Nonprofit ranked as top national builder

[From Philanthropy News Digest] With the housing and financial crises having dealt a blow to the nation's large, publicly traded home builders, Habitat for Humanity has emerged as one of the top builders in the country, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Habitat, which was founded thirty-four years ago in Americus, Georgia, to build, repair, and rehabilitate homes for low-income families, recently was ranked eighth on a closely watched industry list compiled by Builder magazine of the nation's top ten builders, based on the number of homes sold and closed. Habitat's closings were down by 3 percent in 2009, to 5,294, while two of its competitors on the list, the Ryland Group and Hovnanian Enterprise, saw their closings fall by 30 percent and 50 percent, respectively. "We're a lot less tied to the market as a whole," said Mark Andrews, Habitat's senior director for U.S. operations. "We've been able to keep chugging along at a pretty solid pace."

This was the first year Habitat appeared on the Builder list, and it could be the last. The nation's public home builders, itching for recovery, have been ramping up construction, while Habitat is focusing its attention on acquiring and rehabilitating vacant, foreclosed homes and making them available for sale. The recession also has strained Habitat's finances; last year, the organization laid off 8 percent of its corporate staff and its year-over-year cash donations declined by 9 percent, to $171.8 million.