The Trans Organizers Building Better Housing Solutions
Why you can trust us
When Renee Lau, a special projects coordinator at the trans-led housing and wellness center , transitioned at the age of 63, she lost everything. βMy marriage fell apart,β she says. βThe Sears Holding Company, who I worked [with] for 30 some years, declared bankruptcy, and the business that I worked for got shut down immediately.β
Lau, who was living in the Washington, D.C. area at the time, began specifically searching for housing for aging transgender people, but she discovered how little support is available for trans people experiencing housing insecurity. βThere was nothing available,β she says. βNothing in the state of Maryland or D.C. was available at all. So I put a campaign out on Facebook about starting my own nonprofit for senior housing.β
Thatβs when Lau met Iya Dammons, the executive director at Baltimore Safe Haven, who hired her as the house manager for the organizationβs senior home in 2019. Currently, Lau says Baltimore Safe Haven is the only transgender-specific housing provider in Maryland, with five different houses throughout Baltimore and a sixth property underway.
β[Baltimore Safe Haven] is the [only] housing provider for transgender people in the state that [is actually] dedicated to people within the community,β she explains, an issue that persists across the country as housing-insecure trans people of all ages seek safe, dignified shelter and learn that it often doesnβt exist.
in their lifetime, according to the . And if these numbers werenβt stark enough, data indicates that both homelessness and βthe wider spectrum of insecurity ranging from frequent moves, overcrowding, and trouble paying rentβhave dramatically risen in recent years among trans, nonbinary, and gender-nonconforming people.
Though homelessness is , trans people have been hit harder than other populations. Between 2017 and 2019, the National Alliance to End Homelessness found that went up 57%, while the rate increased by 80% for gender-nonconforming people.
That trend has continued, according to more recent data published by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). From 2022 and 2023, increased by another 31%. This community is also βliving on the streetsβwhen compared to their cis counterparts. It is also worth noting how young homelessness can start for trans and nonbinary people: A found that between 35% and 39% of trans and nonbinary youth have experienced either homelessness or housing instability.
Housing remains a critical and generational issue for the trans community, but as we enter into a second Trump administration, there are now additional roadblocks to consider.
During Trumpβs first term, the administration proposed anti-trans changes to , which required housing facilities and other federally funded services to ensure equal access and accommodations regardless of gender identity. The proposed changes were never enacted. In 2021, former President Joe Biden issued an against gender- or sexuality-based discrimination, including those impacting the Fair Housing Act. HUD later announced it would around sexuality and gender.
During his second term, Trump is once again swinging at both housing protections and trans rights. In addition to a wave of anti-trans , newly appointed recently ordered staff to suspend the efforts. Though the National Alliance to End Homelessness points out that , it is unclear how, exactly, this order will impact trans and gender-nonconforming people seeking housing.
No matter who is occupying the Oval Office, trans people need safe, dignified housing. So, across the country, housing advocates and trans-led organizations are filling in these gaps by advocating for and building better housing practices.
Cracked Foundations
There are a number of systemic factors that lead to housing instability. The is the most obvious culprit, according to Donald Whitehead, executive director of the . The cost to purchase a home has skyrocketed by , and the majority of people are struggling to manage mounting, and largely unregulated, .
β[Trans people are] in the largest numbers [of homelessness], according to , the largest number that weβve been in the history of those counts,β says Whitehead. β[Those] counts started back in 2007 … and weβre at the highest level [of homelessness] in that span. And most believe the highest level in history.β
Costs have been driven up in part by a familiar equation: low supply, high demand. To ease the housing shortage, researchers estimate that the U.S. needs to build between across the country. Despite this conundrum, some cities are still partnering with high-end developers to rather than mid-range and low-income units.
For example, there are an in Los Angeles County. The average rent price for a two-bedroom apartment is just under $3,000, according to , but for luxury apartments, rent can easily stretch into the double digits. Developers can then generate much higher profits building luxury housing than mid-range two-bedroom apartments.
Additionally, Whitehead says βstructural -ismsβ such as racism, gender discrimination, and ageism all contribute to homelessness, as do β, emancipation from , the lack of resources for people leaving the criminal justice system, and lack of mental health resources.β Climate change, which leads to stronger, more frequent natural disasters, may also and drive up .
But there are certain factors, including familial rejection, , and , that make trans and gender-nonconforming people uniquely vulnerable to being unhoused.
Housing support led for and by the trans community is often a matter of safety. According to the , 44% of trans people experienced mistreatment at a shelter, including harassment, assault, or being forced to present as the wrong gender. Another 41% report being denied shelter access altogether. Though there are legal protections designed to prevent discrimination on the basis of gender and sexual orientation, privately run shelters often . For example, some faith-based shelters may only take heterosexual married couples or cis women and children, which can of safe housing.
This dangerous and exclusionary atmosphere means that many gender-expansive people avoid shelters. Instead, they may risk unsheltered homelessness, which can increase the likelihood of hate crimes, arrest, and illness. According to theΜύ,Μύ63% of unhoused transgender peopleΜύare unsheltered.ΜύFor unhoused cisgender people, that number is 49%.Μύ
Building Better Housing Practices
At the policy level, there are a number of ways to improve housing access. To prevent homelessness, Whitehead says states need better zoning laws, regulations for landlords, increased wages, and . Meanwhile, more comprehensive, national standards around shelter conditions would help increase accountability and ensure safety in the now.
Realistically, the Trump administration is unlikely to usher in any federal housing wins over the next four yearsβthough strides can still be made in the courts, state governments, and through a bipartisan congressional push. But smaller-scale changes can have a big impact on trans peopleβs access to housingβand these strategies can be implemented without overhauling the entire housing market, economy, or executive branch.
For Beth Gombos and Ashton Otte, organizers at Trans Housing Initiative St. Louis (THISL), better access and competent service for the trans community begin with education. THISL works directly with shelters, housing providers, and other entities that might harm trans people or or turn them away.
βWeβre training them to learn how to interact with and accept and serve trans and gender-nonconforming people with respect,β says Gombos, who is the organizationβs cofounder and executive director.
Typically, this work begins by teaching trans identity 101: gender identity, sex, pronouns, and myth busting. βWe start off by trying to build a level of understanding and basic empathy for this community,β says Otte. From there, THISL educates housing providers on anti-discrimination protocol and their responsibility to ensure care and access for the trans community.
In their work, Otte says theyβve seen many shelter providers who are simply unaware of federal shelter regulations and mandatory anti-discrimination standards.
THISL is also educating trans and gender-nonconforming people on homeownership, financial wellness, and their housing rights to ultimately help people βget into these systems and these programs that would not typically have space for them or make space for them,β says Gombos.
In 2023, THISL partnered with the Metropolitan St. Louis Equal Housing & Opportunity Council to on fair queer and trans housing practices. The report recommends not only policy, but also basic trans-inclusive housing practices, ranging from basic pronoun usage and inclusive intake forms to ID documentation services and diverse hiring practices.
ββThere are a lot of ways that you can subtly but very intentionally support this community, even without those non-discrimination policies in place,β says Otte.
We Take Care of Us
Though equitable housing policies are needed at the federal level, trans-led organizations are not waiting for the federal government to take action. They are already taking care of their own.
Sean Ebony Coleman, founder and CEO of the Bronx-based LGBTQ grassroots organization , says housing support goes beyond providing a safe place for unhoused people to be.
ββOne of the biggest issues is that everyoneβs at a different level when it comes to being ready to access housing, particularly independent living,β says Coleman. βThe conventional shelter model has just this one-stop-shop approach, right? Itβs just βYouβre going in, weβre going to house you, youβll stay for a little while, [and] weβll try to get you into transitional housing or some type of supportive housing.β [But theyβre] not really going to train you as far as getting better employment or securing a better job or even sending you back to school.β
For Coleman, getting into a shelter is just the first step. Destination Tomorrowβs housing support also includes building wraparound services that consider the care of the entire person, including offering independent living support, career and academic opportunities, culinary training, mental health care, and financial literacy programs.
Coleman adds that providing documentation services, such as covering the cost to change a name or gender marker on identification cards and birth certificates, is a critical βfirst stepβ to addressing the root causes of trans homelessness. Accurate documents are a building block for gaining employment, accessing higher education, and even traveling.
So far, Coleman says Destination Tomorrow has served about 50 people through their Sex Workers Immediate Temporary Comprehensive Housing program, which offers emergency housing for trans, nonbinary, and gender-nonconforming sex workers and domestic and sexual violence survivors in the Bronx. Coleman says Destination Tomorrow has also made more than 700 housing referrals around New York City.
Destination Tomorrow is now gearing up to open a brand-new shelter that can house up to 300 trans single adultsβan especially underserved demographic. In New York City, Gothamist estimates that the cityβs traditional homeless shelter system only has for single adults in a city with more than 200,000 shelter-seeking migrants and an estimated .
βWeβre one of a few trans providers when it comes to doing housing for single adults,β says Coleman. βThat was also incredibly important, because the landscape that we came up on was [that] you have housing for youth that went up to [age] 25, and then you had housing for seniors that started at 55. If you were in the middle of that, you just had to try to figure out how to navigate a system that wasnβt designed for you and at all prepared for your success.β
ββThe biggest impact is we give folks hope,β Coleman continues. βIn this moment of uncertainty, trans people need to feel as if thereβs community there for them. And not just within the trans community, but overall, whether it is lesbian, gay, or bisexual, whether itβs the Black community or the Latinx community, whatever it is, we need to feel like there is some love in their space.β
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Sara Youngblood Gregory
is a lesbian journalist, editor, and author. She covers identity, power, culture, and health. In addition to being a Πή³΅΄σΆΣ contributor, Youngblood Gregoryβs work has been featured inΜύThe New York Times, New York Magazine, The Guardian,ΜύCosmopolitan,Μύand many others. Most recently, they were the recipient of the 2023 Curve and NLGJA Award for Emerging Journalists. Get in touch at saragregory.org.
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