Suitability is a unique part of all our humanitarian projects. By sustainability, we mean that there must be a cash generating component that will enable the project to continue to meet expenses and expand after the original funding runs out. Many projects fail in the long run because new donations are unavailable to keep the project going. Our projects are designed to be self supporting and increasing in scope even after the original investment has been disbursed. Among other things, we have selected housing construction to be the financial engine to continue supporting our projects.

In most developing countries there is a shortage of safe affordable housing. To help alleviate this imbalance, the Neufeld Family Foundation is committed to introducing and transferring building technologies that will significantly speed up, and at the same time lower, the cost of construction.

When devastating hurricanes or earthquakes strike, they often destroy thousands of homes. Later, as reconstruction kicks in, the same construction methods are used, and the new houses are just as unsafe as the original ones were. We have technologies that assure safe, permanent housing that can withstand high velocity winds, and high intensity earthquakes. New homes that use these technologies are comfortable, affordable, culturally acceptable, and can be constructed more rapidly than houses built using traditional methods.

This kind of housing is the cornerstone of all our projects. It becomes a powerful engine for driving development and for sustaining the project. When the principle objective of a project is to provide decent low cost housing and transfer the building technology and know how to the host country, most of the returns from the original investment, the low cost mortgage payments, are re-invested in building more houses, and the project continues to expand on its own.

Humanitarian Projects are not inherently self-sustaining, that is, they don't create income so that they can keep ongoing without having to look for more donations. To these projects, we add a housing construction component (usually for middle-income families) designed to create wealth and provide a cash flow large enough to enable the other components of the project to be carried on indefinitely and expanded.

In both these cases, Foundation finds itself in the position of having to wear two hats at the same time, supporting the project and doing some part of the project (usually only the housing component). The Foundation has the expertise to manage, control, and successfully complete the housing component, something that an agency is usually unable to do. Our role is to concentrate on doing the housing component while at the same time limiting our involvement in the major components of the project to that of the supervision and monitoring. This ensures that the agency properly completes its part of the project.