Information on Healthcare Savings Due to Affordable Housing and Connecting Affordable Housing and Health

Numerous reports illustrate how funding for affordable housing and affordable housing renovations helps reduce healthcare costs by taking an “upstream” approach to health issues. Integrating funds that were previously reserved for medical care with housing interventions designed to promote healthier homes can help reduce asthma triggers, prevent home injuries and falls, and reduce healthcare costs associated with repeat hospitalization and emergency care treatments.

Health and Housing Reports: Center for Housing Policy, National Housing Conference (NHC)
These publications from the National Housing Conference (NHC) offer innovative ideas and insights about how to integrate affordable housing and healthcare, cite potential funding sources, and provide evidence-based arguments for the integration of housing and healthcare funding [pdf; NHC Center for Housing Policy, 2015/16]

  • How Investing in Housing Can Save on Health Care
    This research review summarizes and evaluates current research on the ability of housing interventions to impact healthcare cost savings and comments on the future of housing and health service integrations. [pdf; 2016]
  • Impacts of Affordable Housing on Health: A Research Summary
    Published by the Center for Housing Policy, this report reviews research showing how the production, rehabilitation, and other provisions of affordable housing may affect health outcomes for people of all ages. [pdf; 2015]
  • Affordable Housing’s Place in Health Care: Opportunities Created by the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid Reform
    This Center for Housing Policy report addresses how healthcare reform efforts are calling on the healthcare sector to focus more on prevention, care coordination, and the social needs of Medicaid beneficiaries. This report provides a description of how Medicaid works and cites key changes made by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) and may offer insights for better integration of housing and healthcare services. [pdf; 2015]
  • Addressing Housing as a Health Care Treatment
    This report examines accountable care organizations (ACOs), a new system of delivering healthcare coverage similar to a health insurance company, as well as coordinating health and social services. ACOs focus on preventive care and healthcare coordination to reduce costs related to expensive acute care. [pdf; 2015]

Health in Housing: Exploring the Intersection Between Housing and Health Care
This Oregon health-in-housing study explores the link between affordable housing and healthcare. Using national health reform metrics, the study found that integrating housing and healthcare led to better primary care, fewer emergency department visits, improved access to and quality of care, and lower costs. Read the full report. [pdf; Enterprise Community Partners, 2015/16] 

To Reduce Health Costs, Insurer Pays for Housing
The Texas Tribune published this article about United Healthcare’s innovative approach to supportive housing to lower healthcare costs. [url; Texas Tribune, 2015]

Hospitals Must Address Housing in Treating the Homeless
This November 2015 article in the Modern Healthcare, authored by an emergency room physician, exploring the need for healthcare providers (e.g., hospitals) to support supportive housing to reduce overall healthcare costs. [url; Modern Healthcare, 2015]

Housing as Health Care — New York’s Boundary-Crossing Experiment
This article, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, discusses New York State’s investment in supportive housing to address growing Medicaid costs. The study shows that supportive housing costs are largely offset by savings resulting from a reduced use of the healthcare system. Funding for capital, operating expenses, rent subsidies, and services are integrated to finance supportive housing units targeted to high-need, high-cost Medicaid recipients. [url; New England Journal of Medicine, 2013]

Potential for Energy Savings in Multifamily Affordable Housing
This resource documents the economic and energy savings potential by making multifamily affordable housing more energy efficient and uses data gathered from a sample of states to show estimated savings in electricity and natural gas usage generated by adoption of energy efficiency programs in multifamily affordable housing. The resource includes specific findings (and fact sheets) for Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. Read the full report. [url/pdf; Energy Efficiency for All, 2015]