Hidden homeless: U.S. families living in motel rooms
March 11, 2009
by: Erik Eckholm
Costa Mesa, CA: Greg Hayworth, 44, graduated from Syracuse University and made a good living in his home state, California, from real estate and mortgage finance. Then that business crashed, and early last year the bank foreclosed on the house he was renting, forcing his family’s eviction.
Now the Hayworths and their three children represent a new face of homelessness in Orange County: formerly middle income, living week to week in a cramped motel room.
“I owe it to my kids to get out of here,” Hayworth said, recalling the night they saw a motel neighbor drag a half-naked woman out the door while he beat her.
As the recession has deepened, long-time workers who lost their jobs are facing the terror and stigma of homelessness for the first time, including those who have owned or rented for years. Some show up in shelters and on the streets, but others, like the Hayworths, are the hidden homeless — living doubled up in apartments, in garages or in motels, uncounted in U.S. homeless data and often receiving little public aid.
