Homelessness and poverty are inextricably linked. When individuals or families are unable to generate enough income to pay for housing, food, childcare, health care, and education, necessities with a high cost burden sometimes fall to the wayside. Although the cost of living and cost of housing have risen, wages have not kept up, and it is increasingly common for people to experience eviction due to an inability to pay rent or make mortgage payments. Put more simply, poverty and low incomes prevent people from accessing potential housing options, and make others hard to sustain. Being poor can mean being an illness, an accident, or a paycheck away from living on the streets.

What poverty looks like is highly varied in different contexts, both inter- and intranationally. Poor populations in rural areas face different cost burdens and disaster risk than those living in urban centers, but both are highly vulnerable to inadequate or insecure housing and housing loss.

In their own words: Olga | Los Angeles, USA