By Cassandra Khan
AFTER applying for a house lot in 2019, single parent Nadira Allen has finally acquired her own turn-key home this year, through the Central Housing & Planning Authority (CH&PA).
Allen, in a recent interview with the Guyana Chronicle, said that the property is located at Prospect, East Bank Demerara (EBD), awaiting the installation of water and electricity before she moves in.
Sharing a little about the process itself, the single mother said she made her down-payment at the Central Housing & Planning Authority (CH&PA) and was later referred to the New Building Society Limited (NBS) to engage the bank on a loan.
“It’s a two-bedroom, flat concrete house. I think 20×30 is the size of the house. It also comes with septic tanks and plumbing and wiring and everything done.
“The thing is that we have to wait on Central Housing [& Planning Authority] to give us the certificate to go hook up the light at GPL [Guyana Power & Light Company] and I have already applied for the water,” Allen shared.
Once she moves in, Allen hopes to start a small garden because the land is large enough.
The 33-year-old mother, and her two children, ages seven and nine years, all reside with Allen’s mother.
She said her children are very much excited as it is the “biggest thing ever” and they want to see the house every day as they cannot wait to move in.
Allen has two jobs, one at Guyana Stock Feed where she is an accounts clerk from Monday through Friday, and on the weekends where she works at SMS Realty.
She shared that she feels independent and in a state of peace of mind knowing that she is secure and her children now have their own space.
“It’s a sense of security… It feels good because I can be qualified for a loan because of the house, so it feels good to have that upper hand now,” Allen said.
She related that she came from a single-parent home as well with her three brothers.
“We didn’t have it all. My mom is a charwoman, meaning she cleans. She’s working right here at Guyana Stock Feed. She’s been working here for 20-something years.
“And after a while, she re-married when I was like about eight or nine. But I grew up in a not-poor, not-rich home; a content one,” Allen reflected.
She related that her new house, once she is fully moved in, will help to relieve the stress of having to travel to get to work and to drop her children at school as the new home is closer to both her office and the children’s school.
“I’m coming from [La] Parfaite Harmonie… It is hell when you have two children to bring across to go to school and you have to go to work. The second job really comes in good, financially, when it comes to gas and things for my kids on weekends,” Allen said.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This story appears on page 22 of the Guyana Chronicle’s BUILDING EXPO SUPPLEMENT, published in partnership with the Ministry of Housing and Water. The supplement is free of cost with every purchase of the Thursday, July 21 edition of the Guyana Chronicle.
