Santa Barbara Veteran Homelessness

Description: Lack of affordable housing inventory remains a significant barrier to housing for people experiencing homelessness across the country. One of the more effective ways to address this issue is to recruit more landlords into the homeless response system who are willing to rent to people exiting homelessness. Homeless clients face a plethora of challenges in the housing market, including the stigma that the units will be treated poorly, a lack of stable housing history, and overly burdensome credit and income requirements, among others. 

Santa Barbara successfully engaged landlords in a multifaceted approach to increase the number of available affordable units in the county. Team members leveraged existing landlord connections and utilized flyers, social media, and interviews with local news media to help share information about the 100-Day Challenge with the greater landlord community of Santa Barbara. Importantly, they identified landlord champions in the community who themselves either had experience of homelessness, or whose community had been directly impacted by homelessness. These champions were key to recruiting other landlords, as they could engage in peer outreach and education to get them in the door. The Housing Authorities were then often able to further cement their commitment to affordable housing via incentive programs.