Veteran Receives Mortgage-Free House

Christmas comes early for military family relocating to North Texas

A military family from Georgia was welcomed to North Texas on Friday morning with keys to a new house in Arlington.

U.S. Army Sgt. Tobias Green was wounded during a tour in Iraq and received the Purple Heart.

The mortgage-free house was made possible by veteran support group Military Warriors Support Foundation and Bank of America, which owned the house through a previous foreclosure.

"[When] we actually opened the doors, I almost had to pinch myself," Green said. "It just lets you know how many people support the troops."

The Military Warriors Support Foundation has given away more than 250 homes to veterans. Bank of America plans to donate 1,000 homes throughout the country.

Green's wife, Natasha, also a veteran, said she urged her husband to apply to the program once she learned about the program.

"He submitted his story of what happened to him, not thinking that we would get picked to get a home and, in the end, we ended up getting picked, and we were shocked," she said.

"[Veterans] come back from a war, and they're damaged. They're damaged financially, emotionally. There's a distance between their families, children. They've come from a high-risk area. They've come from an area where they may not sleep well at night. They don't always trust the people around them," said Paul LaVoie of the Military Warriors Support Foundation. "And to come home into their neighborhoods, their cities where they have a home that's theirs -- that's the safest place in the world they can be."

As a part of the program, the Military Warriors Support Foundation holds the title for the house for three years to make sure a family can maintain expenses.

The Greens had been living in Georgia. Both were were stationed at Fort Stewart. Given the option of where to live, they selected North Texas because Natasha Green has family in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

The Greens were still taking it all in Friday morning, going from empty room to empty room, picturing what their house will be like once it is filled with their belongings.

Tobias and Natasha Green will be joined by their two children and niece in the four-bedroom, two-and-a-half bathroom, 2,720-square-foot house.

"I'm still just amazed," Natasha Green said. "I'm like, 'Wow this is ours. Our family is going to be raised here."

"We can't wait to make this our home," she said.

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