Most people can’t imagine having to drive five hours to and from the nearest grocery store—yet that is exactly what Sean and Jessica Hughes have to do twice a month to continue living their dream life in an off-grid dome home in Tennessee.

For the past six years, Sean, 44, and Jessica, 40, have endured the lengthy shopping trips because they are one of the only drawbacks to an otherwise idyllic life, one that the couple never believed they would achieve after finding themselves broke and homeless while living in Los Angeles.

It took grit, determination, and some inspiration from YouTube for the couple to achieve their goal, and today, they say they couldn’t be happier, even if their life on a 20-acre plot of dense forest land isn’t what everyone might envision as the perfect setup.

​”We’ve learned how to be happy with what we have instead of what everybody wants,” Sean says.

​“We just want it to be our personal retreat. We want to be able to be lost here, be in our creative space, and enjoy that; that’s the ultimate goal,” Jessica adds. “Everybody’s off-grid life is a different story. … Ours isn’t to be survivalists.”

​Life before moving off-grid

​Long before they moved off-grid, the Hugheses had moved from Western Pennsylvania to Los Angeles with big dreams. But life in the City of Angels turned out to be very different from what they had imagined.  

​Sean, who was working “basically 20 out of the 24 hours” in a day, made just over $100,000 a year. But even with that salary, the couple were only just making ends meet.

​“We were working so much just to maintain a bare minimum that we were forgetting to live life,” Sean says. “We weren’t actually living life; we were barely getting by.”

The two ended up losing everything—becoming homeless on the streets of California for just over a year until they were able to purchase an RV. They escaped to the desert, and after some time, inspired by YouTube creators Off Grid w/ Jake & Nicolle, Tyler and Todd, and Eamon & Bec, they decided to pursue a life that was actually within their grasp.

​“Our electrics are not going to get shut off, our water is not going to get shut off, and we were going to try and live this life that we saw on YouTube that other creators were living,” Sean recalls of their vision.

​In April 2021, the Hugheses bought a plot of land for about $1,000 through an owner-financed land company. Then they set about building a home base for themselves on the parcel, determined for it to be a labor of love that they could be proud of.

​“We didn’t want to just move on to the property and say everything’s built for us,” Sean says. “We wanted to kind of fumble our way through it and learn as we go, so that we could do this for the long run.”

A milestone move

​Interestingly, the dome home was never meant to be the Hugheses’ final dwelling, but rather a stopgap that would shelter them while they got back on their feet.

In fact, they had initially intended to continue living in their RV, parking it on their land, until they were able to build something more concrete. Then, disaster struck when the vehicle they were residing in began to leak, resulting in a hefty amount of mold—forcing the couple out of the camper and into a 10-by-20 tool shed.

Stuck in the cramped structure with their two dogs and all of their possessions, Sean and Jessica began looking for a housing alternative that could be constructed quickly for as little money as possible. It was then that they learned about the geodesic dome home.

​“It seemed like a cheaper, quicker option to put up with a lot of space,” Sean explains. It was “a solid structure that would handle some of the winds and weather that we have around here.”

​The materials for the dome home, shipping fees, and an additional deck they decided to include cost around $10,000. They paid an additional $20,000 to install the various systems they needed, including a water hookup and a wood stove.

This brought the total cost of their dome home to $30,000—less than a tenth of the current median listing price for a home in the U.S., which sits at $429,500, Realtor.com® data shows.

And, as luck would have it, the duo ended up falling in love with dome home living and, six years later, are still making improvements to the structure, from upgrading their solar power to increasing the voltage of their Amazon box so they can power more appliances.

​“We’re still trying to get to the spot where we’re completely comfortable, and we can just go on about our lives, because that’s the goal,” Sean says. “It’s to live a minimalist, as low-paying bill lifestyle as we can without sacrificing.”

A minimalist lifestyle

​Since living off-grid, the couple have maintained a minimalist lifestyle, one that not only enables them to keep costs down, but also has little impact on the environment.

However, despite now feeling in control of the life they have built, they have made mistakes along the way.

​One of the biggest was the placement of their off-grid geodesic dome. Putting their home in direct sunlight resulted in some serious temperature control issues.

​In the summer, the temperature inside the dome home can reach 115 degrees Fahrenheit. In the winter, the temperature can drop to 20 degrees. Though cost-effective, the wood stove can only heat the space so much, and many evenings are chilly.

Then there are the challenges of living off-grid—which, for Jessica, started with learning to share their space with abundant wildlife.

​“Bug pressure was a very real thing to me that I wasn’t expecting,” Jessica reveals. “Learning to live alongside insects and skinks and lizards and bees and things that want to come in like snakes was a huge transition for me.”

​The first year living off-grid, Jessica thought she wasn’t going to be able to survive it. However, after six years, she’s “learned to live harmoniously with it.”

​Another off-grid essential that the couple had to figure out was clean water.

They had purposely bought land with a creek on it, and in addition to collecting rainwater, they installed a faucet from which they could drink. But the transition still came with some complications. For example, doing laundry requires a tough slog to the creek, no matter the weather.

​“Everybody sees this life as freedom, which it is in so many ways. But you are trading conveniences for the same kind of conveniences that require work that goes into them instead of money,” Sean says. “It’s labor input that’s now going into your lifestyle.”

But there are so many elements about their lifestyle that they love, including the increasingly sustainable way in which they are able to live, particularly when it comes to food. They grow their own fruit and vegetables and take twice-monthly trips to the grocery store or hardware store.

​They are learning how to preserve food, as well as barter and trade with their off-grid neighbors.

“We want to get as close to self-sufficiency as we can,” Sean says. “We didn’t actually realize how much hard work that is.”

​Becoming influencers

​While living off-grid and working hard to maintain their lifestyle, the couple have launched careers as content creators.

Inspired by the YouTubers they watched when first transitioning toward an off-grid life and with Sean’s passion for video production and editing, the Hugheses imagined a way they could earn money without having to leave their land.

​However, after starting a TikTok account and a YouTube channel, they realized that the dream they’d been sold looked a whole lot different.

​“We kind of got sold the dream by some of these bigger influencers who made it look magical and beautiful, but what we realized is we were leaving one situation that was difficult to survive in everyday life to one where you just trade them for other hardships,” Sean says.

The couple decided to share the unvarnished truth of off-grid living.

​“I gained such a following because we’re very honest and open about our mistakes, the bug pressures, [and] what you deal with in daily life. It’s not all rainbows and unicorns in this lifestyle,” Sean explains.  

​With their TikTok account, @offgridsean, gaining more than 333,000 followers, it seems that the couple’s honest approach is working.  

​Outside of TikTok and YouTube, the couple have corporate sponsorships and produce promotional videos for their land company to generate income. Occasionally, they film weddings and other events in their community for pay.

​Additionally, companies will occasionally fly Sean to Maine and Florida to help them with their own social media.

​An off-grid future

​The Hugheses enjoy spending their time together working on projects, gardening, filming content, and preparing a home-cooked meal every evening.

​“We just kind of do everything together. It’s a life spent together,” Jessica says. “We do it together, or divide and conquer as needed.”

​Looking ahead, the Hugheses are pivoting from their original plan to build an extravagant home to retaining their minimalist lifestyle. They now plan to build a small 1,000-square-foot cabin as their permanent home with their two dogs.

They’d also like to build a greenhouse and upgrade their solar power.

While Sean would love an “off-grid hot tub and sauna overlooking the mountain,” he understands that it isn’t a necessity for him to “live a comfortable life.” Though they do plan to add more amenities over time.

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California is finally making progress on a stalled program to build tiny homes to address the state’s homelessness crisis.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and City Council member Hugo Soto-Martínez attended a groundbreaking of a development in East Hollywood earlier this week. It will house 50 people, with 10 beds for transitional youth.

“At a time when funding is being cut at every level of government, the determination and creativity it took from my team and our trusted service providers to break ground on these 51 beds is truly extraordinary,” said Soto-Martínez.

Los Angeles intervened at a homeless encampment just around the corner from the project, on Sierra Vista Avenue, and brought 20 people indoors.

Gov. Gavin Newsom put aside $33 million in 2023 for a project to build about 1,200 tiny homes statewide. That included plans for 500 units in Los Angeles, 350 in Sacramento, 200 in San Jose, and 150 in San Diego. The homes would be placed by those jurisdictions, which would own the units and provide recruiting and other services.

It came at the same time that the state said it would release $1 billion in homeless prevention funding. Newsom aimed for a 15% reduction in homelessness statewide by 2025.

The Realtor.com® state-by-state housing affordability report card gives California an F. Newsom championed building more housing in the state, especially more dense housing in reluctant cities.

How the promise to build tiny homes stalled

Tiny homes, already popular with homeowners, looked like an attractive way to address homelessness. California is already one of the pioneers of the market-rate small home, and the market is expanding as more states allow them, and more financing comes to the table. The state is already trying out new housing types including modular-home building and “straw homes.”

But the program stalled and California changed its strategy, instead giving communities cash grants to order the tiny homes themselves. And it picked up criticism along the way, for slow development pipelines, design limitations, and inflating costs per unit.

Los Angeles and some other cities have made progress in addressing homelessness. Street homelessness has dropped by 18% over the last two years in L.A., Bass said.

Still, state and federal support for homeless programs declined. Net funding to L.A. dropped from $6.9 billion in 2022 and 2023 amid the COVID-19 surge, to $1.5 billion in 2025-2026. The city has been pushing for an amendment to the state’s affordable housing bond program in a bid for more interim housing.

California Department of Housing and Community Development, Hope the Mission, Built On Site Systems, Lehrer Architects, and the Zegar Family Foundation are the development team for the East Hollywood project.

Tristan Navera is a senior reporter on housing policy, covering trends and solutions in the housing market from Washington, DC. He was previously a senior reporter at Bloomberg Law, and before that covered real estate for the Washington Business Journal. Earlier in his career, he spent a decade reporting on business and real estate in Dayton and Columbus, OH. A Cincinnati native, he holds a journalism degree from Ohio University.

The United States saw an 18.1% increase in homelessness this year, attributed to a lack of affordable housing, devastating natural disasters and a surge of migrants in several parts of the country, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) reported on Friday in its January 2024 Point-In-Time Count Report.

The report found more than 770,000 people were experiencing homelessness on a single night in January 2024. While HUD acknowledged that the data is a year old and there may be variances in the data, it also announced today several initiatives to combat homelessness.

HUD’s Point-In-Time Count Report indicated that homelessness among veterans dropped to the lowest number on record with an 8% decrease – from 35,574 in 2023 to 32,882 in 2024 – in the number of veterans experiencing homelessness.

Among unsheltered veterans, the number dropped nearly 11% – from 15,507 in 2023 to 13,851 in 2024. HUD says it has helped connect nearly 90,000 veteran households to rental homes through the HUD-Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing (HUD-VASH) Program. The Department of Veterans Affairs also shared it has permanently housed 47,925 Veterans experiencing homelessness in 2024 — marking it the largest number of veterans housed in a single year since 2019.

“No American should face homelessness, and the Biden-Harris Administration is committed to ensuring every family has access to the affordable, safe, and quality housing they deserve,” said HUD Agency Head, The Honorable Adrianne Todman. “While this data is nearly a year old, and no longer reflects the situation we are seeing, it is critical that we focus on evidence-based efforts to prevent and end homelessness. We know what works and our success in reducing veteran homelessness by 55.2% since 2010 shows that.”

Meanwhile, the announcement today revealed that HUD is updating regulations that “streamline the repurposing of surplus federal properties for affordable housing and homelessness services,” as well as awarding approximately $39.8 million to support veterans through the HUD-VASH program.

The updates conclude a collaboration with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in which states may apply to participate in a second cohort of the Housing and Services Partnership Accelerator. Per HUD’s release, the program will “provide individualized technical assistance to help states reduce homelessness by addressing health-related social needs, such as services that connect older adults and people with disabilities to affordable, accessible housing.”

Additionally, in partnership with the General Services Administration (GSA) and HHS, HUD is aiming to boost the use of unutilized and underutilized federal properties to house the homeless. The department says that over 140 properties across the country have been repurposed so far.

“Homeless people need more than temporary shelter. They must have access to a comprehensive set of services that connects them to housing they can afford and maintain over the long term. Title V will allow the federal government to use empty federal properties to house homeless people and provide these vital services. The Housing and Services Partnership Accelerator will help local program administrators better serve older adults and people with disabilities by providing technical assistance and sharing lessons learned across sectors,” said HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra. “As USICH’s chair, I am proud of these groundbreaking efforts to use excess federal properties to help those who have lost it all get back on their feet.”

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Homelessness is an escalating problem for the growing number of U.S. seniors, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) based on data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).

An estimated 138,000 older Americans — those 55 and older — experienced homelessness on a single night in 2023, according to HUD data. The growing problem is complicated by the greater needs that seniors have, according to subject matter experts interviewed by the GAO.

“In addition to affordable housing, older adults often need housing with accessibility features,” the report stated. “Providers described challenges finding accessible housing within the already limited supply of affordable housing.”

Health needs are also a complicating factor, since many older Americans have limitations in mobility, certain “functional impairments” such as incontinence, and other chronic conditions that traditional shelters are not always equipped to deal with. Many shelters may use bunk beds or have bathrooms with limited accessibility features, and not all shelters are capable of making such facility improvements.

“Some shelters GAO visited modified their spaces or services to accommodate these needs, while others cited resource constraints,” the report explained. “Additionally, older adults transitioning into housing may need home and community-based services, such as home health care and personal care. Providers described challenges connecting older adults to such services, such as limited availability of providers.”

The GAO published a 73-page report detailing the challenges faced by rising levels of senior homelessness. Older adults who are part of underserved or minority communities may also face unique challenges, including “unfair treatment, an unwelcoming environment, or cultural insensitivity,” according to the report. “Some providers reported taking steps to promote more equitable provision of services in their programs.”

While some agencies have taken a proactive role to address the rising levels of senior homelessness, the GAO made two specific recommendations for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

The first is for HHS to ensure that the Administration for Community Living (ACL) “as the lead agency for the Housing and Services Resource Center, works with partner agencies to clearly define short- and long-term outcomes for the center, consistent with leading collaboration practices.”

The second recommendation calls on HHS and ACL to work “with partner agencies to collect and use performance information and other relevant evidence to assess progress toward the center’s desired outcomes, consistent with leading collaboration practices.”

Both recommendations remain open as of Wednesday evening.

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The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced on Monday that it will distribute $3.16 billion in homelessness aid to communities across the country through its Continuum of Care program, which is designed to provide housing assistance and/or support services to people experiencing homelessness.

HUD Secretary Marcia Fudge announced the award totals during a Monday appearance in Savannah, Georgia, with the Chatham-Savannah Interagency Council on Homelessness, an organization that will receive more than $4 million from the program.

“Now, more than ever, we are doing all we can to get people off the street and into permanent homes with access to services,” Fudge said in her remarks. “That is why we are making sure the service providers on the front lines of this crisis have the resources they need.”

HUD has either served or permanently housed 1.2 million people who have experienced homelessness over the past three years, and these new monetary awards are designed to build on that work.

“The historic awards we are announcing today will expand community capacity to assist more people in obtaining the safety and stability of a home, along with the support they need to achieve their life goals,” Fudge said.

HUD’s Continuum of Care program is designed “to promote a community-wide commitment to the goal of ending homelessness,” with funding primarily designed to be disbursed to nonprofit providers, Native American tribes, and state and local governments.

It aims “to quickly rehouse homeless individuals, families, persons fleeing domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking, and youth while minimizing the trauma and dislocation caused by homelessness,” according to the program’s website.

HUD detailed the breadth of the new awards by saying they represent “the largest-ever amount of Continuum of Care program funding awarded to communities to address homelessness in history and provides a critical expansion of resources at a time when rates of homelessness are rising in most communities,” according to the announcement.

$136 million of the total will be made available for competitive and noncompetitive Youth Homelessness Demonstration Program (YHDP) renewal and replacement grants, as well as “approximately $57 million for new projects that will support housing and service needs for survivors of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking.”

When first announcing these grants, HUD specified that applicants should “use proven solutions to address homelessness, such as approaches that first connect people to housing, often with supportive services, rather than requiring people experiencing homelessness to first complete a treatment program or achieve sobriety as a condition to accessing housing,” the announcement said.

Successful applicants for these awards “demonstrated their community-wide commitment to ending homelessness by highlighting local partnerships with health agencies, mainstream housing agencies, and others.”

The largest beneficiary is the state of California at $601.4 million. Other large beneficiaries above $100 million include the states of New York ($303 million), Florida ($133 million), Illinois ($158 million), Massachusetts ($124 million), Ohio ($153 million), Pennsylvania ($147 million), Texas ($161 million) and Washington ($110 million).

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Housing Forward is leading the charge in the greater Dallas area against homelessness, a vexing problem that plagues many cities across the county, and in recent years the nonprofit has notched some significant victories in the effort. 

Still, the organization and the coalition of groups it leads face deep systemic challenges that continue to feed the pipeline of economic despair fueling the growth of homelessness in the Dallas area — and across the nation. Chief among those challenges is a lack of affordable housing, according to industry sources in the Dallas area who are attempting to address the crisis. 

As of November this year, Housing Forward and the network of service organizations it coordinates (called the All Neighbors Coalition) have met an ambitious goal by finding permanent shelter for some 2,800 previously homeless individuals in Dallas and Collin counties. That has been accomplished through the Housing Forward-led R.E.A.L Time Rehousing Initiative (or rapid rehousing) — an initiative funded by federal and private dollars that was launched in October 2021 and initially sought to rehouse 2,700 individuals.

The All Neighbors Coalition is a network of more than 140 public, private and nonprofit organizations working together to address homelessness in Dallas and Collin counties — the greater Dallas area. The nonprofit Housing Forward acts as the lead agency of the coalition, overseeing a data-driven homeless-management information system; coordinating access to services within the network; and facilitating training for service providers, among other programs.

The success of the rapid rehousing program to date has attracted additional public and private funding and resulted in a new goal of housing 6,000 individuals by 2025. The expanded goal is a recognition that even as Housing Forward and its coalition of organizations devoted to solving the homelessness crisis achieve important milestones in the greater Dallas area, the scope of the problem it seeks to address also continues to expand — and demand even more attention and resources.

The reality of the nation’s homelessness problem is that the goal posts keep moving. Housing Forward’s job is to ensure the homeless are not left behind in that game by providing them the tools and assistance necessary to effectively find and compete for scarce housing.

“Some of us talk about this system being like musical chairs because there’s only so many apartments that are ready to be moved into on any given day,” said Joli Angel Robinson, president and CEO of Housing Forward. “So, if you have 10 apartments available but you have 15 people needing an apartment, the people who are most equipped, the most connected and who have a support system that may be able to help with a downpayment, to help with moving costs, or they … can go fill out an application in the middle of the day or drive around and find a unit, they are going to get to the 10 available units much faster.”

The annual Point-in-Time count of unhoused individuals in Dallas and Collin counties, a federally mandated survey nationwide, shows that despite Housing Forward’s success in coordinating housing for nearly 3,000 individuals over the past two years, the number of unhoused on the streets of greater Dallas has continued to hover between 4,100 and 4,600 since 2018. 

The most recent report shows 4,244 individuals experienced homelessness in 2023 — evidence that the pipeline into homelessness in the greater Dallas area continues to evade a long-term solution, leaving Housing Forward in a position of swimming upstream against a powerful current.

In large part, the expanding number of homeless in the Dallas area and elsewhere around the nation is being amplified by a lack of deeply affordable housing available in the market, many industry experts argue. As more and more people compete for limited housing in a fast-growth urban area like Dallas, those individuals on the economic margins of society, often a paycheck or less away from homelessness, are often left with few options other than ending up on the street — a reality playing out daily in cities nationwide.

“We have over 4,000 people experiencing homelessness, and we need more housing yesterday — and today,” Robinson said.

Adding to the problem, according to Ian Mattingly, president of Dallas-based property management company Luma Residential, is a lack of federal dollars committed to the Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) program — a major rental-housing subsidy program for very low-income households. 

“Housing assistance was created under this administratively complicated, paternalistic system, and it’s not an entitlement, so only 2.2 million to 2.4 million families [nationwide] have access to Housing Choice Vouchers in the United States, despite the fact that if you look at it, tens of millions of people would qualify [for vouchers] under the criteria,” Mattingly said. “The real challenge is that [housing] is not an entitlement, and it is not something that the federal government has decided to put sufficient money into — to a level required to make sure housing is assessable to everyone long-term.”

The voucher program, also referred to as Section 8, is designed to cover rental costs to ensure very low-income families, the elderly and the disabled can afford housing. The HCV program has an annual budget nationwide of $27 billion, but demand for the vouchers exceeds supply by a long shot — “with only one in four eligible households receiving a voucher,” according to information released by the Cooper Housing Initiative, a private research foundation focused on the nation’s affordable-housing crisis.

“We have got to get serious about really focusing on creating and maintaining deeply affordable housing, not just for the population we serve [the unhoused), but people who are living at the margins, people that are making less than a livable wage, people that are on fixed incomes, whether that be the elderly or the disabled,” Robinson said. “…I boil it down to people that work in your city should have the opportunity to live in the city in which they work.”

Affordable-housing shortfall

David Lehde, director of governmental affairs for the Dallas Builders Association, said demand for housing and rents are both rising in the Dallas area, in part, because of rapid regional growth coupled with a dearth of available housing, particularly affordable housing. 

“If newer units are more expensive, then that starts pressuring the demand on existing units as well, and that can drive up those costs,” he said. “Dallas has a lot of different types of zoning districts, and there’s discussion at City Hall about paring that down and making that more efficient and making more housing available in the city of Dallas. 

“The best way to fight inflation … in prices is to build more housing.”

Jason Brown, CEO of the nonprofit Dallas City Homes (DCH), is attempting to do just that, with a focus on affordable housing. Over the past three decades, DCH has developed more than 2,400 safe and affordable rental units in some of the most distressed areas of Dallas. 

Brown said developers in the affordable-housing space face many obstacles, including restrictive zoning as well as ensuring the development and operational costs pencil out — which often involves seeking government subsidies, private donations and dealing with the associated delays and red tape of the development process.

“As more and more headquarters or regional offices look at coming here [Dallas], they ask about the workforce, but our first responders, our nurses, our teachers, etc., they’re all in suburbia; they’re not living in our city,” Brown said. “So, everyone’s trying to fight for affordable housing now because they’re seeing how it impacts the city.

“Otherwise, we will have a tale of two cities — the haves and have-nots — and it’s going to be hard to have business growth or to attract national events. … So, we’re excited to see now local government and national government starting to understand [the need for affordable housing] and supporting product [development] that has a range [diversity of income], so we’re doing these real mixed-income communities now.”

James Armstrong III, president and CEO of the nonprofit Builders of Hope, which is focused on affordable-housing development in Dallas, said addressing the city’s homeless problem long-term is a “truly complex” mission “and “it’s going to require a multi-prong approach and multi-prong solutions to really move the needle.” He adds, however, that Housing Forward, under Robinson’s leadership, “has done a great job and really shown some levels of impact in recent years.”

Builders of Hope in the past has set its sights on constructing owner-occupied deeply affordable homes — developing more than 500 such homes over the past 25 years. Recently, however, Armstrong said the nonprofit unveiled plans for its first rental project — a 36-unit low-density residential development. The project is slated for West Dallas, where Armstrong said there has not been a below-market-rate multifamily development in the past 15 years.

“Dallas is becoming unaffordable due to rising housing costs, inflation, increased demand and stagnation in pay,” Armstrong said. “In fact, 52% of Dallas County renters are burdened by housing costs, which means that they pay more than 30% of their monthly income toward housing costs.

“That is a recipe for increasing the pipeline to homelessness.”

The business case for building more affordable housing in the Dallas area is underscored by a recent report by the Dallas-based Child Poverty Action Lab, which found that the city of Dallas faces a shortage of some 34,000 rental units for residents earning 50% or less of the area’s median income ($44,500 for a family of four). That housing gap left unaddressed, according to the report, is projected to increase to a nearly 86,000 units by 2030.

“Dallas needs more quality below-market multifamily housing,” Armstrong added. “Neighborhoods should be diverse, not only in income, but diverse in housing stock, in order to create that healthy cycle and that thriving neighborhood, and so we have a lot of work to do,”

Property-management realities

Stevie Jones, director of property management at Dallas-based Waller Group Property Management, said among the issues affecting the availability of existing rental properties for the homeless or extremely low-income individuals in the Dallas area is bureaucracy and red tape. He stressed that is not a problem created by Housing Forward, but rather one the nonprofit also has to navigate.

“If we were able to house [place] people quicker and get payments upfront for the first month’s rent, that would be instrumental, and I think that will help more [property] owners be willing to come onboard with some of the housing programs,” Jones said. “But bureaucracy aside, Housing Forward is an instrumental organization for the Dallas metropolitan area, and they are doing tremendous work in this community.

“Housing Forward is looking at the pool of people that are in need of housing, and they’re working with government entities or nonprofit organizations that are receiving government funds to make sure those individuals are placed in housing.”

Housing Forward has been very effective at bringing together disparate organizations that tended to operate in silos — focused on their particular slice of the [homelessness] problem, Mattingly explained. His father, Jim Mattingly, founder of Luma Residential, sits on the board overseeing Housing Forward. “They are bringing [homeless-focused organizations] together around a shared database and doing the triaging of homeless individuals to identify those partners that are going to be best-suited to provide the assistance, whether it be the housing itself or the wraparound assistance [such as mental health, addiction or job-training services]. 

“I think Housing Forward has done a very good job, particularly in the last few years, of building that network of relationships and going out and actively engaging with property owners, rental-housing owners, to develop relationships and to develop a network of housing providers.”

Looking forward

Armstrong of Builders of Hope said the Dallas region has all the resources necessary to solve its affordable-housing and related homelessness problem. He said the key is to effectively create “one strategic plan that includes all players involved in the cycle of ending homelessness,” and to then work together toward the common solution of decreasing homelessness in the city. 

To that end, Armstrong described Housing Forward’s Robinson as a “leader who is capable of taking Housing Forward [and it’s collaborative strategy] to new heights.” 

“I think we’re turning the corner,” Armstrong added. “And I think you’re going to see a lot of more collaboration within the nonprofit sector because the problem is too big for one particular group to solve. 

“It’s going to take all of us, and I think we’re on that right path.”

Mattingly is equally optimistic, at least in the short-term, that the Dallas area can attain the goal of “near-zero homelessness.” He said the metro area is now on pace to deliver enough housing units to out-pace demand, which creates an opportunity for downward pressure on home prices and rents.

“Housing unaffordability is a supply and demand imbalance,” he said. “So, there is a correction underway now that is going to have a positive impact on the ability to house people. 

“So, with the reduction in that demand pressure, I think there’s a window of opportunity ahead that if sufficient public and private funding can be placed toward the housing challenges, I think we can get there.”

Longer-term, however, Mattingly is less optimistic, adding that the ultimate solution to the Dallas area’s homeless problem, and the nation’s as well, will require even more federal dollars directed at the problem, including expanded funding for the existing Section 8 voucher program.

“At this point, there does not seem to be any appetite at the federal level to do what I think most economists would agree is a critical factor,” Mattingly said. “Public dollars are not allocated in the quantity that the problem demands.”

Mattingly stressed that a recent study by the National Apartment Association shows that as of 2022, fewer than 7 cents of every dollar of rent paid to property owners was “available for profit.”

“That puts us [apartment owners and managers] down in the lowest possible margin of operating businesses, down there with groceries and food production,” he said. “So, any solution to housing affordability or homelessness that disregards the fact that providing housing is not a high-profit margin industry is inevitably doomed to fail.”

Robinson said Housing Forward serves as “the backbone organization” in Dallas for coordinating and leading the response to homelessness. She stressed, however, that Housing Forward can’t solve the problem alone.

For that outcome, it will take community-wide commitment as well, Robinson added.

“We can’t lay it all at the feet of bureaucracy, or things that can be changed in that way,” she added. “It also has to do with public perception and sentiment about affordable-housing development.

“It’s about the community and the public’s appetite or willingness to have affordable-housing developments in their neighborhoods.”

Editor’s note: This is the second in a series of articles highlighting Housing Forward and how what it’s doing for the local community can serve as a catalyst to affect change across the U.S. Read the first article here.

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