Margarita lives with her husband and 11 children in a home owned by a sugar cane manufacturing company. Since 1992, she has been working toward her goal of building her own home. Hurricane damage has thwarted her progress, but Margarita continues to dream of a home to call her own. She sought a loan from Esperanza, HOPE’s partner in the Dominican Republic, a few years ago to begin her business selling chickens. She utilizes her loans to travel to a neighboring town where she can purchase chickens and saves as much of her business income as possible to put toward the continued construction of her home.
![Before Eveness Mulungu joined the Walusungu (“mercy”) savings group through our church partner in Malawi, she faced days where she and her family ate animal feed because they couldn’t afford human food. But that changed when she joined the savings group. Eveness used her first group loan of about $1.70 (U.S.) to start a business selling doughnuts and beans.
“By the end of my first cycle I made $140 (U.S.),” Eveness shared. “My life is no longer the same now; [I] was regarded as no one in the community. ... This was the first time in my life that I ever touched and owned big money like this!”
Pictured: Eveness, with her husband in front of their piggery—a third successful business that she operates.](https://blog.hopeinternational.org/wp-content/plugins/instagram-feed/img/placeholder.png)