Equality & Opportunity Foundation

Programs: Housing: our first venture is in the affordable housing space, where we use housing as an income-generating asset. We believe quality housing is transformational. It can provide a family not only with shelter, but with a space to conduct home-based commercial activity and generate much-needed income. Our houses are designed to serve as a place to work, live and make money. -our mix-use homes come with 1-3 year short term financing loans through our mfi and housing finance partners and can cost as little as $1,000. Our houses can be incrementally built, are designed to accommodate home-based work, and the work can self-finance the house. -through our housing initiative, a family making $5/day can double their disposable income and quadruple their asset-building rate in five years.

-our mix-use dwellings can be used as stand alone homes, commercial spaces, extensions to existing homes and for work-force housing. -in 2014, we optimized our designs and prototypes; started testing technology platform based on mobile messages that streamline communication with our customers; started our work with local training and execution partners; deployed over 30 mix-use home in india; improved the livelihood of over 120 people benefiting from our housing program. We also conducted multiple safe construction training programs in madhya pradesh to educate households and contractors on the basics of safe construction. Healthcare and financial education: the impact of our housing initiative is magnified when families are also provided with basic business education and life skills training. These soft assets provide families with the skills they need to grow

their grass-roots businesses, lead healthier lives and provide a richer future for their children. Our mix-use dwellings have several health promoting features to improve the health, lower the number of sick days and increase the productivity of a family. They come with cross-ventilation as a natural cooling mechanism, rain-water catchment, water filtration, mosquito-netting and optional cook stoves. -we believe that by integrating housing and education, we will create impact over multiple generations and provide equal access to opportunities previously denied to the hardworking poor. -in 2014, we continued to refine all of the health promoting features of our dwellings like mosquito-netting, ventilation and rain-water catchment. We ran multiple business and life skills training sessions for families who are using our mix-use dwelling. We started our m&e program in india to regularly evaluate the impact of our integrated approach on income, health and productivity of households.