Benevolence Farm intends to build a Tiny Home Community on our 13-acre property in Graham, NC. To learn more about the developments of this project, check back here regularly.
Why Tiny Homes?
For the past three years, Benevolence Farm has maintained a waitlist for our housing program. As one of the only reentry programs in the state for women of all conviction records, we witness a high demand that only continues to grow. Despite opening a second home in 2022 that increased our housing capacity by 66%, we are still unable to meet the demand.
Additionally, we take resident feedback very seriously. In 2020, a former resident who was incarcerated for 27 years came to us with a proposal. While it’s nice to have the shared community of our original six-bedroom home, she feared the transition to a community where she would live alone for the first time in her life.
As someone who experienced such a long incarceration period, she had never held a cell phone until she exited prison in 2018. Now, in her 60s, she was anxious about all the new technology she might have to navigate on her own without any help from the community she had at the Farm.
The Tiny Home Community, seven tiny homes built on the backside of our 13-acre property, would not only double our housing capacity at the Farm, but would allow residents the dignity and practice of living in a place of their own while still having access to a non-judgemental and understanding community of neighbors who can provide care and support in the transition phase after prison.
In June 2024, the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency notified Benevolence Farm that we are one of nine organizations who will receive financing from the Supportive Housing Development Program. With this commitment and that of several other community partners, we have set a goal to raise another $60,000 from the community to fund this effort.
With your help, we can make this Tiny Home Community a reality in 2025.
To access our partnership proposal document, click here.
Conceptual Designs by Heeks Collaborative and BSIDE Homes.
Thank you to the following partners for making this project possible:
- North Carolina Housing Finance Agency
- The Meldrum Foundation
- The Cannon Foundation
- Roll Construction
- Eco-Panels
