Annual Trends Among the Unsheltered in Three Los Angeles Neighborhoods: The Los Angeles Longitudinal Enumeration and Demographic Survey (LA LEADS) 2025 Annual Report

We find no change in the number of people living on the streets in the LA LEADS study area from December 2024 through January 2026. This result contrasts with the marked declines we observed in 2024—the first and only net reductions in unsheltered homelessness our study has captured since late 2021.

Hollywood's and Venice's enumerations were statistically flat while Skid Row's ultimately returned to late 2024 levels after hovering at an all-time average high for most of 2025. Rough sleeping (i.e., living literally unsheltered, without a tent, makeshift shelter, or vehicle) continued the upward trend we observed last year and is now the most common mode of unsheltered homelessness in our study area. Relatedly, tent dwelling continued its previously observed decline. By January 2026, 44 percent of the total LA LEADS unsheltered population was sleeping rough—up from 30 percent in 2021/22. And also 90 percent of all tents were confined to Skid Row compared to 60 percent four years ago.

As we highlighted in our last study, the shift away from tent-dwelling towards rough sleeping will impede strategies to resolve unsheltered homelessness. The shift away from tent-dwelling means that encampment resolution programs like Inside Safe that offered interim housing have fewer tent dwellers to serve (Mayor Karen Bass, 2023; Mayor Karen Bass, 2026).¹ At best, housing all of the remaining roughly 150 tent-dwellers in Hollywood and Venice would represent a 10 percent change in these combined populations, leaving more than 1,200 unsheltered people who need a different housing intervention.

Skid Row is qualitatively distinct from those neighborhoods: it concentrates both the largest unsheltered population and the population with the highest rates of self-reported chronic physical and behavioral health conditions, has the greatest outreach intensity and benefit enrollment levels, and remains the sole area with a substantial share of tent dwelling. This last feature makes it the only area in our study where encampment-targeted interventions may still have latitude to affect unsheltered homelessness. But achieving such a goal would also require concurrent scaling of low-barrier behavioral health (i.e., mental health and substance use treatments) and long-term supportive housing to result in durable progress.

Beyond the logistical shift of fewer encampments, we highlight two persistent barriers to progress. Clinically, service providers will face more stress as more of their clients are rough sleepers—a group our survey data show have elevated average acuity levels compared to tent and vehicle dwellers. Tactically, outreach teams will become less efficient as clients become more geographically diffuse and harder to find.

Finally, survey questions added in 2025 indicate high levels of dwelling losses due to enforcement, sanitation, or other displacement—both in general and specifically among rough sleepers. This finding suggests that previously observed correlations between falling tent counts and rising rough sleeper counts may indeed be causal; i.e., that tent confiscation is contributing to meaningful numbers of people going from of having some shelter to none at all. That said, in Skid Row—but only Skid Row—those who lost dwellings were also significantly more likely to report a subsequent offer of shelter or housing. This pattern suggests both that housing offers are being made during encampment resolutions—per city policy (Mayor Karen Bass, 2022)—but also that such offers are reactive to enforcement rather than part of preventive outreach. In all cases, given that all our respondents were by definition not sheltered/housed, any such offers that were accepted did not result in durable long-term housing stabilization. Hence, beyond updating outreach protocols, better approaches to keeping people indoors are likely necessary.

The Questions We Answer

• How has the number of unsheltered people and their dwelling modalities changed month-to-month between late 2021 and early 2026?
• How do neighborhood-level unsheltered populations differ demographically, and in acuity, service access, housing interest and homelessness experiences?
• Do those who lose their dwellings receive offers of housing or shelter?
• What lessons do these three neighborhoods offer for homeless service needs throughout LA County?

The Approach We Used to Answer Our Research Questions

We conducted bi-monthly street enumerations (six per neighborhood; 115 total across the study) with specific tallies of tents, vehicles, makeshift shelters, and rough sleepers, complemented by an annual cross-sectional survey (193 respondents in 2025) of demographics, health, service receipt, homelessness experiences, and dwelling loss and housing offers.

We then conducted regression-based time series analyses of population inferences, subgroup comparisons across neighborhoods, and multivariable models linking demographic and clinical characteristics to different service aspects (e.g., cell phone access and housing offers). We also examined the linkage between dwelling loss and offers of shelter or housing.

Key Findings

Despite reductions driven by tent-targeted interventions documented in our previous study, overall levels of unsheltered homelessness in our three study neighborhoods have leveled off and the composition has further shifted toward rough sleeping and vehicle (particularly car/van-based) dwelling—groups historically less responsive to encampment-resolution strategies.

This finding is important because rough sleepers present greater clinical need across a broad array of indicators, are harder to locate and engage, and frequently lack documentation or phones, creating large practical barriers to housing placement. Vehicle dwellers may need less intensive support than rough sleepers to exit homelessness, but many resist surrendering their vehicle, which provides shelter, mobility, privacy, and safety, in exchange for temporary interim housing. Thus, continued reliance on tent-focused homelessness resolution approaches will likely yield diminishing returns, especially in Hollywood and Venice, where these living arrangements are now uncommon.

The Overall Number of Unsheltered Homeless People Remained Steady in 2025

• The total level of unsheltered homelessness across the three neighborhoods was statistically unchanged between December 2024 and January 2026.
• Hollywood and Venice were statistically flat after prior declines in 2024. Skid Row was the only neighborhood of the three whose unsheltered population has grown continuously since 2021/22.
• Rough sleeping increased (+20 percent, +250 people), tent dwelling declined (−23 percent, −310 people), and vehicle dwelling rose (+11 percent, +90 people) during 2025.

Since 2021, Tents Have Declined by Half, and Were Largely Replaced by Vehicles and Rough Sleepers

• The LA LEADS area saw a nonlinear evolution in unsheltered homelessness ultimately corresponding to a net decline of approximately 14 percent driven exclusively by reductions in tent dwellings (–55 percent since September 2021).
• For every four tents removed, however, approximately three vehicles or rough sleepers were added on average each day, leaving a transformed population with substantially fewer tents and more people living in cars/vans/RVs or literally unsheltered. This inversion is especially pronounced in Hollywood.
• By January 2026, 87 percent of tents remaining in our study areas were located in Skid Row (up from 60 percent in 2021-22), limiting the remaining opportunities for encampment-focused interventions.

Skid Row Remains the Highest Need Population, Followed by Hollywood, Then a Younger and More Transient Population in Venice

• Barriers to service and housing are common and include very low formal employment (3–9 percent), limited cash resources (median monthly incomes of $200 to $378), and a widespread lack of needed documentation and cellphones.
• Outreach intensity and material/service delivery were concentrated in Skid Row. Participants in Skid Row with chronic mental health conditions received more housing offers and dwelling loss from enforcement strongly predicted receiving such offers; this was not the case in Hollywood and Venice.

Recommendations for Government Agencies and Other Stakeholders

• City of Los Angeles / LA County Department of Homeless Services and Housing (HSH) / Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA): Pivot from tent-centric encampment resolution to a more mixed approach. Expand low barrier permanent supportive housing (PSH) with integrated behavioral health, expand rapid rehousing and employment supports for areas with lower acuity populations such as Venice, and continue the use of targeted interim housing options where tents persist.
• Homeless system funders / outreach providers / service agencies: As street outreach will likely become less efficient and effective given prevailing dwelling modalities outside of Skid Row, creating and guiding clients to centralized hub-like services (e.g., Access Centers) may be a better path forward. Provide integrated services at these access centers, including documentation and benefit assistance, phones, hygiene resources, employment assistance, daytime respite, transportation and behavioral/physical health care. Outreach may encompass transportation to these centers rather than provision of services on the streets. While street outreach teams may still be helpful, the goal would be to centralize resource access to create efficiencies. Embedding “housing matchers” with real-time bed availability at each hub would facilitate immediate placement.
• Behavioral health systems / Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Prevention and Control: As has happened on Skid Row, invest in co-located, low barrier SUD and mental health treatment options for high acuity populations outside of it; prioritize follow through on offers made to such individuals.
• City enforcement / sanitation units: Decisionmakers should base encampment resolution/other policies on the nature/number of available alternative dwelling places (e.g., safe camping and interim housing beds). Policies that simply resolve designated encampments or clear proscribed zones are likely to produce “move-along” outcomes that disrupt care and document retention, reducing positive results for all stakeholders.
• Funders / philanthropic partners: Subsidize technology access (basic phones, data plans, charging stations), mobile documentation clinics, and short-term income supports to reduce administrative barriers to program entry and housing placements.
• Data and evaluation leads: Maintain high-frequency enumerations in targeted zones to monitor modality shifts, evaluate whether offers following dwelling loss result in durable exits, and test pilots that directly address rough sleepers and vehicle dwellers.
• Research community: Study mechanisms linking enforcement, displacement, and housing offers. Evaluate the cost-effectiveness of PSH versus rapid rehousing tailored to participant profiles (e.g., the “acuity-environment fit”). Analyze long-term outcomes for placements initiated after dwelling loss versus those initiated through proactive outreach.

In conclusion, our counts and surveys indicate that Los Angeles's unsheltered population has shifted in ways that imply strict limits to the future efficacy of prior encampment-focused approaches. Addressing the remaining population will require participant-tailored mixes of low-barrier behavioral health, housing and shelter modalities, and operational reforms that enhance contact efficiency and reduce displacements not accompanied by immediate options for housing or shelter.