How have California housing production and homelessness statistics changed since 2019?
Executive summary
Since 2019 California has dramatically ramped public investment and targeted production programs—most visibly the Homekey program that the state says created nearly 16,000 homes across ~250 projects—while official counts of people experiencing homelessness have continued to climb or shift unevenly by county, producing a mixed record of outputs, service delivery, and contested outcomes [1] [2] [3].
1. Housing production: big dollars, targeted projects, but still a shortage
California launched a suite of production and preservation efforts after 2019 that state documents and budget summaries credit with historic investments and new delivery mechanisms such as Homekey and proposed cabinet-level reorganization to streamline housing work [1] [2] [4]. Homekey alone is reported to have produced nearly 16,000 homes across about 250 projects and reached hundreds of thousands through related services [1]. Nonprofit and policy groups continue to document substantial unmet need: dashboards and needs reports emphasize that housing production remains far below the scale required to close the statewide shortfall and that affordable housing goals will require new, ongoing revenue sources such as bonds proposed for 2026 [5] [6].
2. Homelessness counts: statewide rise with local variation
Measured point-in-time (PIT) and program-service data show an overall increase in the number of people experiencing homelessness since 2019, with estimates portrayed variably—one analysis reported an increase of roughly 30,000 people from 2019 to the mid‑2020s to more than 181,000, while another counted as high as about 187,000—reflecting different methods and timing [7] [8]. Yet the pattern is not uniform: recent PIT analyses and county reporting show pockets of decline in some jurisdictions and large increases in others—Kern County rose dramatically between 2019 and 2023, while at least nine counties saw significant drops in unsheltered counts in one recent year [9]. Meanwhile, statewide data systems report that Continuums of Care provided housing and services to 356,660 people in 2024, a separate flow measure from one-night PIT counts [3].
3. Spending and outputs: large sums, contested effectiveness
California’s spending surge since 2019 has been enormous by state standards and uneven over time: homelessness‑related spending peaked at about $6.8 billion in 2022‑23 and fell to roughly $2.5 billion in 2024‑25, and independent commentators have framed total expenditures in the tens of billions since 2019 while questioning the ratio of spending to the change in homelessness counts [10] [7] [8]. Advocates and the governor’s office point to units created and people served as evidence of progress [1] [3], while policy analysts and critics argue that—despite large sums—counts have not fallen broadly and data gaps limit evaluation of program effectiveness [8] [11].
4. Why outcomes look mixed: measurement, shelter capacity, and local differences
Multiple reporting threads explain why policy wins and persistent problems coexist: PIT counts capture a single night and can move for methodological reasons or local counting practices, HUD inventory shows that shelter capacity per homeless person varies dramatically (e.g., LA has far fewer shelter beds per homeless person than New York), and program quality, return rates from permanent supportive housing, and regional housing market pressures all shape outcomes [11] [12]. Independent research finds high return-to-shelter rates in some supportive-housing programs and notes unused interim shelter capacity in places like Los Angeles, complicating the link between money spent and durable exits from homelessness [12].
5. Bottom line: production rose, services expanded, but homelessness remains structurally high and uneven
Since 2019 California has increased housing production in targeted programs and massively expanded spending and services—Homekey claims, large CoC service counts, and new policy tools document that scale-up—but statewide homelessness totals stayed elevated and in many places grew, with substantial county-level divergence and ongoing critiques about data, cost-effectiveness, and whether production is happening at the scale or speed required to offset chronic affordability pressures [1] [3] [7] [10] [9]. The record is therefore one of substantial public effort and measurable outputs amid persistent demand and contested outcomes; existing sources do not permit a definitive causal attribution tying every dollar spent to concrete reductions in statewide homelessness counts [8] [11].