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Success Stories

Grateful Homeowner in South Paris, Maine, Paints a New Vision of Her Future

Sarah Sol
Housing
Lisa Gallant, seated, on the front porch of her home in South Paris, Maine, with Rural Development State Office Specialist Wendy Palmer and Community Concepts Inc. Self-Help Manager Michael Sampson.
Lisa Gallant, seated, on the front porch of her home in South Paris, Maine, with Rural Development State Office Specialist Wendy Palmer and Community Concepts Inc. Self-Help Manager Michael Sampson.

 

“I couldn’t be happier,” said Lisa Gallant, of her spacious single-family home in South Paris, Maine. 

“I get up in the morning, and I just walk out down the hallway and into the kitchen, and it’s like, ‘I can’t believe I own this,’” she said, her face lighting up with a smile. “It’s pretty amazing, actually.” 

In November 2023, after a lifetime of renting, Gallant became a homeowner for the first time. It was late autumn, and Thanksgiving and her favorite holiday, Christmas, were right around the corner. She looked forward to settling into her new neighborhood and home and finally realizing goals she’d had on vision boards for years, like choosing new paint colors, such as the warm shade of “Blonde” she has painted her kitchen and dining rooms. It truly was the beginning a new chapter of her life.

Gallant’s new 2,000-square-foot home has two stories plus a walkout basement, three bedrooms and two baths, a two-car garage, a pellet stove off the cozy kitchen (her favorite room), and a cute front porch and back patio. 

“It’s just so open and spacious,” she said. “It’s just beautiful.” 

Lisa Gallant, homeowner, sits in a rocking chair on her front porch.
Lisa Gallant, homeowner, sits in a rocking chair on her front porch.
The front porch at Lisa Gallant’s home in South Paris, Maine.
The front porch at Lisa Gallant’s home in South Paris, Maine. 
A cozy seating area off the kitchen in Lisa Gallant’s South Paris home is complemented by a pellet stove and a paint shade called “Blonde.”
A cozy seating area off the kitchen in Lisa Gallant’s South Paris home is complemented by a pellet stove and a paint shade called “Blonde.”

The house is on a large corner lot, with a brook running through it, not far from the Little Androscoggin River. There is forested land across the street that intersects hers, and she has a beautiful yard where she can garden or enjoy the tranquility of her neighborhood. 

Gallant said she loves where she lives. She’s close to town but far enough away from busy areas that it’s very quiet. And all her neighbors, who are close to her age or older, have been friendly.

 “It’s a nice, peaceful, quiet neighborhood where everybody really watches out for each other and takes care of each other,” she said.

The side of Lisa Gallant’s home in South Paris, Maine.
The side of Lisa Gallant’s home in South Paris, Maine.
Lisa Gallant’s peaceful backyard in South Paris, Maine.
Lisa Gallant’s peaceful backyard in South Paris, Maine.

Gallant purchased her home with the support of a Realtor she knew and liked, along with a $314,471 loan from USDA Rural Development’s (RD’s) Single Family Housing Direct Home Loans program.

RD’s Mutual Self-Help Housing Technical Assistance Grant Program also made the purchase possible. The program provides funds for organizations that administer self-help housing construction or repair programs in local communities. In this case, the nonprofit organization Community Concepts Inc., which has an office in South Paris, received RD funding through the program. With that funding, Community Concepts assists prospective homeowners like Gallant with applying for a home loan and provides technical assistance on home repairs or home construction. In order to secure her home loan, Gallant was required to perform 200 hours of her own labor, and to work with contractors Community Concepts helped to connect her with, to make repairs that totaled around $12,000 of her loan amount. The home needed things including insulation work, painting, window replacement, electrical work, oil tank replacement, handrails, a new door, smoke detectors, and sheetrock.

“Lisa was very active with getting these repairs completed,” said Wendy Palmer, a State Office Specialist in RD’s office in Scarborough, Maine, who processed Gallant’s loan.

Gallant said she learned a lot during the work and didn’t find the repairs daunting. In fact, she felt pretty confident about some of the tasks.

“There was a lot of painting that needed to be done,” she said. “There was a lot of wall repair, because there had been just a lot of family photos from the previous family over the years. But I grew up with a paintbrush in my hand, because my dad owned a paint business on the side. … We, from a very young age, were helping my dad paint people’s houses. So, when I knew there was going to be a lot of painting, I was like, ‘Well, there you go.’”

Without the RD programs, Gallant might not have found or purchased her perfect home. She might still be renting—something that had begun to cause her some concern in the current housing market. She has two rescue cats and had started getting a little nervous about the possibility of her apartment building being sold and a new owner either increasing her rent or displacing her and her pets altogether.

“So, I reached out to my Realtor, and I had heard about the program in previous years, and I just made that my goal: I was going to have a house,” she said.

Homeownership has brought her peace of mind. There is comfort in knowing, as she said, that “as long as I work hard, nobody’s going to take it away from me.”

“My kids are like, ‘You know, Mom, usually people do this the opposite way. You start retiring at your age and downsizing.’ And I’m like, ‘Yeah, but I’m not a typical homeowner,’” Gallant said.

Becoming a homeowner in her 60s is not the only big change she has made at this stage of her life. Gallant went back to school in 2021 to complete a degree in mental health and human services, which has led to a new career she loves and that allows her to help others. It also allows her to pay her mortgage without needing a second income; she had two jobs when she first applied for loan funding.

Gallant feels immense gratitude for how things have turned out.

“Everything just came together like it was meant to be,” she said.

“USDA Rural Development and Community Concepts helped me to—really, seriously—make my dream come true,” she added. “My whole life I’d always wanted a house—something of my own. And I got fortunate that everybody helped me bring that all together.”

Obligation Amount:
$314,471
Year(s) of Obligation:
Congressional District:
  • Maine: District 2