On one night in late January 2025, how many of the people experiencing homelessness in the US were in families with children: about 1 in 10, about 3 in 10, or about half?
About 3 in 10. HUD counted 230,366 people in families with children among the 745,652 people experiencing homelessness that night. That is 30.9% (our arithmetic). The other 515,286 people were counted as individuals, meaning people who were not part of a household with at least one adult and at least one child under 18.
Who HUD counts as a family with children
In HUD’s count, a family with children is a household with at least one adult age 18 or older and at least one child under 18, counted together on the night of the count. Parents ages 18 to 24 and their children are included. Parents under 18 and their children are counted as individuals instead.
One detail does a lot of work here: HUD’s national figures count the people in those households, not the households. So 230,366 is a number of people on one night, not a number of families.
Most were children
Of the 230,366 people in families with children, 131,294 were under 18, or 57%. Adults ages 25 to 44 numbered 70,974, about 3 in 10 (our arithmetic). Young adults ages 18 to 24 numbered 15,507, about 7 in 100 (our arithmetic).
Where people in families slept that night
HUD counted 214,255 people in families with children in emergency shelters or transitional housing, about 93 in 100. The other 16,111 were counted in places not meant for living, which HUD describes as sidewalks, abandoned buildings, bus stations and vehicles parked for long periods.
Individuals were split far more evenly. Of the 515,286 individuals counted, 265,077 were sheltered, about half, and 250,209 were not (our arithmetic).
HUD adds its own caution: some unsheltered families are hard to find, so the actual number of unsheltered people in families with children could be larger than reported. The report does not say why families and individuals differ so much, and this page does not guess.
Down from 2024, close to 2007
HUD’s count of people in families with children fell 11% from January 2024 to January 2025, down 29,107 people from 259,473. In the same year, HUD reports, the count of individuals reached a record high.
Over the longer run, the count of people in families with children is close to where it was when HUD first reported it in 2007: 234,558 then, down 1.8% by 2025. A flat line can hide a lot of motion. Over the same span, the unsheltered count of people in families with children fell 71.3%, while the sheltered count rose 20.1%. HUD notes that national trends do not always reflect what happens locally, and this page reports these changes without explaining them.
The short version
On one night in late January 2025, HUD counted 230,366 people in families with children, about 3 in 10 of the 745,652 people experiencing homelessness in the US that night. Most of them were children, and about 93 in 100 were in a shelter or transitional housing. It is a count of people on one night. It is not a count of families, a yearly total or anyone’s personal odds.
Data limits
Counting a whole country on one January night is harder than it sounds, and HUD’s report lists the ways it can wobble. This is a point-in-time count: local Continuums of Care count people in shelters, transitional housing and places not meant for living on one night in the last 10 days of January. It counts people, not family households. It does not count families staying with relatives or friends, or families in rapid rehousing or permanent housing, and it is not a count of everyone who experiences homelessness over a year. Methods vary by year and place: each community chooses an approved method, 29 communities counted only sheltered people in 2025 and reused their 2024 unsheltered numbers, and six had permission to count in February. We compare years only where HUD prints the comparison itself (2007, 2024 and 2025), and HUD reprints the same 2024 count of people in families with children, 259,473, in both its 2024 and 2025 reports. No 2021 family count is shown because the pandemic disrupted counting.
Sources
- U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Community Planning and Development, “The 2025 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report (AHAR) to Congress, Part 1: Point-in-Time Estimates of Homelessness,” May 2026, https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2025-AHAR-Part-1.pdf (read via the Internet Archive copy; accessed Oct 19, 2026).
- U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, “The 2024 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report (AHAR) to Congress, Part 1: Point-in-Time Estimates of Homelessness,” December 2024, https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2024-AHAR-Part-1.pdf (read via the Internet Archive copy; accessed Oct 19, 2026). Used only to confirm the 2024 family count.
- The shares and “in 100” figures are our arithmetic from HUD’s printed counts. Year changes are HUD’s own printed comparisons.
Last checked: 2026-10-19, against HUD’s 2025 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report, Part 1 (May 2026).
This article was machine-checked against the sources above and has not been expert-reviewed. Spotted an error or a newer public figure? Please tell us on our contact page with the article link and we will review it.