sense to me and it's it's really interesting to me to like even think about and dream about and imagine the stabilizing force of having, like your own home, your own set of keys, your own mailing address where that anxiety and that current can kind of simmer down a little bit. Yeah. And you can pick up other pieces that maybe have been neglected or or you just didn't have the energy or like quite literally the bandwidth to pick up.
Kristin Candella: Exactly.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. What a what a what a gift. How did you get into the work that you're you're doing? I mean, executive director of Habitat For Humanity in Fort Collins, where did that dream come from? Where were you exposed to I mean, did you what's the origin story in your current role, I guess?
Kristin Candella: I mean, I it's a it's a longer story and I'm gonna condense it, but I was a student at CSU and I think I was studying politics and that's not a popular subject with anybody including me but I admired Jimmy Carter and like a lot of people that get involved with Habitat there's a connection to the Carter's getting involved.
Jeff Faust: Huge legacy.
Kristin Candella: Huge legacy. I loved I loved the way they lived out faith in a way that did not exclude people but welcome them. Yep. I loved that they did not believe in these political divides by party, really, that they wanted to bring people together in ways that cut across that. And I saw the Carters and the way that they honored the dignity of people, you know, that went far beyond things that divided.
Jeff Faust: Yep.
Kristin Candella: Right? And so to me, that was very admirable. And I remember a church had burned down in the South, this was devastating to hear that we were still living in that place where churches were being burned down. And it was a black church. Yep.
And CSU was taking students to go build with Habitat For Humanity. Really? And at the time, didn't get in. I I didn't make the cut. There was a ton of student interest, which I loved.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: And then after that, I went to grad school in San Francisco and for some reason I was I had a little hook in me for Habitat. I applied to join them on staff. I didn't get a call. Yeah. And then I moved to San Diego, went into a temp agency.
I walked in thinking I had a generic resume and a I wanna work at a nonprofit resume. Really? But I looked down at my generic resume and there was a typo in it. I was never gonna give that to them. It was embarrassing.
Yeah. So I go in, we're to attempt at agency and I say, wanna work at a nonprofit. And they say, that's very strange. Yes. So it's a couple weeks later when someone from the agency calls me and says, have you heard of Habitat For Humanity?
They have a one week job.
Jeff Faust: One
Kristin Candella: week. So that one week in San Diego turned into two years.
Jeff Faust: Wow.
Kristin Candella: And I loved it, and I got to understand more about how the model actually worked. Right? Like, this isn't a free for all Oprah, a house for you, a house for you. You know? I thought, like, a lot of people think that Habitat just gives away houses.
So once I learned that people worked to buy their home and did sweat equity and paid a mortgage and, you know, built their house and then bought it and that it recycled back into the community, all this goodness, I was hooked. And I just wanted to come home. And I wanted that impact to be in my own hometown which was Fort Collins. So, you know, I then over time ended up back here in Fort Collins and and was on staff and it's been my third stint with Habitat but I've been the director for thirteen years.
Jeff Faust: That's incredible.
Kristin Candella: So
Jeff Faust: Thank you for sharing that. I do kind of find myself wondering if it was a two year job in San Diego all the time, but they just called it a one week job. Can can this person hang with us or not? So you must have done a really good job in one week to to get two years, is incredible. I
Kristin Candella: don't know if that's true.
Jeff Faust: I I I would love to I mean, I there's so much richness to even the small things that you just mentioned about habitat that I I'd love to dig in with you here and and just give you a chance to share with me or anyone who's listening about how habitat is so much more than just like giving a free house away. We're talking family development and stabilization. Mhmm. But you're you're explaining community development. Yeah.
You're explaining like an impact on an entire city and community. So just talk to us for a little bit about how Habitat For Humanity, like, loves our city. Mhmm. One life at a time, one neighborhood at a time. Mhmm.
What what kind of things are you guys up to? What kind of impact are you making?
Kristin Candella: Yeah. Well, thank you. You know, I I do think that's the bit that surprises people is that it's not just one house or that it's bigger than that. Things people don't know about Habitat. Habitat's a Christian organization, actually, that welcomes all people.
So everyone. Right? To be a homeowner, to be a volunteer, to be a donor. Our mission is actually bringing people together to build homes, communities, and hope. Yeah.
So, our organization's been here working over thirty years, and the way it actually works is that someone who wants to become a homeowner, they apply. And it's it's like going to a bank. There's a huge stack of paperwork. It's very revealing. It's very challenging.
Yep. There's a community of volunteers that do underwriting just like a bank would. The standards are very high. And then once someone actually qualifies, it's a great deal for them. It is not a giveaway, though.
So they're paying a no interest mortgage.
Jeff Faust: K.
Kristin Candella: We're a nonprofit. We're not trying to make a profit. They have a very affordable down payment. They save $1,500.
Jeff Faust: Yep.
Kristin Candella: But they are earning under 80% of the median income. Okay. So they are earning a low to moderate income, right, which many, many professions in our community fall into this. That that actually shocks people.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: I want people to look at our chart and and recognize themselves as someone that could become a homebuyer. Yeah. Because there are teachers, there are police officers, there are firefighters. There over 10,000 households just in Fort Collins that would qualify income wise. Yep.
So you can film Moby Arena four times Wow. With the number of folks that would qualify. Casual. Yeah. So people don't always know that it's for them.
So they, once you qualify, you're committing to doing those things, but you're also, doing sweat equity. So adults contribute two hundred hours to building their home
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: And to doing homebuyer education and to working alongside volunteers that are so diverse. I mean, it's the most amazing group of volunteers on-site. You have the, you know, you have the folks that came up with Jimmy Carter and have decided this is part of their retirement plan
Jeff Faust: Right.
Kristin Candella: To be on-site Tuesday and Thursday through the winter, all year round, totally faithful, amazing. You have those folks, have faith communities, diverse faith communities Yeah. Which I think is amazing. A dozen plus faith organizations that that come together every single year Yep. To build homes together.
Jeff Faust: Even beyond your stereotypical Christian church.
Kristin Candella: Absolutely. Which is
Jeff Faust: what's so sweet because we're we're really we're building the community together.
Kristin Candella: It is and and it's it's it's just great to see people that stand on that common ground and and support a family that they don't know that didn't come from their church or their faith organization?
Jeff Faust: It just, It strikes me as really incredible because there's not a lot of spaces in our culture right now where you can push all of the things that separate you aside Yes. To unite behind something good. And Yeah. And your organization is doing that. Consistently doing that.
Kristin Candella: Yeah. It might be my favorite part of it in this world that we live in right now is that people are standing next to each other, raising walls, and not talking about what divides them. They are talking about the values they share. Yep. And that and one of those values is neighbors coming together to support neighbors.
And that you don't have to know everything else about them. You don't have to know their background. You don't have to know how they got there. There's no judgment in it. There is just we are better when we stand together.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: You know? And and it is one of the most beautiful things about our work and we get to see just outrageous generosity. Out at Harmony we've been building at Harmony And Taft for a number of years. Yep. It's called the Harmony Cottages.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. Drove by just the other day. Saw some of your work.
Kristin Candella: It has been the most incredible project. It has a great origin story on its own, but I won't belabor that. But what's wild about it is that when we started that project, we had been building, you know, a couple homes here, a couple homes there. So to take on a project of 48 homes felt totally impossible.
Jeff Faust: Yes, that…
Kristin Candella: It required a lot of faith and a whole lot of, wow, if we step over this threshold, will the community rise up to Yeah. Support Huge risk. And guess what? We just raised the walls on the final four homes.
Jeff Faust: That's amazing.
The final four homes. I mean, really just can't believe it. And what has happened with risk taking in this area has been future opportunity. So we are gosh, we're just we're just really blessed that we have a future ahead of us. We have 77 homes ahead of us in three different neighborhoods.
So after Harmony, there's life. Yeah. There…
Jeff Faust: Tell me about some of these other Yeah. Sections. Like, what as I drive around town Yeah. Where might I bump into some of your future work?
Kristin Candella: Yeah. You're gonna bump into us in in all all across the town right now, which is amazing. So over by Trilby and Lemay, part of the Rockies Church donated land to a project that has care communities apartments.
Jeff Faust: So hold on. They donated let let's just give a shout let's give a shout out to Heart of the Rockies for donating land.
Kristin Candella: Shout out.
Jeff Faust: To build homes for families. That's incredible. It is. That is incredible. It's
Kristin Candella: so great. If you
Jeff Faust: are listening to this and you have land, like, can more people donate land to you? Is that is that?
Kristin Candella: I mean, is that a real question?
Jeff Faust: I asked him, well, this is like a real thing. Like, we are still in the business of taking more land.
Kristin Candella: We are in the business of taking land. That's a fact. Yes. No. I like that question. They can donate money even.
Jeff Faust: Yes. Money and land. Both accepted Habitat For Humanity.
Kristin Candella: You heard it here first. Yeah. No. It's not getting easier to do this. So, yes, people can donate.
No. It's outrageous that Heart of the Rockies Church did that. They actually held that land for over thirty years with never having any intention to build a bigger building for the church. They always intended it to support the community in some way. They always had that vision.
So to see the apartments there…
Jeff Faust: I love that. That is so is so good.
Kristin Candella: It's incredible, and and and our part of it is small and big at the same time. So we have nine homes there which are actually single family homes being built by Poudre High School.
Jeff Faust: Oh, may so okay. Oh, so okay. Nine single family homes in this land that a church donated.
Kristin Candella: Yes.
Jeff Faust: I have to imagine that's fairly unique. Yes. For a church to just give up land. And then again, because back to how you're not just building a house, you're you're building a community. I mean, is community development.
It is. Now you have a Poudre School District involved in your work. Yeah. So tell me more about that because I mean, you're I imagine you're helping educate students in the trades.
You're helping develop and even plant seeds on like, what you do like, part of our communities, you give back. Like part of what we do is part of our tell me more about that partnership and what that looks like because that sounds incredible.
Kristin Candella: Oh, it's so hard not to gush about that partnership. We've been working with Poudre High School and Poudre School District for a dozen years. Yeah. Students in a geometry and construction class. So they're learning geometry and construction, building a house modularly in the parking lot of the high school.
Really? So they're learning math in the classroom and then they're going outside and immediately applying the skills. So, yeah.
Jeff Faust: This is new to me because my kids are younger. Okay. So they haven't, like, gotten to the part where they get to do math and swing a hammer at the same time yet.
Kristin Candella: The coolest. So cool. Your kids will get there. Incredible. It's amazing.
It really is amazing. And there are about a 100 students that go through this program a year. So about a thousand students have gone through this program. Wow. And their building houses thirteen and fourteen currently.
Yeah. So the program itself, it just really it it it is so special special because it is an entree, like you said, into the trades, construction, engineering. But there's also, wow. My mental health improved…
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: Because I know that my life matters.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: That's one of the things the students have said to us. Yep. I I know I can work alongside my peers and make something happen and I worked with that family that now is living under that roof safe because I did my bit. Mhmm. Like, it is so powerful to see students have that revelation that they can make a difference.
Jeff Faust: Well, we're yeah. I mean, I have to think we're created for impact and we're created for significance. There's something in all of our hearts that wants to like build something that lasts. Maybe even beyond our own life. So Yep.
This is like a really tangible way where they're being exposed to that.
Kristin Candella: That's it. The teacher always says that. The teachers will drive by years later and say, I built that in high school.
Jeff Faust: I can see that. Yeah. I can see that happening for sure. Okay. So that's happening more on the West Side of town.
Yep. But tell me about some other projects or where else we might see you guys at work.
Kristin Candella: Yeah. Well, Hartford Homes is an unbelievable partner. They have been working with us for years. They are building a community over off of East Mulberry called Bloom.
Jeff Faust: Okay.
Kristin Candella: And Bloom is an awesome mixed income community with a lot of housing types. Yeah. But they have gone above and beyond in having affordable housing in that community. Really? So we are building cottages in that community.
It's Hartford's product. Okay. But we're going to be building those homes and making them affordable to our buyers. So we'll be building 40 there with Hartford.
Jeff Faust: 40 more.
Kristin Candella: 40 more there. And then this last one, you're gonna love this too because you don't have just churches donating land. You have other amazing partners donating land.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: So if you know Odell brewing…
Jeff Faust: I do. Very well, actually.
Kristin Candella: lot of people know Odell brewing. The amazing Odell family actually donated the parking lot. You go up the dirt Yes. To park.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: They donated that space to Habitat For Humanity a couple of years ago.
Jeff Faust: Oh, man.
Kristin Candella: And what's so awesome about it…
Jeff Faust: I parked in your land a couple weeks ago.
Kristin Candella: You did? You parked on our land. I hope you were a good parker.
Jeff Faust: I was.
Kristin Candella: Good job. We are gonna be building condos there, which is a desperately missed product in our state. It has not been built for, they've not been built much for a number of years. So the Odell family donated the land, and Hartford Homes being a deeply committed partner of ours and just really a genuine contributor to the local community.
Yeah. I mean, is a family run business. Right? They are donating all of the site development to make those condos affordable. So we're gonna have 30 affordable condos, and they're gonna have a 110 that meet that missing middle need in our community.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. So I love that so much. I love that I love that churches and breweries. I mean, what a great picture.
Kristin Candella: Amazing.
You know, I mean, you swing the hammer for a little bit. Who wouldn't, you know, maybe wanna go out for a beer with your friends afterwards?
Kristin Candella: Afterwards is the important part.
Jeff Faust: Not too much beforehand because that will that will make that two by four go in a little wonky. Which would be like really bad news for me actually because you said you've got to put sweat equity into these homes. You have to have like skin in the game. You do. And sweat and equity financially.
I mean, you're taking on a mortgage. You you you've got all the things that people have to qualify to not only get a home, but stay in the home. Yes. I think that's wonderful because you you want like folks to be able to thrive generationally, which is which is the goal for sure. I'm really bad at building things.
What on earth could I I mean like really bad because I mean it I've tried to do some home projects and my wife comes in and she's like that's crooked. I'm like I know it's crooked. I just can't. I like my brain I do words and I and I that's what I I can't. Yep.
How could someone as inept as me would be like how could I be involved?
Kristin Candella: You know, I think you would be shocked by what you can do with the right skilled person leading you in a very kind and constructive way. There's a photograph over here on the wall of me with a team of folks after drywalling for a week in New Orleans. I am not good at these projects myself. But with the right leaders, I was capable of drywalling.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: You know? And so we have a saying on the built site. I do it. We do it. And then you do it.
Yes. So I do it. The skilled builder, the general contractor or the, you know, the site supervisor, they do it. Then you do it with them. And then you do it on your own.
Jeff Faust: I'm a pastor in town by so like I run this Love FoCo podcast as a way to get great stories out in our community, but my my like day job is a pastor. That sounds a little bit like how I try to model my faith. Yep. Like I'm living this. Come watch how I live this.
Kristin Candella: Right.
Jeff Faust: And we'll try to do this together a bit. Yep. And then I'll have you do it while I watch and eventually you'll you'll go and do it.
Kristin Candella: Yeah.
Jeff Faust: I mean, that's I mean, this is how we learn.
Kristin Candella: It's a
Jeff Faust: fact. Yes. Even I can swing.
Kristin Candella: Even you. Even I can. You know? I mean, I've hit a thumb or two in in my day, but I've also been surprised by what I'm capable of doing when I have the right team.
Jeff Faust: Well, I wanna ask you about that volunteering too because I'm always looking for and I'm always trying to to promote around our city for others ways where you can have intergenerational service. Because I I think there's a lot of beauty in that. Yeah. But not only in finding your place in society but also the conversations that can have. I I would imagine tell me what tell me what you know and what you see because I Yep.
You know, I know Poudre School District can go and do Yep. I I would imagine it sounds like CSU went to help rebuild a church. A bunch of college students here. But I would imagine there's also great opportunity for, like, grandparents to serve with their kids and serve with their grandkids. Yep.
And all of a sudden you've got like a whole family unit doing something together to give back. Mhmm. Do you see that? I mean is that
Kristin Candella: Oh yeah. Absolutely. There there are there are certainly limits on the age of folks working on a construction site and holding power tools and all of that. But we see a lot of intergenerational work on the build sites when a kid hits 16. Right?
Like, I've been counting down until I could be out on-site with my kids building.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: Powerful. I mean, we've had teams of people go travel and do builds where the, you know, youngest person is 16 and the oldest person is 80.
Jeff Faust: Wow.
Kristin Candella: So, you know, you can see that coming together. But even before then, before someone's out on-site with a hard hat and holding a power tool, there are opportunities to serve and families are doing it together. They're doing it at fundraising events. They're, they're serving food literally together. Moms and son teams are doing that.
We have, you know, lemonade stands that are really a total family affair
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: Where every summer, a family will say, our neighborhood gets together and does a lemonade stand with the biggest bakery selection you've ever seen in your life. It's a really amped up lemonade stand, but raising thousands of dollars a year to build a home for someone else and doing it as a family. Yeah. Doing it as a community, it's it's something we see a lot of and you'll see students come work at our thrift store and all kinds of things.
Jeff Faust: Oh, that's so good. Yeah. That's so good. And I I wanna I wanna get back to the fundraising piece because as a nonprofit leader, I mean, is always part of the gig. Yep.
And so I wanna ask you a little bit about some of your your current projects and and your future dreams and and what it's gonna take to get there. Yeah. But before we do, can you talk a little bit, I know you're the executive director here in Fort Collins, you guys also have an international footprint.
Kristin Candella: We do.
Habitat is working all over the world. Yep. You're not just building homes in our neighborhood, you're building in even you pockets of the world that are less resource than we are. And so just tell just briefly even talk about some of the global impact that you are a part of and what you get to see there too.
Kristin Candella: I I love that question, Jeff, because it is part of what inspires me so much. In fact, you're there's a there's a drum set sitting behind you on the shelf. And I remember being at a conference, and it was a global conference for habitat. So habitat's working in 70 countries.
Jeff Faust: Wow.
Kristin Candella: And at this conference, it might sound corny, but it just wasn't. We were given drums, and there was represent representation from all over the world, and we were asked to to, you know, drum. And as I heard that drumming in a ballroom, a sterile place, nothing special about it, I just could imagine for the first time that really there was a heartbeat of hammers happening all over the world. Yeah. That we were all very small and very local.
But when you put us all together, it was this, like, outrageous act of love and generosity and support in all of these communities all over the world. So, yeah, I feel I feel really proud to be part of something like that. As far as giving, it's a need that is ongoing. Right? And people are feeling really unstable right now.
You know? We know about cuts to SNAP benefits. We know about cuts to vouchers and housing. We know that people aren't depending on government support like they used to. I'm a believer that we should never depend on government support, that we should depend on each other.
Yeah. It's an important resource for our work, so please hear me. Elected officials are very important. Policy is very important. Resources that come that way are very important.
Yeah. But I think we can do without that if we stand up and do what we can.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: And that means everybody doing what they can. It's not only the big wealthy donors that, you know, can do the big thing. I think it's the small things coming together. It's the lemonade stand girls. And it's everything all the way up to the Odell family donating land.
Right? I I think that that's how you make change happen is small.
Jeff Faust: Yeah. Well, I mean, there's just there's a lot of ways to reach a funding goal.
Kristin Candella: Yeah.
Jeff Faust: And as someone who does probably you probably are in development conversations and funding conversations a lot, you realize there there's gonna be some big hitters.
Kristin Candella: Yes.
Jeff Faust: There there has to be some big hitters.
Kristin Candella: You need that.
Jeff Faust: Not everybody's got 20 acres or however Yeah. 50 acres or whatever they can donate. Some people do. And so let me just remind, if you've got land and you're wondering Yeah.
Kristin Candella: Do it. Do that.
Jeff Faust: Thousands of people in our community wanna make a difference. Yes. Thousands of people in our community wanna see families stabilized Yep. Break the cycles of generational poverty and increase the ability to see folks thrive
Kristin Candella: Yeah.
Jeff Faust: For multiple generations and be part of our community for the future. Small gifts stacked up over time make a really big difference. They make a really big difference.
Kristin Candella: Huge. And we need it more than ever before. And I I I'm not just saying that because that's what nonprofit folks say. I am saying it because we have continued to go out on faith and ask the community to go with us, and we're building 21 homes this year.
Jeff Faust: Wow.
Kristin Candella: That is so much more than we have ever done before.
Jeff Faust: Yeah.
Kristin Candella: You know? And so we we need everybody to, you know, stick with us and and be in it because it is every single home has big donors and also has little donors and everything in between. Yeah. There's hundreds of donors for every single home that we build. Every single home is a grassroots community effort.
Jeff Faust: Well, and you know, price of, you said the average price of a home is in our area is 600 some, I forget the number you said, something like that. Yeah. But you know, we both know this. It's not like lumber is just all of a sudden super cheap and affordable to get. Yeah.
You gotta buy lumber, gotta buy shingles, you have to buy cabinet, you've got I mean, when you're building a house, there's all kinds of things that are going into that. Yeah. A ton of resources needed and 21 homes is no joke.
Kristin Candella: Yes.
Jeff Faust: That's that's a real annual budget.
Kristin Candella: Yeah. It it is and it doesn't cost us less to build. I think that's the other thing that people don't always know is that because we're using volunteers and because they are such a key part of our work, they're so vital that doesn't mean it's free to build our homes. Yep. Right?
Jeff Faust: Well, you said 0% interest.
Kristin Candella: So Yeah.
Jeff Faust: It's not like you're raking money off of this and it's stashing it away to make it happen.
Kristin Candella: So Yeah.
Jeff Faust: It's just a lot of faithful people who wanna make a difference.
Kristin Candella: That's right. Right. And
Jeff Faust: so we'll make sure to put in the show notes, websites, and different ways that they can link up with you guys.
Kristin Candella: Great.
Jeff Faust: Volunteering, giving, learning more. That'll be an important mean, it's an important part of this podcast so we can get your name out and get your information out. I I'm curious if you have any any last things you'd like to share with us just about maybe not just the end of of this year, but even into the future, things that you're hoping to see or or things that you're you're grateful for here in Fort Collins and and with Habitat specifically?
Kristin Candella: You know, I I feel like I get to see the very best of our community. And as I think about who your listeners might be, I imagine that many of them have contributed to Habitat For Humanity, right, in a variety of ways. I love going out and talking to a group and finding out that, you know, someone's aunt served on the board and someone else, you know, was part of the volunteer group that started the affiliate and used to order the appliances and someone else donates every year faithfully. We just find out how many people contribute to this work every time we're out there. So I guess what I'm grateful for is that.
I am grateful for the people that make it possible. The the staff is really quite small compared to the volunteer effort and the donor effort that exists. And what I would hope is that we would all, retain hope, that we would believe that we can still build the kinda community that we wanna live in, and that we would think that this affordable housing challenge that exists is solvable.
Jeff Faust: Yes.
Kristin Candella: I think that's incredibly important for people to remember that we designed this and that we can change it. That we are still creative beings that can make a home for for our neighbors. Yeah. And that we can all thrive together.
Jeff Faust: I love that. I love that so much. It can feel insurmountable sometimes. It can feel like a problem maybe too big for me to figure out how to solve. Yep.
But you know, wise minds, creative minds, persevering minds are coming together and and making a real dent in this.
Kristin Candella: Yep.
Jeff Faust: And so yeah, grateful that you shared that. Next time you're driving around Harmony and Taft. And Taft. Yep. Next time you park in that gravel parking lot, think about I I know I will be thinking about you and thinking about this office and this conversation.
Kristen, And I'm just grateful for your leadership in our city, the work you and your entire team is doing. And may it continue. Make 21 homes turn into 42 homes and 42 turn into 84 and you can just keep seeing that that work. It's it's incredible what you're doing. So Oh, you much, and and thanks for spending some time with me today.
Kristin Candella: Absolutely. Thank you.
Narrator: Thanks for listening to the Love Foco Show. If today's conversation inspired you, share it with a friend who loves Fort Collins as much as you do. Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode, and leave us a review. It helps more people discover us. To learn more about Love Foco and find opportunities for loving our city one life at a time, visit lovefoco.com.
For now, keep loving Fort Collins well.
