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Homelessness is a global challenge.

The United Nations Human Settlements Program estimates that 1.1 billion people live in inadequate housing, and the best data available suggest that more than 100 million people have no housing at all.

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Hardiness and homelessness: A strengths-based perspective of service use by veterans who are homeless

James C. Petrovich

The purpose of this study was to expand the current knowledge base regarding the use of assistance services by veterans who are homeless. Informed by existing gaps in the scientific literature, it recruited a systematic sample from a low-demand urban shelter and applied a strengths-based perspective by evaluating whether the personality construct of hardiness predicted utilization of assistance services. It also utilized a...

Stigma and Prejudice Against Individuals Experiencing Homelessness

Denise De Las Nueces

This chapter will review the scope of anti-homeless stigma in society today, first by defining homelessness and then by examining the roots of anti-homeless sentiments through a review of the history of homelessness in the United States. The current manifestations of anti-homeless stigma as reflected in today’s local legislation, violence against the homeless population, and health care disparities will also be examined....

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Data Reports

The Annual Homeless Assessment Report (AHAR) is a HUD report to the U.S. Congress that provides nationwide estimates of homelessness, including information about the demographic characteristics of homeless persons, service use patterns, and the capacity to house homeless persons. The report is based primarily on Homeless Management Information Systems (HMIS) data about persons who experience homelessness during a 12-month...

OECD: Affordable Housing Database

Access to good-quality affordable housing is a fundamental need and key to achieving a number of social policy objectives, including reducing poverty and enhancing equality of opportunity, social inclusion and mobility. Housing needs are frequently unmet, and today a significant number of people across the OECD are homeless and too many households live in low-quality dwellings or face housing costs they can ill afford. The...

Leaving Homelessness Behind: Housing Decisions Among Families Exiting Shelter

Because homelessness assistance programs are designed to help families, it is important for policymakers and practitioners to understand how families experiencing homelessness make housing decisions, particularly when they decide not to use available services. This study explores those decisions using in-depth qualitative interviews with 80 families recruited in shelters across four sites approximately six months after they...

The Dilemmas of Frontline Staff Working With the Homeless: Housing First, Discretion, and the Task Environment

Carissa van den Berk-Clark

This article examines staff discretion in permanent supportive housing facilities run by a nonprofit agency claiming to use a Housing First approach. Field observation, archival data, and individual and group interviews with staff and clients were examined to better understand agency processes involved in intake, sanctions, and disposal of clients to evaluate Housing First fidelity. In their day-to-day interactions with...

Universal Screening for Homelessness and Risk for Homelessness in the Veterans Health Administration

Ann Elizabeth Montgomery

We examined data for all veterans who completed the Veterans Health Administration’s (VHA) national homelessness screening instrument between October 1, 2012, and January 10, 2013. Among veterans who were not engaged with the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) homeless system and presented for primary care services, the prevalence of recent housing instability or homelessness was 0.9% and homelessness risk was 1.2%....

Human Trafficking Prevalence and Child Welfare Risk Factors Among Homeless Youth

Debra Schilling Wolfe

Johanna K.P. Greeson

Sarah Wasch

Daniel Treglia

The Field Center completed a three-city study as part of a larger initiative by Covenant House International to research human trafficking among homeless youth encompassing nearly 1,000 young people across 13 cities. Of those interviewed, twenty percent were victims of human trafficking, including seventeen percent who were victims of sex trafficking and six percent who were victims of labor trafficking. Fourteen percent...

Missed Opportunities: LGBTQ Youth Homelessness in America

The second in a series of Research-to-Impact briefs by Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago on understanding and addressing youth homelessness. Missed Opportunities: LGBTQ Youth Homelessness in America highlights research related to the specific experiences of young people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) and face homelessness. The study learned that, compared to heterosexual and...

Discussion Paper: Ending Homelessness and the Right to Housing

Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness

The purpose of this discussion paper is for Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness (CAEH) to present their opinions and position regarding the right to housing. In this paper, the CAEH discusses housing rights in Canada, including the Canadian government's recognition of the right to adequate housing – with guidance from The United Nations human rights framework. In addition, the organization presents the right to adequate...

A transitional housing program for older foster youth: How do youth fare after exiting?

Sonja Lenz-Rashid

This study is an outcome evaluation of Bay Area Youth Center's Real Alternatives for Adolescents (RAFA) transitional housing program in Hayward, California. Methods: This study examined a sample of 55 youth ages 16 to 21 who lived in the RAFA transitional program between 2007 and 2015. About 96% were in residing in stable housing at follow up, there were low rates of parenting before age 22 (41% of females and 16% of males)...

Still Hungry and Homeless in College

This is the largest national survey assessing the basic needs security of university students. It is the Wisconsin HOPE Lab’s 3rd national survey. This year the Lab reported on 43,000 students at 66 institutions in 20 states and the District of Columbia, which included over 20,000 students at 35 4-year colleges and universities, as well as students at community colleges. Overall, the study concluded 36 percent of college...

Supporting Partnerships for Anti-Racist Communities: Phase One Study Findings

In September 2016, the Center for Social Innovation launched SPARC (Supporting Partnerships for Anti- Racist Communities) to understand and respond to racial inequities in homelessness, through research and action. Through an ambitious mixed-methods (quantitative and qualitative) study, the SPARC team documented high rates of homelessness among people of color and began to map their pathways into and barriers to exit from...

Protect Tenants, Prevent Homelessness

While many communities across the country are working to end homelessness, too few have adopted legal protections to help renters find, and stay in, housing. This report explores the links between housing instability and homelessness as well as the laws that can reduce housing instability. While increasing the availability of affordable housing is a necessary component of ending homelessness, it may not be sufficient if low-...

Fitting Stories: Outreach Worker Strategies for Housing Homeless Clients

Curtis Smith

Leon Anderson

Social service outreach workers serving homeless populations exemplify Michael Lipsky’s concept of street-level bureaucrats who exert considerable discretionary power in the performance of their roles. In their efforts to qualify their homeless clients for housing, outreach workers create “fitting stories” that present their clients as qualified for support within the social service contexts that provide housing services. We...

Supportive Housing: Single Site Model

In a Supportive Housing Single Site model all units within a single property or building provide housing for a range of supportive housing populations including people experiencing homelessness, persons with disabilities (including Olmstead populations and other at-risk populations). Supportive Housing Single Site models provide opportunity for independent living for supportive housing populations combined with supportive...

WHAT WOULD IT TAKE? Youth Across Canada Speak Out on Youth Homelessness Prevention

The What Would it Take study asked young people with lived experience of homelessness: what would it take to prevent youth homelessness in Canada? Between July 2017 and January 2018, A Way Home Canada and the Canadian Observatory on Homelessness consulted with youth across Canada to ask: 1) What would have prevented your homelessness? 2) What programs, policies, services, and supports are needed to prevent youth homelessness...

Impact of a New York City Supportive Housing Program on Housing Stability and Preventable Health Care among Homeless Families

In this article, the authors captured housing events and health care service utilization during 2 years prior to the first program eligibility date (baseline) and 2 years post-baseline. They performed sequence analysis to measure housing stability and compared housing stability and preventable ED visits and hospitalizations between program participants (treatment group) and eligible applicants not placed in the program (...

The right to housing in Flanders-Belgium: international human rights law and concepts as stepping stones to more effectiveness

Research into the effectiveness of the right to housing concerns research into one of the most basic needs of human beings. For a lot of households, the cost of housing (together with food and water) is not only a considerable share of their budget expenditure, it is also their primary concern. This is especially the case with regard to people who have trouble making ends meet. Little is worse than running the risk of being...

Prevalence and Correlates of Youth Homelessness in the United States

Youth homelessness is a serious concern. Evidence shows that youth who experience homelessness are at high risk of exposure to a range of physical and mental health problems, violence, early pregnancy, and early death. However, efforts to solve the problem have been constrained by the absence of credible data on the size and characteristics of the population and reliable means to track youth homelessness over time. In...

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