By: Cara Baldari
Numbers don’t always tell the whole story, especially when it comes to family homelessness in the United States. Nearly 260,000 people in families with children experienced homelessness in shelters or in unsheltered situations (such as sleeping in their car or a tent on the street) in 2024, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). This represents a 40% increase in family homelessness from 2023.
But even this alarming figure only captures part of the reality.
Most families with children who experience homelessness do so in less visible ways. Parents and caregivers will do anything to keep their kids off the street, and in many communities, there are not enough family shelters to meet the need. Families, therefore, go wherever they can, usually in hidden situations such as temporarily staying with others or spending their last dollar to pay for an overcrowded motel room. These situations are often unstable and can lead to frequent, involuntary moves.
While children in these less visible situations are not necessarily counted in HUD data, the Department of Education’s McKinney-Vento Education for Homeless Children and Youth (EHCY) program requires public school districts to identify and support students experiencing homelessness throughout the school year. The EHCY program uses a definition of homelessness that more closely aligns with the lived experience of many children and families and therefore provides a critical source of data on family homelessness in the U.S.
The U.S. Department of Education reports that over 1.5 million public school students were identified as experiencing homelessness in the 2023-2024 school year, the most recent school year for which we have data. The number of students experiencing homelessness has more than doubled in the past 20 years and rose nearly 30% over the past 3 years for which we have data. Importantly, most of these students are experiencing homelessness with their families, meaning this figure represents many more individuals.
While this data is closer to capturing the full scope of child and family homelessness, it still doesn’t tell the entire story because it only includes school-age children in public Pre-K through 12th grade. We know that our country’s youngest children – infants and toddlers – are at the greatest risk of eviction and are therefore especially vulnerable to experiencing homelessness. Our partners at SchoolHouse Connection worked with Poverty Solutions at the University of Michigan to quantify young child homelessness and found that nearly 450,000 infants and toddlers ages 0-3 were experiencing homelessness from 2022 to 2023.
Taken together, this data shows that, at a minimum, nearly 2 million children ages 0-18 are experiencing homelessness in the United States each year, many with their families. And we know this number is likely an underestimate, since many children and families avoid telling anyone they are experiencing homelessness out of fear of stigma or repercussions.
Twelve states and the District of Columbia have populations smaller than our country’s population of children experiencing homelessness. The problem is likely to grow, as rents remain high in many regions and 60% of children in low-income families struggle to afford housing. This is a significant problem that demands sustained attention and investment.
And time is of the essence. Research shows that the longer a child experiences homelessness, the more dangerous it is to their healthy development. Early intervention is critical — to mitigate the length and severity of homelessness for children, or ideally to prevent it altogether. Many adults experiencing homelessness first encountered homelessness as children or youth. If we act now, we can prevent the next generation from facing the same fate.
Stay tuned for the release of Family Promise’s 2026 policy platform with solutions to prevent and end homelessness for children and families and tools to mobilize and build the political will necessary to advance these solutions. We hope you will join us in this work to ensure every child has the chance for a bright future.
