Habitat for Humanity burns mortgage of first home in Fort Mill

They probably aren’t the first couple who wanted to burn a mortgage bill. On a rainy Monday 26 years in the making, Kenny and Tournorris Walker went for it.

The Fort Mill couple celebrated a debt paid in full with a “mortgage burning” at their Paradise neighborhood home. The small ceremony was the second of its kind for Habitat for Humanity of York County, the first in Fort Mill.

“To be able to see the end of that journey, it’s just a blessing,” said Stefanie Barnette, Habitat’s community outreach director.

Since Habitat began in York County in 1988, it has 60 home construction or rehab projects under its toolbelt, along with 47 home preservation partnerships. But in 1994, the organization was barely breaking ground when it arrived at 524 Joe Louis St.

“This home was the third home built,” said Tim Veeck, Habitat’s executive director.

It was the first in Fort Mill. The light blue exterior backs a front porch with white wicker seating, a wraparound wooden deck leading to and overlooking a wooded back yard. A paved driveway leads to the basketball hoop that still draws a crowd when any number of six sons and four grandchildren visit.

Tournorris Walker has a hard time believing decades have passed since the groundbreaking, the day she received keys, the ribbon cutting. She remembers picking out trees on the property to save from construction. She recalls the mandated 500 hours the family committed to its own home and others, a figure Habitat leaders say they easily surpassed.

“I couldn’t visualize a house being here,” she said.

Her mother was a single mom who hadn’t owned a home. The Walkers lived with those six boys in government housing on nearby Bozeman Drive. A Habitat worker at United AME Zion Church, the farther of two churches the family could walk to without crossing a main road, distributed applications. Tournorris Walker still remembers that worker showing up at her doorstep.

“I saw her out the peep hole,” she said. “I said, ‘You aren’t coming here to tell us that we didn’t get it.’ ”

The family spent every weekend working on site, returning on nights just to imagine their new home.

“I came every day after work,” Kenny Walker said. “Tournorris would be home every day with the children, and I’d be here.”

At the time, potential Habitat partners had to put in the sweat equity, and at least one of them had to be a native. Tournorris Walker hails from Brooklyn.

“Paradise was my childhood neighborhood,” Kenny Walker said. “I’ve made a lot of great memories and friends here. I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.”

The Fort Mill Rotary Club was a main Habitat partner in the early days. There were linen donations, and the basketball hoop was a gift. Someone left a credit card at the furniture store up the street for the Walkers to use.

“Being the first one in Fort Mill, we had some very generous donors,” said Rotarian Ell Close, who celebrated years working with the Walkers on Monday.

Close describes a family whose efforts helped set the table for projects to come in Fort Mill and in York County.

“They were a model first family,” he said.

The family prioritized its mortgage over other bills. The same way Tournorris Walker prioritized her boys, staying at home so she could remain active in their schools. They stayed in nights watching movies or reading. Tournorris Walker said “there was no way” they would be homeowners without Habitat, and without sticking to their commitment in the decades since.

Habitat leaders today say potential homeowner partners light up when hearing about the Walkers. Hearing the end of a story that seems so far away to them, as it did to the Walkers almost 30 years ago. The first Habitat home in Fort Mill, paid off, offers hope.

“It’s overflowing to other people,” Veeck said.

Tournorris Walker knows about commitment paying off. One of the bedrooms that bustled with boys all those years ago is now a library for grandchildren. Another is a quiet space for her.

“It’s my ‘she den,’ ” she said. “It’s for females only.”

Hallways have pictures of the family, one from a newspaper article about the home in 1994. Each room has an earth-tone design, from the hands of a woman who says she never touched a paint brush before Habitat came calling. Now she paints any chance she gets.

The couple works hard to maintain a home they more than appreciate, one they hope is a reminder for six boys who grew up in Fort Mill, whether others find inspiration in it or not.

“I’m hoping that we’ve laid the footprints to them to be homeowners,” Tournorris Walker said.

This story was originally published December 14, 2015 at 6:39 PM with the headline "Habitat for Humanity burns mortgage of first home in Fort Mill."