Issues: Affordable Housing

Well ahead of the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic, available affordable housing was already in short supply across the cities and countries where Covenant House serves young people facing homelessness. 

United States

In the United States, where the shortage is severe, the number of people facing homelessness has risen every year for the past four years. Unsheltered homelessness is driving the overall increase, according to the “State of the Nation’s Housing Report” by Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies.

The National Alliance to End Homelessness, in its most recent “State of Homelessness” report, indicates that 6.5 million U.S. households spent more than 50% of their income on rent (the formula for affordability is not more than 30% for rent and utilities) and 4.4 million “doubled up” (i.e., lived with family or friends) in 2017. “Over the last decade, the nation hasn’t made any real progress in reducing the number of Americans who are at risk of homelessness,” the report says.

Since the pandemic’s onset, more than half of renter households have experienced a loss of income, deepening their uncertainty. Just as the pandemic revealed that Black, Indigenous, and other people of color were most impacted by COVID-19 and its fallout, so, too, these communities are disproportionately impacted by housing disparity across the U.S.

The federal eviction moratorium gave renters and homeowners a much-needed respite, a moment to catch their breath during the pandemic’s upheaval. But it did not address the deep underlying disparity in housing affordability brought on by gentrification, the ever-increasing wealth gap, and a chronic shortage of housing for working class and poor families, according to reporting by the New York Times.

Young people who leave, are removed from, or are thrown out of their family homes face enormous housing challenges. Those who age out of foster care without adult support are “thrown into the deep end” of the adult swimming pool, expected to arrange stable, affordable housing from one day to the next. Many, however, are ill-prepared to find and hold a job that can cover their housing and related costs and may still be dealing with the traumatic events surrounding their homelessness.

The U.S. Administration for Children and Families says that by age 21, at least 26% of young people who aged out of foster care in the U.S. have experienced at least one period of homelessness; the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development puts that figure at 11 to 37%, with another 25 to 50% unstably housed. 

Canada

In Canada, while the national government is supporting a 10-year, $70 billion housing strategy, the country is in a “long-standing housing crisis.” 

Former U.N. special rapporteur on the right to housing, Leilani Farha, told a House of Commons committee in May 2021 that in Canada,“1.7 million households are in core housing need, and 235,000 people are living in homelessness. New homeless encampments are springing up in every city, big and small. More than 250,000 rental households are in arrears and are now at risk of eviction from their homes.” 

In addition, housing prices in Canada have increased 168% over the past two decades, more than in any of the other 36 countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Farha said, citing a report by the OECD. 

Latin America

In Central America, governments have lacked the ability or drive to provide affordable housing for large swathes of their populations. According to research at INCAE Business School, a Central American institution, at least 7.5 million Central Americans live in informal settlements, or slums, a number that is rising. In Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala, there is a housing shortage of a million homes in each country. Poverty, inequality, and the lack of opportunity are among the factors that prompt Central American youth and adults to leave their homes and join the migrant trail.

The housing shortage in Mexico translates to millions of citizens living in small, tight spaces in dwellings made of poor materials such as cardboard and reeds. According to a 2016 report of the Center for Housing Research and Documentation and the Federal Mortgage Society, about 34 million Mexicans live more than two people to a room in such homes. “A large number of people living in small spaces can lead to academic failure, child abuse, stress, tension and depression,” notes a 2018 article in El Pais. Living in tight, unstable quarters also fosters illness and mental health issues, it says, something the COVID-19 pandemic made abundantly clear. 

Covenant House

Across our federation, Covenant House, known as Casa Alianza in Mexico, Nicaragua, and Honduras and La Alianza in Guatemala, provides emergency shelter as well as transitional and supportive housing programs to help young people overcome homelessness. Some Covenant House sites have developed apartment-living programs that provide youth with time-limited rental subsidies to help them transition from our care to their own housing. 

At Covenant House, we help youth develop the tools and skills they need to sustain their independence, providing comprehensive financial literacy programs that help them take their first steps toward obtaining a bank account and building credit. We also help them build their job readiness and to define and discover career pathways that can support them and bring them a sense of pride and satisfaction into the future. And, we help young people fill in their education and life skills gaps and deal with the trauma of their past homelessness. In all these ways, Covenant House helps young people prepare themselves to pay rent, sustain their housing, and become truly independent. 

Resources

Read “The State of the Nations Housing 2021,” Joint Center for Housing Studies, Harvard University, June 16, 2021; “The Gap: A Shortage of Affordable Homes,” National Low Income Housing Coalition, March 2021; “The U.S. Averted One Housing Crisis, but Another Is in the Wings,” The New York Times, June 17, 2021; “State of Homelessness,” National Alliance to End Homelessness, 2020; “Understanding Housing Challenges and Supports for Former Foster Youth,” HUD PD&R Edge, 2016; Lelaini Farha comments to the Standing Committee on Finance, House of Commons, Canada, May 4, 2021; “Canada’s Housing Crisis Needs Answers—But First We Need to Ask the Right Questions,” The Conversation, June 29, 2021; “Corporate Landlords Favored by Government Are Making Housing Unaffordable,” Rabble.ca, May 19, 2021;  “Estado de la Vivienda en Centro América” (English summary),  CLADCS, INCAE Business School, 2018; “A Tight Spot for the 34 million Mexicans Living in Micro-Apartments,” El Pais, Feb. 9, 2018.