More low-cost rental units than low-income renter households.
~1 in 4
renters were cost-burdened
Homelessness existed, but it was episodic. It rose and fell with the economy.
What changed: 1973 to 1983
Four shifts over a decade left the country short of low-cost housing:
1
Federal housing moratorium (1973)
Nixon froze new approvals for subsidized housing for about 18 months.
2
Deinstitutionalization without follow-through
States released psychiatric patients, but the promised community mental-health system was never fully funded.
3
Loss of SRO housing
Single-room-occupancy units, the cheapest homes for poor single adults, were demolished or converted.
4
HUD budget cut by more than half
In 1978, federal budget authority for subsidized housing peaked at about $82 billion in constant dollars. Congress cut it by more than half in the early 1980s.
The result: by one consistent measure, homelessness about doubled between 1984 and 1987.
Two early estimates count different things and cannot be read as one trend. In 1984, HUD's first national estimate found 250,000 to 350,000 people homeless on an average night. A broader Urban Institute estimate found 500,000 to 600,000 people homeless over one week in March 1987.
Now: 2024
7.2M
shortfall of rental homes affordable and available to extremely low-income renters
35 / 100
affordable homes available for every 100 extremely low-income renters
770,000+
people homeless on a single night in January 2024, a record count, up 18% in one year. The January 2025 count was 3% lower.
The swing, in one line
+300K
1970 surplus
▶ −7.2M
2024 deficit
A swing from a surplus to a shortfall of 7.2 million, while the population grew. The surplus and the shortfall are counted two different ways.