Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I think another reason for homelessness though that no one has mentioned, is the requirement now of credit checks before you can rent, and the increasing number of people with poor credit from having fallen on hard times whether due to illness or job loss. We had a friend who along with his wife made enough to rent an apartment for he and his family, but because his credit was poor he couldn't get approved. They had to live in a cheap motel for awhile with their kids, which makes the situation worse because even a cheap motel is $50 and up for a day. If they hadn't had that money, they'd definitely have been homeless. I think there are a lot of people now who are in this situation.
That's an important point, I see apartments advertised all the time requiring a credit score of 650, and then there is the insane requirement that you earn 3X the rent, so for a $1500 apartment you need to gross $4500 in provable wages. A fair number of people who are struggling and earning low wages make extra money by doing odd jobs or babysitting, but that money won't count when you are trying to qualify for an apartment.
They are busy building a new rehab facility close to my house. I have heard (I'm not sure) that the cost to stay there is about $30K/month. Online it says from $20 to $30K/month. Who pays for this? Drug addicts don't have that kind of money; unless they are also selling. So the money has to come from the taxpayers. When looking at the cost of this treatment they mention insurance plans and Medicare/Medicaid and ACA. Whether it is $240K or $360K; that is a lot of money spent on an individual in a year. Of course most of the time the people are only in for a short time and released to half way homes.
But my feeling is that we could never afford state operated mental facilities unless we rethought the scope of the treatment and limited the medical cost. But, by cutting back on the services provided, we could turn those facilities into the ones we shut down for humanitarian reasons. We need people that think outside the box so we could create a new system.
One problem is the way insurance companies operate. There is no billable service for maintaining a person in the state that he is already in. Therefore you can take a mentally ill person who is agitated and aggressive and you can treat him until he is stabilized. You can charge for that. Once he is stabilized he’s a maintenance person and there’s no more billing to be had so they are back on n the street. The only option for residential care nowadays, is a nursing home that has a locked unit.
These stories about single people becoming homeless when the cheap place they were renting came to an end, or when they broke up with the person who was supporting them - I just don't get it. "It costs so much to rent an apartment!" I couldn't afford my own apartment for many years - I rented a room in a group house for about 6 years, before I could afford a third floor apartment in someone's single family home - cheapest way I could have my own place. And the neighborhoods were terrible. I did what I had to do. Single people can rent a room in a shared apartment or a shared house. Single mothers with young children can team up with another single mother with young kids, and rent an apartment together for much less than it would cost them to rent their own place.
If you can't afford to rent a room in a group house in an area, then you just cannot afford to live in that area, and should move to a cheaper city. I know a young man on SSI for a mental health disorder. He moved to a very inexpensive city in the Southwest, where he could rent a one bedroom apt for $400. His SSI check of about $740, plus food stamps, is enough to live on there in his own apartment.
A single person, sure.
For a person with children, things get a lot more complicated, and that's when the cheap motels/extended stays become a necessity.
People think it's all bums who don't want a job, or mentally ill people who cannot hold a job, but a lot of these people work. I just had a patient tell me she slept in the Atlantic City bus station for awhile, while she was working full time at one of the casinos.
Yes. But often homeless people can’t work because they have no permanent address. It can become a vicious cycle. If a homeless person is working while homeless, I’d have to say she was especially tenacious.
These stories about single people becoming homeless when the cheap place they were renting came to an end, or when they broke up with the person who was supporting them - I just don't get it. "It costs so much to rent an apartment!" I couldn't afford my own apartment for many years - I rented a room in a group house for about 6 years, before I could afford a third floor apartment in someone's single family home - cheapest way I could have my own place. And the neighborhoods were terrible. I did what I had to do. Single people can rent a room in a shared apartment or a shared house. Single mothers with young children can team up with another single mother with young kids, and rent an apartment together for much less than it would cost them to rent their own place.
If you can't afford to rent a room in a group house in an area, then you just cannot afford to live in that area, and should move to a cheaper city. I know a young man on SSI for a mental health disorder. He moved to a very inexpensive city in the Southwest, where he could rent a one bedroom apt for $400. His SSI check of about $740, plus food stamps, is enough to live on there in his own apartment.
How does a homeless person find the resources, or the knowledge, to leave? Many do not have vehicles, and those that do probably own less than reliable ones. Someone who has concerned family might be able to do this with their help.
One of our local TV stations took on the homeless problem here in Portland. One of the things I learned from it was that many, if not most, of the Portland homeless were displaced natives. That says a lot about the high rents in this area.
Yes. But often homeless people can’t work because they have no permanent address. It can become a vicious cycle. If a homeless person is working while homeless, I’d have to say she was especially tenacious.
My impression is that she became homeless while she was working. That’s another good point though. Once the person is homeless getting out of it becomes next to impossible. Try to apply for a job without a permanent address and see how many people are interested in hiring you.
One problem is the way insurance companies operate. There is no billable service for maintaining a person in the state that he is already in. Therefore you can take a mentally ill person who is agitated and aggressive and you can treat him until he is stabilized. You can charge for that. Once he is stabilized he’s a maintenance person and there’s no more billing to be had so they are back on n the street. The only option for residential care nowadays, is a nursing home that has a locked unit.
Excellent point and one that I have attempted to make in other threads. People constantly complain about the police not "locking up" the mentally ill, but what happens is that the cops detain someone for a psych evaluation because they meet the criteria of being in immediate danger of harming themself or others, they trott them off to the ER, the ER doc medicates them and they are no longer dangerous or suicidal so they release them - many times the same day.
There is not one place in the country where minimum wage gets a person an apartment.
First of all, this isn't true. You can make minimum wage and afford a studio where I live.
But beyond that, why exactly do you think someone who makes minimum wage (ie... is actually providing less value than that relative to their peers, but are being propped up by a minimum wage law) deserves their own apartment? If you are that low on the totem pole, maybe you haven't earned your own apartment. Look into roommates. And more importantly, work on being able to provide a skill or service that is worth more than minimum wage. It's not that hard.
That's an important point, I see apartments advertised all the time requiring a credit score of 650, and then there is the insane requirement that you earn 3X the rent, so for a $1500 apartment you need to gross $4500 in provable wages. A fair number of people who are struggling and earning low wages make extra money by doing odd jobs or babysitting, but that money won't count when you are trying to qualify for an apartment.
So a landlord who wants to make sure their tenant can afford to pay the rent is an "insane" requirement? Yeah, okay. If it was such an insane requirement, then tenants wouldn't be able to meet that requirement and landlords would be sitting on empty properties. After a while, rent prices would drop.
And if you are doing oddjobs and babysitting, it will absolutely count when you try to qualify for an apartment. Unless of course you are cheating on your taxes.
So a landlord who wants to make sure their tenant can afford to pay the rent is an "insane" requirement? Yeah, okay. If it was such an insane requirement, then tenants wouldn't be able to meet that requirement and landlords would be sitting on empty properties. After a while, rent prices would drop.
And if you are doing oddjobs and babysitting, it will absolutely count when you try to qualify for an apartment. Unless of course you are cheating on your taxes.
You shouldn't need to earn over $4,500/month to live in a standard apartment. Someone making $1,000 less than that should be able to afford a $1,500 apartment fairly comfortably. That's an extra $2,000 for car, insurance, food, etc. That's a lot.
Odd jobs are not a "reliable, consistent" source of income, regardless of whether or not they are claimed on taxes. They don't count.
The funny thing is, the way housing is set up in this country, if someone is making over a certain amount (I think it's around $32,000) they can't live in certain income-restricted complexes where rent is anywhere from $700-$1,200. But then if they make under $4,500, they can't live in a standard complex either. So people earning low wages can live comfortably in decent complexes. People making over $4,500/month can also. But the people in between? That's the crowd earning $15-$22/hr. Where do they go? They have to live with roommates?
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
