Home repair assistance helps low-income homeowners address urgent or chronic home conditions that endanger health, safety and livability. These include water leaks, unsafe structures and utilities, unreliable heating, plumbing problems, deteriorating roofs, and lack of accessibility or energy efficiency. Most of the largest cities in the US have municipal programs that provide loans or grants for these repairs. These programs are a key source of support for lower-income residents and are complemented by other national and local nonprofit providers. For example, the US Department of Energy’s Weatherization Assistance Program improves energy efficiency for lower-income households nationwide. Local community action agencies, neighborhood groups and Habitat for Humanity offer additional services to assist low-income residents with home repair.
In Delaware, there are roughly 25,000 homes in need of repair, according to an independent assessment. This figure includes both structural and health-related conditions such as lead paint, asbestos, unsafe septic systems, and insufficient or nonexistent insulation. Key informants report that the needs of this pool are well beyond the capacity of existing home repair programs, which are characterized by limited funding and the capacity to complete very few repairs per year.
Most of the organizations that offer repair services are focused on providing housing stability for low-income families, often with particular emphasis on vulnerable populations such as elderly householders. As a result, they are well-positioned to connect with households experiencing chronic illness or disability and their healthcare providers, who are able to make recommendations for necessary home modifications that can help people stay safely in their homes.
This approach is a common one, and many programs link with healthcare services to help families manage health-related home modifications. For instance, NHS Brooklyn, a nonprofit in New York City, offers grant money to enable veterans with mobility challenges due to combat, non-combat injuries or serious illness to make accessibility modifications to their homes.
Despite these opportunities for connections with health care, the vast majority of home repair programs have no direct connection to healthcare. This is largely because government grant money generally does not flow directly to individuals, but rather to state agencies, which then distribute the funds to specific programs.
A few programs are trying to fill the gap by integrating health care with home repair. These include a collaboration between three local Habitat for Humanity affiliates in Delaware to design a statewide Healthy Homes program, which aims to increase capacity for home repair and incorporate partnerships with healthcare providers. This approach can be effective because it allows organizations to bundle multiple types of support and assistance, including home repair, while linking it with healthcare, thereby increasing the impact of each dollar invested. This article originally appeared on Shelterforce.