US Homelessness Falls More Than 3% in 2024, First Decline in Nearly 10 Years

7 articles · Updated · The New York Times · May 30

More than 3% fewer people were homeless in 2024, according to a delayed HUD report released Friday, reversing two years of increases during the Biden administration.
Nearly 746,000 people were still living in shelters or on the streets in January 2025 when President Trump took office, leaving homelessness 28% higher than three years earlier despite the drop.
Researchers have largely tied the earlier surge to an influx of asylum seekers, some of whom have since found housing or left the country.
The decline lands in a charged political debate: Trump and other Republicans have used high homelessness counts to back camping bans and forced treatment, and the report was released months late with little notice.

As overall homelessness falls for the first time in a decade, why is it rising for the chronically ill and elderly?

Could proposed work requirements for housing aid erase this year's modest decline and trigger a new homelessness wave?

From the U.S. to Scotland, are national asylum policies fueling unsolvable housing crises in major cities?