Rocky Mountain Communities was honored to be one of the hosts for an affordable housing conference series featuring Gregg Colburn. His powerful analysis of the homelessness crisis and the imminent need for more housing solutions across the nation, is influencing real change. His book Homelessness Is A Housing Problem, coauthored by Clayton Page Aldern, spearheaded thoughtful conversations with developers, real estate stakeholders, practitioners, students, legislators, and government officials.
On April 15th, 2025, Metropolitan State University of Denver CAVEA Theater hosted an important lecture called “Homelessness Is A Housing Problem: What Does The Data Tell Us?” where Gregg shared data-driven research that dispels common myths about the cause of housing insecurity and underscored the need for economic housing solutions. Gregg explains the substantial regional variation in rates of homelessness in cities across the United States. In a departure from many analytical approaches, he shifts the focus from the individual experiencing homelessness to systemic issues in the metropolitan area. Using accessible statistical analysis, he shows a range of conventional beliefs about what drives the prevalence of homelessness in a given city—including mental illness, drug use, poverty, weather, generosity of public assistance, and low-income mobility—and finds that none explain the regional variation observed across the country. Gregg never discounts the human experience, but he poses questions for all audiences to look inward at what we can do. He finds that the housing market conditions, such as the cost and availability of rental housing, offers a clearer explanation and spectrum of solutions. The book explores in depth the U.S. cities’ diverse experiences with housing precarity and offers policy solutions for unique regional contexts.
We are proud to continue the important work at RMC that provides affordable housing solutions to address the growing housing insecurity crisis in Colorado. “Across Colorado, there is a shortage of rental homes affordable and available to extremely low-income households (ELI), whose incomes are at or below the poverty guideline or 30% of their area median income (AMI). Many of these households are severely cost-burdened, spending more than half of their income on housing. Severely cost-burdened poor households are more likely than other renters to sacrifice other necessities like healthy food and healthcare to pay the rent, and to experience unstable housing situations like evictions” (National Low Income Housing Coalition). There is much work to be done, but as Gregg said, having these hard and important conversations is essential now.