EXPLORING MULTIPLE LEVELS of ACCESS to RENTAL SUBSIDIES and SUPPORTIVE HOUSING

The Effects of Rental Assistance on Housing Stability, Quality, Autonomy, and Affordability

Federal rental assistance is an important source of affordable housing for low income households, given a growing and severe affordable housing crisis. However, few studies have examined the extent to which rental assistance may improve housing access. This paper examines associations between rental assistance receipt and four dimensions of housing: quality, stability, autonomy and affordability. We draw on data from a longitudinal cohort study of low-income adults in New Haven, Connecticut and use Generalized Estimating Equations to examine associations between rental assistance receipt and housing measures. We find that participants receiving rental assistance had lower odds of reporting housing instability, low quality housing, lack of autonomy related to housing, and some measures of housing unaffordability compared to those not receiving assistance. The large and highly significant effects remain after adjusting for demographic variables and factors that can impact access to rental assistance.

Navigating Limited and Uncertain Access to Subsidized Housing After Prison

An emerging literature has documented the challenges that formerly incarcerated individuals face in securing stable housing. Given the increasingly unaffordable rental market, rental subsidies represent an important and understudied source of stable housing for this population. The existing literature has described substantial discretion and a varied policy landscape that determine former prisoners' access to housing subsidies, or subsidized housing spaces that are leased to members of their social and family networks. Less is known about how former prisoners themselves interpret and navigate this limited and uncertain access to subsidized housing. Drawing on data from repeated qualitative interviews with 44 former prisoners, we describe the creative and often labor-intensive strategies that participants employed to navigate discretion and better position themselves for subsidized housing that was in high demand, but also largely out of reach. Our findings also illustrate the potential costs associated with these strategies for both participants and members of their social and family networks.