Habitat aims to build decent houses in decent communities where people could grow into all that God intended. This means that Habitat should also ensure the proper development of Habitat communities, especially in the following areas:

• Community organizing & values formation
• Livelihood
• Education
• Health, sanitation, and the environment
• Promoting a culture of savings

In the implementation of community development programs, Habitat has traditionally attempted to work by itself. But community development is outside Habitat's core competence. On the other hand, other organizations have as their core competencies the "soft" programs needed by Habitat communities, and they can deliver these programs more efficiently and effectively than Habitat can.

Because of this, Habitat has chosen to enter as an equal partner into non-traditional alliance with these organizations.

One such alliance is with the Center for Community Transformation, also a Christian ministry. Its holistic approach has a strong microfinance component that is directed to providing their members access to self-help livelihood projects with an excellent record repayments. CCT's partnership with Habitat also fills the gap in the needs of their own community partners, i.e. decent housing via largely renovations of their existing substandard dwellings. The CCT, in turn, conducts community-organizing work in BASECO and in other Habitat communities.

This partnership may well become the model of partnerships with non-affiliates in promoting the housing ministry as they allow us to focus on our core competency of building homes while a CCT-type non-affiliate provides the soft programs.