Explaining The Health Benefits of Place Attachment for Formerly Unhoused Clients of a Furniture Assistance Program

: Although scholars have mapped the health consequences of housing insecurity as they pertain to rent burden, housing conditions, and homelessness, an overlooked aspect of housing instability’s impact on wellbeing is the experience of furniture poverty, or living in un or underfurnished dwellings. Although a few studies detail the health consequences of furniture poverty and furniture assistance, as well as the ways in which the presence of furniture supports place attachment, or the ability to form positive thoughts and feelings about one’s space, the literature remains limited and the connections between place making and health remain undertheorized. This study drew on interviews with 30 formerly unhoused clients of a furniture assistance program operating in Southern California to understand how place attachment results in improved holistic health. We found that furniture assistance makes individuals “feel at home” both within their housing and their surrounding communities. Since this dual place attachment supports ontological security, or a sense of security in one’s material and social environments, it paves the way for identity reconstruction after homelessness and the formation of new routines which enhance social, physical, financial, and mental health. As improvements to holistic health support housing stability, this research has important implications for both social scientific research at the intersections of health and housing and for policy development.