Help Jonathan's Family Avoid Eviction with a $5 challenge.

We are in a seriously tight spot; we are stuck without any other option.

GoFundMe has helped us a lot. And I really didn’t want to ask here again as people have been generous in the past. We’ve been able to move to Arizona. We’ve been able to get Nic’s dog Daisy started on being trained and on her way to being a service dog. But, we have to come to ask for help again.

In 2022, after we moved to Arizona in 2021, I landed an amazing job. It had a great salary, and I enjoyed the work. But then they had to lay me off after 6 months as COVID was still affecting certain industries financially. From there, it was a constant battle to stay in our home from month to month while I looked for a new job. We have been able to make it each month through the support of others and various services from the state government and the community when needed. Later, last year, my wife Konica, with almost 10 years under her belt, had to leave her job at Apple. With neurological issues such as Bell’s Palsy and chronic migraines, and then taking care of our kids who have higher needs most of the day, she just wasn’t able to be at work as much as they needed her to be.

In January of this year, I was able to start working in the field of Child Welfare, working as a Case Manager. The stability helped our family a lot, but we were still in the woods of our struggles. Our life has been a lot of ups and downs and a lot of “borrowing from Peter to pay Paul” with our monthly bills the past couple of years. We trimmed down, we made changes in our expenses where we could. But already things like our credit were heavily affected by the instability I had of 15 months with off and on contracts.

But my job was there to keep things going. Then, Konica was able to start being able to be Parent as a Caregiver of our youngest who has various medical needs. This has helped a lot. But with late fees and everything, we still haven’t been able to get out of the woods, and the edge of the forest got further away.

Our income is just enough that if everything was normal and not behind, we could honestly slowly get ahead to do big things for our expenses like refinance our cars or be able to save up and move to a new rental with a lower price in line with the current market.

Our gross income is large enough that we have lost access to SNAP benefits this month. But our net income is a vastly different story after taxes, required state pension, and insurance.

We are facing eviction. Arizona is a very landlord-friendly state, and landlords are able to move quickly. Ours has been willing to hold off while we dig for help. But we’ve reached the end of their allowed time.

Konica has been busy searching for help through anywhere. At this point for our city, county, and state, she knows more than 211 does for resources. We are on waiting lists that are out to December. Any help we have turned to has said they are unable to assist. From agencies to churches, they all say they are unable to help as funds for the year have run out or they don’t feel they can help us.

If we are evicted, we lose the stability that honestly allows us to stay in Arizona. For me to work where I have found my calling in life. For our kiddos to thrive socially, and in their education, while they get the medical care in ways they couldn’t before moving here. Our oldest 16-year-old son has been offered a $4,000 per semester scholarship to his top college choice, as long as his grades stay on track.

We would have to move back to Idaho, as there really isn’t anywhere for us to go as a family of 7 with children who have medical needs; like our youngest needing to be on oxygen at night or she isn't very strong the next day. I wouldn’t have the opportunity to work where I am the same way and most likely would have to do a career change into something else. Konica would have to try and become a Parent as a Caregiver under a different program and start all over.

So this is the game plan here.

First off, if we hit the goal of this challenge and it’s done the way we would like people to do it, we should get through a few months taking care of rent and getting our monthly bills on time to reduce all the late fees and help our credit. If we can survive to get to tax season, then our plan is to take the hit and lose our deposit by breaking our lease and move into a more affordable home after refinancing our cars to lower payments.

So here is the challenge for this request for help.

We are asking only 2,000 people to donate $5 each. If you want to give more, save it and give that extra to others here on GoFundMe. We only ask you to do $5 each.

Now, the more people who do this, the more of course we receive, and we would of course use that to help us sooner on a couple of the above details. After that has been accomplished, we would then turn around and give the remainder to others here so that we can then be sustaining ourselves while others are also in need.

So help us get this message to 2,000 people who could donate $5. It’s the lowest amount GoFundMe accepts, but do not give more than that.

If you are in a situation that you need that $5 to get through one more day to payday, save it and instead share this request with as many people as you can. We would love to see the shared with number skyrocket. We believe in the power of community, the power of villages, the power of many.

This is a campaign of numbers, exposure, and forcing it to essentially be a little viral.

Our landlord gave us until today, 10/17, to pay our rent without further action, so yes, they will be moving forward with filing for eviction. We will have our rent plus hefty fees to pay to stop it.

But we believe in this challenge.

If we don’t hit the goal, but can still hold off our eviction, we will at least get to November and will do what we can from there, but we may have to reach out here again. So now is the best time to donate and share.

Thank you - Jonathan.