My new goal is to expand my business. I am a plumber and I have a small hardware shop. I want to expand my business so that I can get more income that will enable me to meet all the needs of my family comfortably. I managed to invest part of our recent transfer in the business where I bought more items for sale. The business is thus doing well and this has encouraged me. I would like it to grow more.

I liked the fact that GiveDirectly is very transparent in their dealings. One does not need to go through someone or know someone for them to be enrolled in the program. I also liked the fact that they went to each person's household and they enrolled them there. This way they got to enroll every member of the village and they sent the money directly to him or her without passing through other people's hands. Everything thus went well and the exercise was fair. I do not see anything that went wrong.

We invested KES 25000 of our recent transfer on the hardware shop. We bought more items for sale with it. I am a plumber by profession and I had decided to open a hardware shop. The shop though had less stock. I hence decided to invest some of the money in it so that it could grow. I am thus glad that it is now doing well and the stock has not gone down. This hardware shop plus offering my plumbing services at a construction site is what I usually depend on to feed my family of three. Other than that, we spent the remaining amount on buying some missing household items. We bought chairs, some beddings, clothes, and food for our consumption. The chairs and the beddings are the items that we had always thought of buying but due to lack of money, we have not been able to. We are thus grateful to GiveDirectly for their support.

It was early morning and I was busy fixing the walls of my house that were almost falling apart when I heard a beep on my phone. I checked it and was met with the pleasant surprise that I had received KES 55,000. I was overwhelmed with joy and was left speechless because I couldn't believe how lucky I was.

I still cannot believe my eyes when I look at my new, spacious one-bedroom home. Only a few weeks ago, my family lived in a small, grass-thatched house, that was falling apart. Even though I was worried about my family's safety, I could not afford to change our living conditions. I am a plumber and work is rare to find. If I'm lucky to find it, I get to earn KES 500 a day only, which is spent on buying food for the family. This cash transfer, however, has changed that. We have built a modern house that can accommodate us. I am so relieved that my family is safe.

Until a few weeks ago, my family lived in sad conditions. We lived in an old, tiny house whose walls were falling apart. So I needed to begin the construction of a new house, as soon as possible. I spent the KES 55,000 on construction material such as bricks, timber and iron sheets, and labour costs too.