Affordable housing in the Sunshine State is being talked about a lot this year. Reports from sites like Realtor.com show South Florida has the third fastest growing rental market in the country. The price for rentals are up 27% from last year.
More renters are forced to adjust - and some are simply priced out with no place to live. They are the working homeless in the Treasure Coast who liken looking for affordable housing to searching for buried gems.
We’re in Stuart, The Sailfish Capital of the World at the home of Gail Harvey who isn’t packing for a trip to the pier but she’s tending to less spoken business.
"I’ve had several people call me and say - ‘my rents just gone up $600. I can’t pay it anymore. I’m going to be homeless,’" she said.
Crisis calls she and other members of the non-profit Tent City Helpers physically respond to every Monday.
"When you’re sick, down and out on your luck - it’s sad that this is an option even," Harvey said.
As board president of Tent City Helpers she personally goes under bridges, behind stores and other public spaces distributing supplies and homeless resource information.
"There are people out there that are working their butts off and trying to make a living without a shower, living in their car, trying to find a way to make it without housing," Harvey said. "So there’s a lot of hardworking people out there."
People like Christianne Taylor who works full-time as a prep cook at a Martin County restaurant.
"We’re causing mayhem is what they think - and we’re not," Christianne Taylor said. "There’s nowhere else for us to go."
WPTV met Taylor when she was off the clock in a parking lot. When she’s working her day starts at 5am in a public park. But finding a restroom is just one daily hurdle. Taylor also carries everything she owns in a large camouflage duffel bag.
"Blankets, pillows - this is what I’ve got to carry around everyday," Taylor said.
Sevens Report Research founder and economist Tom Essaye says Taylor’s situation is a red flag that should ignite collaboration between policy makers, builders and developers.
"Housing prices continued to skyrocket and now you have people who actually are employed that are homeless," Essaye said. "If you have people who are employed yet cannot afford to live or rent in your community — that’s a big red flag. The policy makers have to get together with the builders and with the developers and say we have to try and tackle this crisis and find a way where we can prevent essentially a California-style mess."
WPTV met with Martin County’s Human Services administrator and her staff to learn what’s being done, whose most at risk and what they’re hearing from the working homeless.
"Rents are very high and even rents that were affordable are no longer affordable," Miller said.
"People are now calling us saying, ‘I’m getting evicted because the landlord’s selling my place. I have nowhere to go. I don’t have a savings.’ So there’s a new population that they were settled and they were okay in the unit they were in and their rent was reasonable but now because of what’s going on with real estate and rentals in this area, they’re now on the streets and they can’t find another unit that that’s low rent," added Terri Ellis, Martin County Human Services case manager.
Both Miller and Ellis say the county is assisting more priced out working families, seniors on fixed incomes and the working aged adults with disabilities.
"Where are they going to get something for $900 even a one bedroom in Stuart. It doesn’t exist," Ellis said.
As a case manager, Ellis works with people in transition providing HUD’s housing choice vouchers that they can apply to a unit they find.
"Things are changing," Ellis said.
The change is finding an affordable unit that matches the level of income required to move in.
”They want them to have two or three times the rent every month to be able to go in. So there’s income guidelines for the sites and that’s something new that we’ve been seeing the past several months,” Ellis said.
She calls it a large team effort to find affordable housing in 2021. And amid the uptick in people who need it the county welcomes more landlords willing to work with their neighbors, both near and far.
"A landlord or someone who has units to rent, call. Call us," said Ellis.
”We’re out here for a reason,” added Taylor.
If you are a landlord, builder or developer who would like to work with Martin County’s Human Services Office, visit here: https://www.martin.fl.us/martin-county-services/homeless-rental-assistance Or call (772) 288-5785.
For more information about Tent City Helpers, a coalition of everyday residents addressing homelessness in Martin County visit, here: https://www.tentcityhelpers.com/about-us.html. Or call 772-341-7553 and leave a text message.