Vanlife after Harvard: "From Harvard to Homeless"

You've had a long day at school. Not just at any school, considering the fact that you're studying at one of the most prestigious colleges in the United States, Harvard. With your textbook in your hand, you jump in your vehicle, whether it being a car or a van and begin to drive home. 

We have a new solidary project called #FromHarvardToHomeless! ✅Check it out, donate & support! https://www.homelessentrepreneur.org/en/solidary-projects/from-harvard-to-homeless #HomelessEntrepreneur #Harvard #Homeless #homelessness @harvard

Now, picture this. What if your car was your home? Sounds a bit odd when you first think about it but really, being able to live in your own vehicle has been the solution to an easier and safer lifestyle for people, especially for young ones, students to be exact. Living on your own while pursuing a higher education is not an easy lifestyle. Not only is it expensive but the amount of stress involved in such a situation is sometimes not even bearable for some, making people drop out of college or losing their homes. 

However, the fact that there is alternative housing options like living in your own vehicle for students and young homeless people, gives the chance for them to pursue a higher education, as well as being able to pay off their student loans, find a job and have a home to come to at the end of the day without worrying about the excess amount of bills to pay for. Yet, people are unaware of this solution.

Franklin Lee, former Harvard student himself, explains his own experience on what it's like living in a van and the kinds of opportunities he's been able to discover thanks to being able to explore different housing options.

Franklin wasn't always "homeless." He grew up in L.A with his family until things got rough with his parents after coming out to them. It got to the point where he had to find his own means of living. His turning point, however, was when he spent one night homeless on the streets of New York City. Once he pondered over his situation and how complicated it was to secure his apartment at the time, he decided to explore different housing options, thus discovering the wonders of van life and the doors it could open if it were more implemented in the community. Yet, due to overregulation, it hasn't been simple. 

Franklin gives us the chance to join him on his journey into van life in his book, " From Harvard to Homeless." The objective of this book is to inspire people to look for creative solutions to their housing problems as well as any other community problems that can be related to homelessness. For example, young ones who are struggling to live at home due to strained circumstances but can't afford a place on their own as they are studying at Harvard. Maybe these young ones got kicked out due to, once again, complications within the family and are stuck on the streets. Perhaps the ones who are already homeless have given up on trying to find someplace safe to live, as obtaining a home in their circumstances seems impossible. Or even, they are simply drowning in debt due to student loans and therefore, cannot pursue the life of freedom and independence we all desire. 

One of the things that Franklin promotes in his book are safe parking lots. This idea could have a positive rippling effect on the community. Homeless people, especially the young ones, would be able to secure a home for themselves, which would be their vehicle instead of a bench or a building entrance. They would have somewhere safe to leave their car where they know they won't be getting hurt, mugged or assaulted, a common issue in the homeless environment. They would have access to basic amenities, such as water and electricity. They would have a place to heat up their food or even obtain food if provided by the government. Mostly, they would have a safe place to sleep.

According to https://www.whitehouse.gov, over 550,000 people were counted as homeless and currently, 0.2% of the U.S population are made up of homeless people, a fraction of them being minors. 1 out of 30 youths experience homelessness at least once during their lifetime in America. Sadly, deaths have increased 22% over the last year. Being stuck on the streets, especially a massive city like New York, is dangerous. They tend to become a vulnerable target and with changes such as safe parking lots, it could really save homeless people from experiencing traumatic events on the streets.

Also, with safe parking lots, more job opportunities would open up, such as security guards, janitors, etc. This would give people the chance, perhaps people among the homeless community, to gain a job. It could also open the door to possible business entrepreneurs who are looking into investing into an idea and running it. However the case, ideas such as these could have a big impact and become a solution to such a popular problem. This would not only apply to the homeless community, but to those who are curious and want to try things on their own as well. For those who need their independence, who need to keep studying their higher education yet, can't live at home anymore or for those who simply are looking for a new project. 

Franklin uses his own personal experience to motivate people to find solutions, explore options, and to inspire those to pursue their curiosity, especially if they haven't necessarily succeeded at whatever they're passionate about. Sometimes, having options and trying them is better than pursuing a passion that doesn't seem to work out in the end. Either way, the more support we receive, the more chances we have on creating awareness as well as helping people. 

Please click on the link below to donate and support Franklin’s upcoming book, which will also destine part of the proceeds to #HomelessEntrepreneur programs! 

Written by a proud content writer, Natasha Dilena, who is volunteering to speed up the process of ending homelessness via work and active citizenship with #HomelessEntrepreneur.

Homeless Entrepreneur on Housing Policy

Policy Goals

            Housing policy reform is a central component in the fight to end homelessness throughout the world. One of the leading causes of homelessness is a lack of affordable housing for low-income individuals¹. With this in mind Homeless Entrepreneur promotes a series of housing policy measures aimed at preventing homelessness and empowering people within the G7 and the EU to improve their living situation. While some member nations are farther ahead than others when it comes to housing policy, this article is designed to lay out some basic policy goals that all members should strive to meet. These policies include actions designed to: (1) prevent eviction, (2) ensure availability of affordable housing, and (3) assist in the creation of assets for those affected by poverty. By targeting social policy in these areas, we can help provide a wealth of opportunities for individuals to reduce homelessness and find greater financial stability in the future.

(1) Eviction Prevention

          A lack of eviction protection policy can be a fast-track to homelessness. It is essential that we implement a series of reforms to protect those most vulnerable to losing their homes and being forced into insecure housing situations. These reforms should begin with expanding eviction protections for low income individuals and those renting without a formal agreement. In many instances people living in poverty cannot afford the upfront costs of a down payment or security deposit necessary to enter into a formal renting agreement with landlords. As a result, they end up renting through informal month to month payments. Since they are more likely to have no formal lease or renting agreement, people in poverty are often disproportionately subjected to abusive housing practices such as eviction without notice and sudden rent increases. Without a formal lease they are forced to either agree to their landlords demands or be forced out onto the street with no legal recourse. While it is always important for everyone to have secure access to housing, it is even more urgent given the current pandemic. Losing housing could be a death sentence for those who are evicted and forced to live on the street without a place to socially isolate.

However, policymakers can assist in preventing these types of problems in several ways. One way in which they may address these abuses is by extending legal protections to those renting without a formal agreement by making them similar to those renting with one. This would require legislation emphasizing the fact that verbal non-written agreements still provide tenants with protections against abusive housing practices. However, it is possible that expanding protections to informal agreements in this way could prove difficult due to the vague nature of their terms. As such policymakers should also consider making funds available to assist potential tenants in making the down payments or security deposits necessary to enter into a formal lease agreement with their landlord. These funds would in turn be met by obligations on the individual that they care for the property they have been assisted in leasing. By doing so policymakers would provide tenants with the protections of formal agreements without having to adjust existing contract law. Finally, cities should seek to limit no-fault evictions. No-fault evictions are a tool used by landlords to evict tenants without reasonable cause. This practice often results in landlords leveraging tenants into either paying ever higher rent or being forced out of their home when their lease expires. Ending no-fault eviction helps to protect the housing market from becoming even more expensive going into the future.

          While ensuring that everyone has access to the eviction protections allotted to formal renting agreements is important, it is by no means adequate for the prevention of eviction and the homelessness that so often follows. We must also make resources available to those who have formal renting agreements or mortgage agreements but are still in danger of being evicted because of low income. Unexpected medical expenses, family emergencies, or loss of employment can all cause people to suddenly find their financial situation destabilized and make the threat of eviction or foreclosure imminent. Often these situations require immediate intervention to provide short-term economic assistance. As such, crisis intervention funds and low or no interest emergency loans should be made available to those facing potential eviction. An emergency intervention can act as a small individual economic stimulus to provide short-term support. Given the billions of euros that the EU is currently devoting to provide emergency bailouts to corporations it only makes sense that we provide that same assistance on a smaller scale to everyday citizens. The investment in these programs can be thought of as insurance in preventing further expenses in the future. In the United States providing assistance to the chronically homeless through social programs costs an average of $35,578 USD per year². Through the allocation of emergency intervention funds, communities can avoid the costs associated with people relying on social programs after having been evicted. Implementing these changes could have a real positive effect on the stability of the lives of millions.

(2) Creating Affordable Housing

          When it comes to preventing homelessness, one of the areas that social policy can have the largest impact is by ensuring the creation of affordable housing. Although it varies by nation, affordable housing is typically defined as being housing that costs up to 30% of an individual’s income. Since 2007 rent in the EU has increased by an average of 21% while the price of houses has increased by 19% ³. However, some member states like Austria saw house prices go up by as much as 85%. Programs like Homeless Entrepreneur’s Homeless Hostels Work Program, which converts underused tourism infrastructure into temporary housing, help to assist those who cannot afford housing on a short-term basis. However, as the global population continues to increase it is essential that now more than ever we take measures to address the issue of long-term housing affordability. The simple fact is that if people cannot afford adequate housing, our rates of homelessness will only increase going forward into the future. To create a bulwark against this trend we must implement policies that stimulate the construction of affordable housing and that do so in a manner that promotes opportunities for a greater portion of the population. The ramifications of this reality should branch across a broad range of topics beginning with zoning and housing construction. Policy changes in these areas should strive to meet two primary goals: The creation of an adequate number of affordable housing units and ensuring that these units are available in high opportunity areas.

Constructing new affordable housing units is an intuitive first step in expanding the availability of affordable housing. To ensure that developers prioritize the creation, policy makers should incentivize that a portion of all newly constructed housing complexes consist of affordable units. This can be done through the creation of affordable housing grants or through tax breaks for affordable housing development. Programs like the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit in the United States have provided developers with an average of 4-9% tax break in return for an agreement that a percentage of the units constructed will fall within affordable rent guidelines⁴. While creating more affordable housing units is essential, we must also do so in a manner that addresses the underlying problem of those who require low income housing.

If they are to meet their goal of helping to support low income families, then affordable housing should be constructed in areas of high socioeconomic opportunity. In the past when developers have created new affordable housing units they have consistently done so in impoverished areas of low economic opportunity. As a result, those who wish to live in the newly available affordable housing are unable to find the employment or education resources necessary to improve their living situation. To combat this practice, cities can implement Inclusive Zoning Ordinances in areas of high economic opportunity. Inclusive Zoning requires that a percentage of housing units in a given area are affordable to those making less than the average median income for the city. This would allow low income individuals to move into areas of higher economic opportunity where jobs are more readily available and expand their possibilities for financial success. If used in combination with subsidies to ensure access to education, these ordinances can vastly improve social mobility. By coupling the practices of incentivizing real estate developers and implementing Inclusive Zoning cities policymakers can expand economic mobility while also providing a greater amount of affordable housing.

            Beyond the construction of new housing, it is important that communities take steps to make existing housing affordable for a larger portion of the population. The most direct way to improve housing affordability is by supporting and expanding housing assistance programs. Housing voucher programs play an important role in preventing homelessness and supporting economic mobility. Households who qualify for housing assistance are typically spending as much as 30 - 40% of their monthly income on housing expenses. In 2014 24.7% of households in Spain spent more than 40% of their income on housing⁵. Housing vouchers allow renters to spend a greater percentage of their income on essentials such as food, clothing, and medicine instead of housing expenses for each month.

Data: US Bureau of Labor Statistics

This means that unexpected expenses have a reduced chance of making someone choose between buying essentials and being forced into homelessness. Just as importantly, housing vouchers broaden the housing options available to renters. This is important because housing mobility plays an essential role in creating economic mobility. When people are not prevented from moving because of prohibitively high rent, they can take advantage of living in high opportunity neighborhoods where their socioeconomic situation can improve. In this way housing vouchers can help those who qualify become more economically independent in the long run.

(3) Accumulating Equity

            At Homeless Entrepreneur we believe in assisting and empowering homeless people to improve their situation and take ownership of their present future. Consequently, we advocate for programs that help create assets for homeless individuals and that personally invest them in building successful communities. One way in which communities have helped to build assets for low income individuals is by supporting investment in Limited Equity Cooperatives (LEC).  Limited Equity Cooperatives can not only provide affordable housing but also build assets for residents and invest them in the well-being of their communities. These programs have shown great success in US cities such as Washington DC and Boston. Rather than paying rent like a traditional housing complex, residents of LECs pay to buy shares in the cooperative that in turn provides them with the right to stay there as well. The difference in these systems being that LECs provide residents with partial ownership in the property that grows over time as more payments are made. This means that those living in LECs are not just making rent payments, they are making real estate investments that accumulate value over time and can pay out in the future. Affording residents partial ownership also gives them a stake in maintaining the property and managing decisions regarding how it should be run. LECs grant people an opportunity to become active working participants in their community while also providing affordable housing and generating financial assets. For these reasons communities should take steps to invest in LECs projects. This could come in the form of offering low or no interest loans to create LECs, creating tax breaks for their development, or providing support to the NGOs that are working to develop LECs within communities. Giving low income individuals the tools to build their assets through active participation in their community is a great way to prevent future homelessness.

How to Help

            The best way you can help to bring about housing policy reform is by showing your government representatives that you support these proposals. While the policies mentioned above are all steps in the right direction, they will not be successful without the active participation of local and national leadership. As Tom Baker, a professor of Human Geography at Auckland University puts it, “Decades of inclusive zoning and developer subsidies have not delivered a great deal of 'properly' affordable housing, both in relative and absolute terms. It is increasingly clear that improvements to affordability cannot be achieved without substantial state involvement in the housing sector”.

            If you are interested in learning more about how you can help, consider lending support to non-profits like Homeless Entrepreneur who seek to advocate on behalf of homeless and low-income individuals. In addition to the Homeless Hostels Work Program mentioned above, Homeless Entrepreneur also operates:

The HELP Program:

The HELP Program works by matching individual participants with nine managers in the key areas of: professional development, education, health, housing, finance, legal assistance, communication, sales, and a mentor. This creates a support structure of individuals all working together to help participants achieve housing and financial independence within twelve months.

https://www.homelessentrepreneur.org/en/help-program

Homeless Voices:

Homeless Voices provides insight into the lives of homeless individuals to connect them with their community along with housing and employment opportunities, so they can grow their income and build their assets. People are given the opportunity to tell their story and expose the ways in which our current system is failing to meet the needs of many.

https://www.homelessentrepreneur.org/en/he-voices

Homeless Helpline:

The Homeless Helpline collects real-time data from and about homeless people or those about to become homeless and connects them to available resources. By acting as an information hub Homeless Helpline aims to prevent and reduce homelessnes.

https://www.homelessentrepreneur.org/en/he-helpline

Noah Thompson,

Homeless Entrepreneur | Policy and Fundraising

noah@homelessentrepreneur.org

References:

¹ U.S. States Conference of Mayors, Hunger and Homelessness Survey: A STATUS ON HUNGER AND HOMELESS IN AMERICA’S CITIES – A 25-CITY SURVEY 2 (Dec. 2014)

² http://endhomelessness.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Cost-Savings-from-PSH.pdf

³ European commission, Eurostat. Housing Price Statistics.

⁴ Congressional Research Service, An Introduction to the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (Feb. 2017)

⁵ OECD Affordable Housing Database – HM1.3 Housing tenures and HC1.2 Housing costs over income

#mobilitymovesminds

More than ever travelling and mobility are parts of our lives. A luxury life being possible because of the freedom of choosing where to go, when to and how to move. From cultural interests, business trips, products that reach us directly on our dining table to a weeklong art experience, we expect an experience, a will-do inspiring offering that is affordable, enjoyable, on-time and exciting. We expect a destination experience offered by the ecosystems around the world with an all-inclusive community-opens-up-its-assets-for-us attitude. We look here into physical mobility as first element of the resilience triangle.

A pandemic incident, like any other disastrous event abruptly ends our freedom of choosing. It rips off our safety shield. No one would have thought what it meant to be caught in a bubble of inactivity like what we experience throughout the Corona crisis. We never could have imagined what we will be missing. Zero safety shields turn the light on our vulnerability. They move us into the shadows. Into the shadows of streets, building corners, solitude, and nearly zero communication. Mental mobility is reduced to a minimum with least experience, positive momentums and brick walls become literally our mental walls. Mental mobility is the second element of regaining resilience.

We ask us what we might be missing if we did not have the means to afford mobility. We ask ourselves what it takes to turn back mobility into a substantial asset and public good for everyone – during and post the pandemic. Many words are spoken by governmental and economic stakeholders. First attempts are made to revitalize businesses through financial aid and funding programs. Second attempts looking into the digital world of mobility are hardly made. We find individual mobility moves throughout video call and conferences. Cargo wise we miss the element of digital supply chains and modular production and supply. Digital mobility complements physical and mental mobility as third element of the triangle.

Leveraging physical, mental, and digital mobility, any ecosystem being large city, municipality, or community is being confronted with the transformation of turning elements into assets, and assets into offerings. More than ever, is resilience re-build a cross-sectoral, public, private, and shared effort.

We live in dynamic times where information and digital technologies are rapidly changing the way we do day to day tasks and activities. The basis and backbone of the change is the evolution of technology from physical to digital.

How will ecosystems climb back the ladder to reach back their resilience equilibrium? Travel, transport, communication, migration have always been integral part of people’s lives, and we are grouping all these aspects under the definition of an affordable and consumable mobility, regardless of budget, handicap, age, and geography. Industry, innovation, and technology are all changing, and also evolving inter-dependently. This is all happening under the umbrella of our structural ecosystems, the villages and cities, the communities and municipalities. But they are at risk. Take the tourism sector: the drama is not a tourist industry restricted drama due to the lockdown and pandemic impact cycles! The drama started already putting entire villages and regions at the border of existence. What does it take to turn these ecosystems into self-sustaining ecosystems with their own contextual safety shields?

Self-sustaining ecosystems will demonstrate re-invention and the new normal of innovation, which concludes in a novel manner how constituents, visitors, guests, and natural resources interact more meaningful and heads up. Our understanding of mobility means, intermodal, smart and sustainable mobility will expand massively way beyond the physical hybrid car, the self-driving autonomous people mover, the industrial cycle of reproduction and circular supply chain.

We are facing in our communities an increasing number of homelessness due to several reasons. In our daily rush we overlook those that are stuck. The longer it takes to get back into the working and moving society, the harder it gets to break the boundaries and morph limits into chances. With respect to health and social infrastructure – we are created to move and spend energy. Hunting for food is still a “habit” for homeless people and the ones lose their home due to private debt and businesses running out of customers onsite. Now we are experiencing de-mobility – food comes to us with a phone call or a mouse click. Instead of healthy moves, we wait to be served. What is the use of technology anyhow? Are we really turning solutions and cloud services up to the point of rebuilding resilience? How will cities reshape their resilience streams – digitally, physically and mentally?

We hereby dedicate an initiative called #mobilitymovesminds short #mmm to the efforts of rebuilding resilience on personal and organizational level. We will be leveraging the human voices of the street, analyzing ecosystems and the systems of collaborative social responsibility, resilience design and execution. Furthermore we focus on identifying resilience patterns that can be leveraged by any community being big or small, by any stakeholder being private or public sector, to ultimately end corner-stone living on the streets and end poverty.

Our #mobilitymovesminds initiative results covers in a printable and digital book and website format covering the following:

• Voices of the street, governmental and private institutions

• Research on mobility and further elements of employed and unemployed individuals

• Analysis of mobility involved patterns that stimulate people to move on, investigating the role of mobility and its influence, roadblock and effort

• Requirements analysis to designing new businesses in collaboration with homeless people

• Designing a social business framework

• Publishing and disseminating the results including field runs and social business model framework in print and podcast formats

We ask for your support to make the #mobilitymovesminds happening and giving back a resilience patterned framework to the suffering ecosystems of the globe.

We are estimating a 15.000 € effort to write, design, publish and make mobility moves minds come true. Barbara will be herein opening work opportunities for homeless peers of #HomelessEntrepreneur. Furthermore, throughout the process of #mobilitymovesminds Barbara will be launching this resilience framework to steer the process of rebuilding resilience in communities. This results in publication formats book, podcast, and transcripts. The costs we need to cover the core part of our efforts are €15.000.

With your donation starting of €50 your personal story will be covered. Barbara will interview you and let you speak up.

With your donation starting of €420 you and your local ecosystem, being city or village, will be included in our analysis, finding entry in social business framework and ultimately being covered among a total of 20 ecosystem stories in the book.

Turn the light on for you and your community, being a village or city.

You have further questions? Or like to support now, here we are

Barbara

barbara.fluegge@dvcconsult.com +41 (0) 79 820 2473