How to stop homelessness before it starts | Jen Loving

Elise Hu (0:00)

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Homelessness can feel like something that's just too big to fix, too complicated, or something we've learned to walk past. Non-profit leader Jen Loving has spent her entire career proving that this dismissive instinct is wrong.

Jen Loving (0:59)

We've been conditioned to believe that homelessness isn't solvable, that it's too complex, that it's too expensive. But the truth is, it's a lot easier to solve than you may think.

Elise Hu (1:14)

Jen leads Destination Home, an organization working to end homelessness, and a grantee of TED's Audacious Project. Her family ran a shelter out of a church when she was a kid, and she's worked in the field ever since, in shelters, on the streets, in camps, and housing programs. In her talk, she argues that we've been fighting homelessness backwards, waiting for people to hit rock bottom, instead of stepping in before they fall. It comes down to prevention, an idea we rely on in almost every other part of life, but for some reason, not to housing.

Jen Loving (1:48)

We screen for cancer early because it saves lives and money.

We reinforce bridges before the hurricanes hit. And every single day, every single one of us put our seatbelts on when we get in the car, just in case we're in an accident. But when it comes to housing insecurity, we like to do the opposite. We prefer to wait until the crisis has already happened.

Elise Hu (2:09)

Jen shares how her prevention model has already kept thousands of people in their homes and why acting on homelessness before it happens isn't just more humane, it's cheaper, too. She offers a genuinely hopeful reminder that some of our hardest problems aren't as impossible as they seem. That's coming up right after a short break.

And now, our TED Talk of the Day.

Jen Loving (2:41)

About 20 years ago, I was working the front desk of the largest homeless shelter in Silicon Valley. And that's when Tanya walked in. She looked exhausted, the kind of weary that comes from having no place to go and no idea what to do. She was clutching a satchel tightly to her chest, like it was all she had left. And then all of a sudden, the satchel started to cry. Inside was her newborn baby.

She shared that she had been assaulted, which led to her pregnancy. Prior to that, she had been working a minimum-wage job and renting a room in San Jose. But when complications from her pregnancy arose, she had to stop working. So she lost her job and then her home. So when she was discharged from the hospital, she had no place to go, no home to go back to, no savings, no family to call. She was discharged from the hospital with a list of shelters and a bus token. So Tanya did what too many people in our community do when they're in crisis. She rode Hotel 22, our only 24-hour bus line that doubles as a moving homeless shelter for those with nowhere else to go. And she rode that bus for two days with her baby in her arms. Tanya's story is heartbreaking. But what's worse is it's not rare. It's not exceptional. This kind of thing happens in America every single day. In 2024, homelessness in America reached the highest levels ever recorded. There were over 771,000 people without homes in our country. And that was an 18 percent increase in just one year. And for every one person on the streets, there are thousands more on the edge, living paycheck to paycheck, one unexpected bill or crisis away from losing it all.

We've been conditioned to believe that homelessness isn't solvable, that it's too complex, that it's too expensive. But the truth is, it's a lot easier to solve than you may think. Prevention is the key to having less people on our streets over time. In almost every other area of public policy, we understand the value of prevention. We screen for cancer early because it saves lives and money. We reinforce bridges before the hurricanes hit. And every single day, every single one of us put our seatbelts on when we get in the car just in case we're in an accident. But when it comes to housing insecurity, we like to do the opposite. We prefer to wait until the crisis has already happened. But just like diseases and natural disasters have warning signs, homelessness does too. A missed job, a death in the family, a medical emergency, just to name a few. And because these patterns are predictable, it means we can and must intervene sooner. Because homelessness doesn't have to be inevitable. And if we continue to act like it is, we will never solve it.