Dwelling Place

Yesterday, we had a build day working with Dwelling Place in Grand Rapids, MI. Dwelling Place is an affordable housing organization which provides safe and decent housing to lower income members of the community by renting out apartments at no more than 30% of their tennants' income. Our task was to completely clear out six floors of an apartment building scheduled for rennovation. In contrast to the single family homes on our other builds, Dwelling Place manages a building with 126 apartments.

We were all working on different tasks. Dale worked in the basement clearing out stacks of old furniture and setting aside select items to be repurposed. Alyssa shuttled furniture from the landings on each floor to the lobby on the first floor. Jake then moved the furniture to the dumpster outside.

Throughout the day, we had conversations with several people who wished we could save some of the furniture from the dumpster. We all agreed that some of it had to go, but other items seemed like they could still be used. On the other hand, it was much cheaper for Dwelling Place to clear the building all at once than to spend additional time and money sorting out the nicer items.

We also spoke with some of the tennants. Many had already temporarily moved out, or were leaving that day. Some seemed upset that they had to leave, and frustrated with the inconvenience of the work we were doing. We could understand part of their frustration because, while some rooms had mold and pest infestations, other rooms were kept very clean.

In the end, we were fairly productive in our clearing out. We were greatly slowed down by tennants needing to use the elevators. Because they were old, the elevators were very slow, and forcibly shut after 30 seconds of having the doors open, regardless of whether or not you were in its path. The dumpsters also filled up very quickly, and there was a slow down waiting for a third dumpster to arrive. By the end of the day, we had completely cleared all six floors and most of the basement.