Homelessness in EU cities and towns before and during the COVID-19 pandemic – Main challenges and ways forward

This study summarises the main findings from a survey conducted among a sample of European cities and towns, composed of 133 local administrations across 16 EU Member States. A specific feature of the research is that findings are also analysed according to city size (ranging from small towns to large metropolitan areas), allowing for the detection of possible differences in terms of homelessness numbers, profiles, trends, and policies between cities, both before and during the Covid-19 pandemic. Overall, there are indications that city size matters when it comes to homelessness. For example, exclusively smaller urban areas report ‘zero homelessness’, while in smaller urban areas that do experience homelessness, more variation in profile type is observed. Furthermore, during the pandemic, it was largely the smaller urban areas that maintained stable numbers of homeless people. More research is needed to fully understand the exact cause of these differences. For example, the observation that smaller urban areas more often experience ‘zero homelessness’ may be rooted in more effective (prevention) policies, migration to larger cities, or due to different definitions or methodologies to measure homelessness. Improving policies that aim to tackle homelessness and precarious living conditions, fits with the ‘Leaving No One Behind’ principle, which is crucial in the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals framework and several EU initiatives, among those the European Pillar of Social Rights.