MAHANOY CITY -- Tambria Howard is from Pittsburgh, she doesn't know a soul in Schuylkill County.
Yet on this New Year's Day, she found herself sifting through burned rubble at a stranger's home in Mahanoy City.
It all started when a man named Jeremy Wade walked into the hotel where she and a friend were staying.
"He was cold, freezing, people had given him clothes. And, we kind of made room, he actually stayed in her room, we don't know him at all," Howard said.
Jeremy Wade did not want talk on camera while he and Howard got what was salvageable out of his home.
Firefighters said the fire started on Wade's stove Wednesday evening. It spread quickly into the adjacent row home.
Wade's home is destroyed. Howard told Newswatch 16 he doesn't have much family nearby and he doesn't have a car.
"I'm from out-of-town anyway, so I thought anywhere he needs to go today, I'm willing to help out," she said.
Wade's neighbors felt badly for his situation. But, they also felt relief. The row homes on South D Street are close together and the fire could have been much worse.
Trudy Anderson only had smoke damage in her home.
"I've got certain papers in a safe, and my husband has certain papers in a safe and we grabbed them. Whatever happens, happens, there's nothing you can do about it," Anderson said.
But after the fire, Tambria Howard felt she could do something. Help out a stranger left homeless on a holiday.
"What a way to start the new year, I think people should always be helping other people," she said.