‘Let the two house halves fly’

LAURA

Managing Editor

POWHATAN – “Let the two house halves fly!”

And then they did. Moments after Tyler Hudgins exclaimed those words, the future home of Nicole “Nikki” Chrimes and her son Aiden was lifted through the air by a crane and placed on the foundation where the duo will soon reside in Powhatan County.

This new chapter in their lives is also a turning point in the story for Habitat for Humanity-Powhatan, the nonprofit that helped the family get to the point on Feb. 23 where their house came together – literally.

Normally the kind of crowd gathered on the build site would have been present on the day a new Habitat homeowner was handed the keys to his or her completed home after months of on-site hard work by volunteers.

But for its 16th house, the local nonprofit went a different route, using a modular home constructed at a factory in Pennsylvania, brought to the build site two days earlier and put together onsite by Hudgins Homes, which is based in Moseley.

Within a matter of hours on Feb. 23, the 1,200-square-foot home was lifted onto the foundation, married together, under roof and weatherized, making it 85 to 90% complete, Hudgins said.

The last of the work – HVAC, electrical and plumbing connections as well as painting, porch and deck building, and landscaping – will be done by Habitat volunteers and a team of local