housing security / insecurity
Last updatedWhat to know
Terms used to refer to the stability of an individual or family’s housing and living situation. The US Department of Health and Human Services lists high housing costs, poor housing quality, unstable neighborhoods, overcrowding, and homelessness as factors. No single index or definition of these terms exist, so it can be helpful to explain local concerns, such as noting if a region is more impacted by houselessness than another, along with the systemic factors that may be involved. In some cases, housing insecurity is directly tied to spending over half of one’s monthly income on housing, but this is best regarded as a single factor when taking into account varying costs of living and rent prices in the country.
Additional resources
- Pandemic Leads to More Precarious Housing Situation (Center for Economic and Policy Research)
- Ancillary Services to Support Welfare to Work (Department of Health and Human Services)
- Measuring Housing Insecurity in the American Housing Survey (Department of Housing and Urban Development)
- Why housing security is key to environmental justice (Environmental Health News)
Summary
Terms used to refer to the stability of an individual or family’s housing and living situation. No single index or definition of these terms exist, so it can be helpful to explain local concerns, such as noting if a region is more impacted by houselessness than another, along with the systemic factors that may be involved.