Teen raises $150K after using savings for rent
Alondra Carmona’s mother was two months behind on rent and fearing an eviction but kept her struggle secret until last week.
Her loving daughter came up with a solution: She would reach into her hard-earned college savings — $1,800 from parttime jobs — to help her mother stave off eviction.
Almost as an afterthought, she also started a GoFundMe page that, to the family’s surprise, has exploded across the nation.
As of Thursday night, about 4,300 people had donated a combined $153,825, more than what she needed to pay for all four years of school at prestigious Barnard College. She also has earned grants and other financial assistance from the school, she said.
“My mom, she’s hardworking, and it helped me to go after what I want and look out for my mom, too,” Carmona told the Houston Chronicle. “And she’s the only person we have.”
Carmona, who has two sisters, at first did not think the GoFundMe would collect the tens of thousands of dollars needed to offset her remaining costs for school. About $3,000 was in the account after two days.
Then, to the family’s surprise, the GoFundMe page “blew up,” she said.
Within four days, donations had ballooned to $40,000. Carmona was featured on “Good Morning America.” Julián Castro, the former U.S. secretary of Housing and Urban Develop
ment, tweeted about the “heartbreaking” nature of the family’s plight.
Their story “is one our nation should be ashamed of,” he said, while also sharing the GoFundMe account.
“Americans owe $70 billion in back rent that they won’t be able to pay,” he said in the tweet. “If we don’t get them relief, there will be millions of stories like these.”
Carmona earned a reputation as a determined student at YES Prep East, where she is set to graduate in June.
“She’s gone through a lot of things throughout her years with us, and no matter the challenge, she takes it on full force,” said Cecilia Mendoza, a student support counselor at the school.
Starting freshman year, Carmona pushed for opportunities to further her education during and after school. Despite not having access to a computer sophomore year, she used her smartphone to fill out a two-page application for a Rice University summer research internship.
With help from one of her teachers, she became one of five young scholars selected for the program in the summer of 2019. Her continued hard work led to her acceptance last year at Barnard College, a prestigious women’s liberal arts school in New York City.
“It had always been my dream school,” she said.
The now 18-year-old had been sprinting toward her goal until last week, when she learned that her mother in November had been laid off from her job. Her mother, Martha Zepeda, a single mother of three daughters, had been working as a longshoreman at the Port of Houston. After pandemic-related layoffs, she kept the news from her daughter to prevent her from stressing about their finances, Carmona said.
Zepeda disclosed the news last week. So, Carmona scraped together savings from her current job at Chipotle and other past internships to help.
Carmona, who lives in the Gulfgate area, said her mother still plans to apply for rental assistance through the state.
The Texas Department of Housing and Community
Affairs will soon launch a new rent relief program to help Texans who have struggled to pay rent and utilities in the pandemic. It will offer more than $1 billion to eligible residents through funding allocated to Texas in the latest federal
stimulus package.
A federal order intended to halt evictions for qualified tenants remains in place until March 31. Mayor Sylvester Turner also said the city will pursue a “grace period” ordinance that could block evictions
in the city through March.
Meanwhile, Carmona said she is grateful for the thousands of donors who have “made my dream come true.”
Her sights are set on becoming a pediatric neurosurgeon. She is interested
in how children’s brains adapt and learn at higher rates than those of adults.
Carmona’s goal is to continue to be a good role model for her younger nieces and nephews. They could be the first in their immediate families to go to
college, she said.
“They really look up to me, and I really try to be good, especially for them,” she said. “Because I know it’s hard.”