Habitat for Humanity and Wells Fargo Financial Bank

Habitat for Humanity and Wells Fargo Financial Bank To Dedicate New Home To Sioux Falls Family On Friday

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. – Officials from Habitat for Humanity of Greater Sioux Falls and Wells Fargo Financial Bank team members will turn over the keys of a new home Friday to Ghebre Tsegay and Yerusalem Ghebremesih and their children. The family came to the U.S. from Eritrea, a country along the Red Sea in northern east Africa.

The dedication ceremony will take place at 11 a.m. Friday at 3609 North 9th St. in Sioux Falls, which is located north of Hermosa Drive.

"This will be a great day for a family that has worked hard to accomplish the dream of homeownership," said Sue Olsen of Habitat for Humanity.

Ghebre has worked at John Morrell & Co. since 2000. Ghebre and Yerusalem have three children; Saron, Samiel and Diana. Wells Fargo Financial Bank representatives, along with Habitat board members and build volunteers, will join Ghebre, Yerusalem and their children to celebrate and dedicate their new home.

Ghebre and Yerusalem completed 400 hours of sweat equity, which is their down payment, by helping to build the home. They will purchase the home from Habitat for Humanity, which will carry their no-interest mortgage.

The home was built almost entirely by crews who are team members of Wells Fargo Financial Bank, a credit card center that employs approximately 900 of the 3,000 Wells Fargo & Company employees in the Sioux Falls metropolitan area.

The Wells Fargo Financial Bank team contributed more than 1,500 build hours on the home and also raised $5,000 to help the family purchase additional items for their home. Tammy Nold, a credit reporting analyst for Wells Fargo Financial Bank, has served as the family advocate. She has worked with the family throughout the build process to help them understand the budget and pick out items for the home, regularly attended English classes with Yerusalem at the Immigration and Refugee Center in Sioux Falls and helped the family enroll their daughter in kindergarten.

"Our team members have been committed to this family since the planning on the project started in February and the build began in May," said Anne Jackson, president of Wells Fargo Financial Bank. “I have been awestruck by the outpouring of support our team has provided through the donation of their time and resources. Serving the communities in which we live and work is a core value of Wells Fargo, and the team in Sioux Falls exemplifies that better than anyone."

The Wells Fargo Financial Bank and the Wells Fargo Housing Foundation combined to contribute a $50,000 grant to help build the home. In the past six years, Wells Fargo has contributed to 66 Habitat builds in South Dakota and donated more than $600,000 to the organization in the state.

The Wells Fargo Housing Foundation was created to provide permanent solutions to homeownership needs in Wells Fargo communities nationwide. Through the volunteerism of Wells Fargo team members, more than 2,000 homes have been built or renovated through the Housing Foundation since its inception in 1993. The Housing Foundation is funded by Wells Fargo Home Mortgage.

Wells Fargo Financial Bank is part of Wells Fargo Financial, a unit of Wells Fargo & Company. Wells Fargo Financial provides real estate-secured lending, automobile financing, consumer and private-label credit cards and commercial services to consumers and businesses. The company has $67 billion in assets, approximately 21,000 team members and operates in 48 states across the U.S., the 10 provinces of Canada, the Caribbean, Latin America and the Pacific Rim. It is headquartered in Des Moines, Iowa. More information about Wells Fargo Financial is available at