Used-car dealer in Charleston lets homeless sleep inside cars in his lot

After experiencing homelessness with his wife and six children for three months a few years ago, James Charles aimed to pay it forward.

Now the manager of Kiplin Auto, he provides homeless families and individuals a place to park their car, and sleep — in the parking lot of his used-car dealership every night.

While he can’t directly provide shelter, Charles provides a safe and secure place for people living outside their cars to spend the night without problem.

Charles, who runs Kiplin Auto, which comes under Kiplin Automotive Group in Charleston, South Carolina, has been doing this since January, according to CNN, for about 20 people and families who’ve stayed anywhere from one night to some weeks.

“We know that some families are having a hard time and in a tough situation,” Charles wrote in a Facebook post. “Yea whole families sleeping in the car… We will provide a safe place to park at night. As this service to the community develops we will look to assist these families in other ways but right now a safe place is what we can offer.”

Charles has also opened a GoFundMe page and has promised to donate $200 from each car sold, in order to help his informal charges past their crisis, his company’s Facebook page shows. People are also donating, besides money, knitted hats and a host of other objects, according to CNN.

He’s also working to establish a nonprofit, called Halo Now, to ramp up his efforts so as to offer a building with amenities such as showers and bathrooms.

“We’re specifically concentrating on the people who have a job, are living in their cars because they aren’t making enough money to cover that rent, and they’re just stuck in the middle,” Charles informed the station. “We want to be able to offer them a bathroom, a shower.”

He doesn’t want individuals to be penalized for not quite being able to afford to get into an abode, he stated.

“The people who sleep in our lot are just normal people who have come upon hard times,” James said. “They take the kids to school in the morning and go to work like everyone else, but generally, they’ve just had a difficult time saving enough money to put down an apartment deposit.”