Woman left in tears after Kansas painter surprises her with free home makeover
By Rachel Ripp
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OLATHE, Kansas (KMBC) — A paint job in Olathe meant to last is certainly leaving a mark. Thirty gallons of paint, a team of six painters, six to eight ladders and attention to detail.
“We’re putting caulking in every nail hole,” said Lorenzo Lopez, project manager for Stone Painting. “This is the most important part of the job, I would say.”
Leo Stone, owner of Stone Painting in Overland Park, decided to pay it forward.
“She was a referral and had some chimney damage that we had to work on the west side of her house,” Stone said.
Leo met Virginia last fall.
“Just like when I talk to my grandma, she’s just full of wisdom and, yeah, just reminded me a lot of my grandma,” Stone said. “She mentioned she wanted to paint her house in the spring, but didn’t have a lot of money … We were able to stack away some cash to help her out, so it feels, I mean, it feels better than probably the biggest paycheck I’ve gotten this year.”
Then he called her with the good news.
“I said, I’m going to hang up now, because I’m going to cry. So then I hung up, and then I sat there and cried for several minutes because I was just so shocked,” said Virginia Kasper, the woman whose home was painted for free.
Leo said she called him back a few days later.
“I said, I’m so sorry. I had to regroup myself, and I said, you know, it’s so shocking. Why would you want to do that? He said, ‘Because I want to.’ I’ve thought about it since January, and I said, ‘Well, OK then, I think,'” Kasper said. “It’s been one of the most wonderful experiences I’ve ever had.”
Virginia said she was completely caught off guard by the phone call.
“We forget the only thing that we’re ever going to take with us when we leave this earth is what we gave away,” Kasper said.
“It’s easy to get lost in profit and loss and dollars and cents, but doing something like this to kind of pay it forward, I think, is so important in life,” Stone said.
This fresh new layer of paint is marking hearts for the better.
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