You may notice that we use the term houseless more often than homeless.  The reason for this is straight forward to us but maybe not so obvious to others.  Houselessness describes the single thing we are focused on, the lack of adequate: shelter, dwellings, or physical buildings to live in.  Shelters are structures where interactions and dynamics transition the physical object into a home. 

However, a life in homelessness is more than simply not having a physical dwelling.  It is a condition which may include addictions and mental health problems as well, certain social interactions or the lack thereof, and the absence of a physical dwelling or houselessness.    

Sabine Springer, a researcher at the United Nations Centre for Human Settlements, (”Homelessness: A proposal for a Global Definition and Classification,” by Sabine Springer, Habitat International, Vol. 24, 2000)., homelessness is a term burdened with many possible meanings. The U.N., in its data collection and research efforts, will start using the term “houselessness.”

How do you collect data on ‘homelessness? Houselessness, in contrast, is a much clearer, straightforward term. Whatever other problems some people in society may have, some of which are often included under the term ‘homelessness,’ the term houselessness presents no such confusion. It refers to the one crucial factor all homeless people have in common. While homelessness is not just a housing problem, it is always a housing problem.

We can understand how difficult it is to gain an understanding of the numbers of houseless people in a developed country can be.  Every census begins with one thing in common, a fixed address.  Without that fixed location in which to associate people, it is nearly impossible to gain accurate counts.  Here is an article articulating the challenges from a Canadian perspective.  Now, if the challenges are like this in Canada, how much more difficult will it be in a developing country where tens and even hundreds of thousands of people are without a fixed address.   And in truth, the problem of houselessness is by no means limited to developing countries.  However; houselessness and poverty are often found together and no country is immune to either.