An El Paso Veteran goes from Homelessness to Homeownership

From homeless to home ownership. An El Paso woman is celebrating tonight. Cholla Fox, a veteran, can now call herself a home-owner, something she hasn’t been able to do since 2008.

Cholla joined the u.s. army in 1982 and served this country for 25 years, before she lost everything, not once, but twice. Cholla told ABC 7 that she worked very hard to get to this place in her life, “if you have determination and drive like I did, anything is possible,” she said. Being in the military Cholla experienced some struggles that made it difficult for her to settle down in one place. She said that financial issues were a factor in her everything saying, “Even though you’re military you don’t get paid a lot. You’re not in one location for anytime so when you finally get out you have to start over,” she said. Starting over is something she is very familiar with. In 2006 Cholla lost her home to the floods, then was hit again in 2008 when she lost another home in the recession. She knew she wanted to get back on her feet, but couldn’t do it on her own, so she asked for help. ” If you ask for help, you’ll get the help you want, and that’s what I did I asked for help,” she said. Cholla joined a federal program in 2014, designed to end veteran homelessness, (Hud-Vash), then enrolled in a budgeting class, worked to clean up her credit and saved up $1500. From there She worked with the Housing Authority of the CIty of El Paso to become a home-owner. HACEP’s C.E.O Gerald Cichon said the goal is to help people, and them help them become self-sufficient. ” It’s what we want,” he said “we want people to get off the assistance and get self sufficient and this is that big step for this veteran. ” Cholla was given the key’s to her new home, and now she is helping to raise four of her grandchildren in her new home. She said “I’m happy, because if it wasn’t for me they wouldn’t have any place to go, and I’m not the type of person to let family out on the street.”