When the dump truck cut through Joselyn Casas’ trailer park to pluck her family from their flooding home during Hurricane Harvey, she had to wade to safety in water so high it reached her baby bump.

“Oh, please,” prayed Casas, who is 30. “Keep my baby safe. Keep my family safe.”

Looking over her shoulder at the trailer that she, her husband, Juan, and her daughter Mia, then 11, shared with her parents, she already knew it was likely they’d never be able to return. But she tried to keep calm. She had already launched a plan - one that could save her whole family.

Casas first heard of Habitat for Humanity — the program famous for its success in helping people who wouldn’t qualify for a home mortgage to be able to buy a house they helped build — on Univision two years before Harvey. Habitat was hosting an information meeting at a local church.

There, she learned about the non-profit’s requirements: She would need to dedicate 250 hours in sweat equity to build not just her home, but also to pitch in with some of her neighbors’ houses. She would have to take classes to up her financial literacy by learning about escrow and taxes, and homeownership courses in which she’d learn how to maintain her house. But first, she needed to financially qualify for the program.

And at first, she didn’t. When Casas submitted her application in November 2015, Habitat asked her, “Are you going to get a raise anytime soon?”

“Maybe in January,” Casas replied, though she wasn’t really sure.

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She was told to resubmit her paperwork when she had a higher income. “You just need a little bit more,” they told her.

Casas felt her dreams crumbling. She turned to her father, Alfredo Casas, who had raised her and her four older sisters to work hard, hold onto hope, and pay it forward.

“I can’t get a house,” she cried to him. “They’re too expensive. I’m not going to be able to pay.”

Her father did what he always did. He offered prayers. Support. Strength. Casas lit a candle and prayed alongside him.

And then in January, Casas got the raise they’d prayed for. She resubmitted her application, and in July of 2016, when she learned she’d been accepted into Habitat For Humanity’s ownership program, she ran out of her room, screaming with joy.

“What happened, Mama?” her father asked.

“They approved me for the house!” she cheered.

She’ll never forget her dad’s face that day, beaming. It felt so good to see him like that, to know she was the source of his pride. the one for whom he was beaming.

It was time to start building. As part of Casas’ agreement with Habitat, she pledged to contribute 250 hours of labor toward building her house. This sweat-equity promise, combined with the work of other volunteers, is a central component of Habitat’s formula to keep prices affordable, even for three-bedroom, two-bathroom houses like Casas’.

She carved out time on weekends with her family, and showed up on weekdays by herself. She became an expert at caulking and painting, and when she hit her second trimester and her pregnancy became obvious, the volunteers on site regulated her to light tasks, far from paint fumes.

Windows were installed. A roof went on. The kitchen was fitted with more cabinets than Casas knew what to do with. Life felt perfect.

Then came the rain.

The trailer park where Casas lived with her parents always flooded quickly — even in minor storms. So when Hurricane Harvey dropped more than four feet of rain on Houston in August, 2017, Casas feared there was no way her home would stay dry. She was right. The front part of the trailer had the least ground clearance. That’s where the water started, before rolling down the hall, into bedrooms and restrooms and, finally, the living room.

When she returned to survey the damage after the floodwaters had receded, she felt the tears brimming in her eyes immediately. The water had soaked the couches. The beds. The walls. The flooding was so catastrophic that the Casas family even had to replace the toilet. The only thing spared was her mother’s table.

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While the Habitat house was safe and dry, the dreams of the new home she’d been sweating to build felt suffocated. Yes, Mia would finally be able to have her own room after a lifetime of bunking with her grandmother. But she no longer had a bed. All the financial literacy classes Casas had taken over the past two years hadn’t prepared her for this wrench in her plans: How do you rebuild from nothing?

Her father kept praying. And soon, Casas got a phone call from Felicia Best, the director of development at Habitat’s Northwest Harris County office. Best was calling to update Casas on plans for a local priest to come bless her new home as part of a home dedication ceremony. But after hearing about Casas’ latest setback, Best called the church herself, asking if they might be able to include the Casas family in their Harvey recovery efforts.

As it happened, the church, Prince of Peace, had a storage unit full of furniture donations from Costco. Volunteers at the church fitted the Casas new home with couches and tables, and sent over some essentials for the coming baby as well.

On move-in day, in November 2017, Casas’ father carried the possessions that had survived Harvey into the house, his arms brimming with shoes and clothes as Casas’ eight-month bump and swollen feet kept her to tiny handfuls. With each load of her possessions, she cried tears of joy, imagining the new life her family would lead in this three-bedroom house. Her new baby would learn to walk and run here. Mia would attend a new school with a better reputation. They’d have a yard for the first time. A bathroom big enough for Casas to apply her makeup at the sink in the morning.

And as she cried, her father reminded her of his life motto: “Remember, there’s a lot of good people that help,” he told her for what felt like the thousandth time. “And you always have to give it back. Not always with money. Sometimes with your help. But if you receive something, help another person. And show that you’re doing good with God.”

She took it to heart, the same way she always did. Memorized the words so she could recite the speech to her own children. Then she hung photos of her family -Mia, Juan, and Jayden, who arrived at 6 pounds and 5 ounces in early January - and the family dog Leo, in the front hallway.

She began introducing herself to her neighbors, most of whom were freshly moved-in to one of the 21 newly built Habitat houses in her cul de sac.

When her father passed away, just 10 months after she moved into her dream home, she brought her mother to live with her, and set a big, framed photo of her dad in a prime location, so he can see everything happening in the house.

And then she started volunteering to build other people’s Habitat houses, caulking windows, painting walls, and holding ladders as Juan climbed up to the high spaces that scared her.

To Casas, the Habitat house was the miracle she needed to reach new heights in her family’s American dream. But helping others build their houses? That’s the answer to her father’s dream.

And that’s just what she’ll do.

maggie.gordon@chron.com

twitter.com/MagEGordon

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