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It was the first time Tierra Antigua Hope Foundation organized its annual holiday party for teenagers aging out of foster care in Tucson, Ariz. A single interaction would leave a lasting impression on its founder, Kim Clifton, president and owner of Tierra Antigua Realty.
“There was a child who said, ‘I've never had my own new pillow in my whole life,’” she recalls, and it broke her heart.
Clifton quickly refocused her priorities as she came to understand the true challenges facing young people who suffer from poverty. She decided that instead of giving teens Starbucks gift cards, she would distribute useful items like bedding, dishes and baby items for soon-to-be moms.
“Everyone wants to buy a baby doll for littles at Christmas,” she says. “People don’t typically think about teenagers during that time. They’re a forgotten group.”
But not for Clifton. She has a heart for youths who will be released from the foster care system on their 18th birthday, typically with no money, nowhere to live, few educational prospects, and limited parenting to prepare them for being on their own.
A Champion of Tucson’s Children
The veteran broker is a self-described caregiver and problem-solver, a powerful combination of qualities for the strategic mind leading the Tierra Antigua Hope Foundation.
Launched in 2014, the nonprofit aids people at or below the poverty level throughout Arizona. It provides meals for the homeless, stocks a local food pantry and donates to a women’s shelter. Since its inception, Clifton’s nonprofit has raised more than $565,000 and helped 15,000 people.
But a strong area of focus, and one particularly close to Clifton’s heart, is the work she does for Tucson’s children. In addition to hosting the holiday party, which provides a sense of belonging to those already in foster care, Clifton does everything in her power to keep children out of the system.
“It was the hardest thing I've ever done, opening a charity, and I have a brokerage and a 10 pound baby.” —Kim Clifton
At a moment’s notice, Clifton responds to requests from Arizona’s Department of Child Safety for things like car seats, cribs and beds—items families at risk of being separated may legally need to remain together. The volunteer group helps fulfill basic DCS requirements to ensure qualifications for safe housing are met.
“There’s just more kids than there are caregivers,” she says.
For example, a grandmother might simply need furnishings for a bedroom so that she can become the guardian for a child, and that’s where the foundation steps in. “If she can feed them, she can bathe them, she can care for them, she can love them, and she can make sure they get to school—but she doesn’t have the money for a bed or a dresser—that’s our space. We show up with no questions asked.”
Clifton receives requests through a platform called CarePortal, and she quickly works to purchase, assemble and deliver items to families. Just in the last year, she’s responded to 81 requests, helping 143 kids and offsetting the cost of $60,000 worth of items.
“She is really gracious,” says Pastor Adam Kemper, regional manager for CarePortal.
“Just this last weekend, I was looking at my email and had several emails from Kim,” Kemper says. She signed off with “thank you for allowing us to serve.”
Nothing is too small for Clifton.
Lena Abeyta with the Arizona DCS recalls how Clifton once told Abeyta to reach out if she ever got a weird request—and Abeyta did.
“I had a specialist call and say, ‘I have a family that's requesting Easter baskets. I reached out to all the different agencies, and they said they don't have anything left,’” Abeyta says. Clifton delivered three Easter baskets to a struggling mom so she could share a special moment with her kids.
“You have to have a heart for people—and hers shines,” Abeyta says.
‘We Live Here, We Give Here’
When Clifton started her brokerage, Tierra Antigua Realty, with her husband, Matt, in 2001, she had no idea they would one day employ more than 1,100 agents at eight offices in southern and southeastern Arizona.
What makes their agency so unique is that it both runs and funds the Hope Foundation. Real estate agents have the option to donate a portion of each property sale toward the foundation.
“We’re not pressuring anyone to do anything,” Clifton explains. “We provided an opportunity for our agents to give. And it just has snowballed.”
“I don’t want anyone to not be wanted. And if there’s an opportunity to be with their family and a bed or dresser or some food is gonna come in between that, and I can save that, no way [am I not going to help]!” —Kim Clifton
Patrick Devine, a sales manager in their Green Valley office, was sold on the idea.
“I decided that I wanted to actively give back,” Devine says. “So with each closing, my wife and I decided to start making a contribution to the Hope Foundation.”
With Clifton’s encouragement, he began volunteering at holiday parties, building dressers to be delivered to families, and helping plan a charity golf tournament.
“That’s the biggest thing that Matt and Kim have done: They’ve inspired many hundreds—if not thousands—of people to be involved and to give back,” says Devine, who was once the beneficiary of Clifton’s generosity when she saved his former workplace, which was on the verge of collapse, by taking over the Sierra Vista brokerage’s lease and adopting its 40 agents.
Whether it’s helping foster children or fostering agents, Devine puts it simply about Clifton: “It’s in her DNA to take care of other people.”
A Personal Connection
Whether it’s nature or nurture, her generous work ethic traces back to her childhood.
“I had to work for everything I’ve ever had,” she says. Her father wasn’t in the picture; she grew up among alcoholism, and she was practically raised by her grandparents, “who already had 11 kids.” She remembers being evicted a lot.
“I don't really remember being a little kid without responsibility,” says Clifton, who became a mother at 18, worked three jobs and remembers using food stamps. She never had the luxury of feeling like failure was an option.
“I've always tried to take care of others, even when I needed help myself,” she says. But her upbringing hasn’t turned her bitter; it’s fueled her to give Tucson’s children “better.”
“There are some things in life you don’t get to choose, but you can either whine about it or do something about it,” she says. “Every day is a gift.”
Kimberly Clifton, AHWD, C2EX, of Tierra Antigua Realty in Tucson, Ariz., is founder of Tierra Antigua Hope Foundation.
