The iTHINK Community Foundation of iTHINK Financial gave a fully furnished house to Methany Thornton, a middle school teacher from Marietta. In addition, Thornton and her husband received a $500 payment from the credit union Berkadia for any moving-in expenses they may require.
Thornton is a social-emotional learning teacher at Marietta Middle School, where she has worked for over six years. She also coaches cheer and lacrosse. She and her family were living in Cartersville in a townhouse with no yard for the children. Thornton and her family now live in a larger house, and she is only a few minutes away from work.
The new homeowner declared the mansion is now a home for her and her husband, Kelcey, her daughter, and two grandsons after the initial shock and tour of the furnished rooms.
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“Thank you for all that you do in the community for people like me. You truly are God-sent, and I pray that as you continue to bless others, God will bless you even more,” Thornton expressed, according to WSBTV.
On the day of her dedication, several of Thornton’s students came to support her. As a teacher, she said she enjoys “paying it forward”.
The home dedication required a large number of collaborators, according to Jessica Gill, CEO of Habitat for Humanity of NW Metro Atlanta. She went on to say that a “key component” of building a community is relocating close to your place of work.
“It took a lot of partners to bring this accomplishment to fruition today. Living where you work is a key component in building community, and partnerships like this one are fundamental to making local homeownership achievable, as well as thanking the public servants who serve us and our children,” Gill remarked.
The average schoolteacher in the U.S. can only afford to buy 12% of the homes for sale within a 20-minute drive of their school, down from 17% last year, according to a report from broker Redfin. The average public school teacher salary in the United States is $66,74 and according to data, the salaries of teachers are not “keeping up with inflation and the rising cost of homeownership.”
