Education and Well-Being of Children in Assisted Housing Programs

This report examined the impacts of moving into Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) assisted housing on children’s well-being and education outcomes. We used a quasi-experimental longitudinal design to examine outcomes over time for children who entered HUD assisted housing and compared them to the outcomes for children with similar risk factors who did not receive HUD assisted housing. All youth were in households receiving Basic Food or Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), may have left or entered assisted housing at some later date, and may have received other types of housing assistance not recorded by HUD. We found that moving into HUD assisted housing led to increased residential stability for children and kept youth connected to social services. However, HUD assisted housing did not appear to impact educational outcomes.