Homelessness fell 26% in Montgomery County from last year, according to a recent survey. The decrease for families experiencing homelessness was even steeper, at 47%.

This year’s numbers stand in marked contrast to the county’s previous survey, which found a 32% increase in unhoused people living within its borders in 2025 compared to 2024.

County officials attribute much of this change to the Short-term Housing Resolution Program. The county program, launched last year, gives individuals and families experiencing homelessness security deposits, first month’s rent and additional rent subsidies for up to a year.

The program has helped more than 300 households since it launched in 2025.

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That’s more than 1,000 adults and children “who have stability of a home again, which is an incredible success,” Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich said in a media briefing Thursday. “It gives families breathing [room] to live while they stabilize their lives, and they’re living in a home rather than a shelter or motel.”

It’s also cheaper, according to Elrich. Today, the county is putting up 60 families in shelters and hotels. In July 2025, that number was more than 150.

Elrich is recommending a one-time increase of $2 million for SHaRP in his budget proposal for fiscal year 2027. He also is recommending a decrease in motel funding to support this increase.

Last year, the SHaRP program received about $13 million.

Christine Hong, the county’s director of Services to End and Prevent Homelessness, said that, although the SHaRP program isn’t considered traditional case management, the county checks in with families after they are placed in stable housing to ensure they are not at risk of losing it.

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“I’m really proud of our county for making that commitment, not only to ensure that no family with children would sleep outside but also to ensure that we would house them quickly, so that their experience of homelessness would be as short as possible,” she said.

The count

An analysis released Monday by Community Solutions, a national nonprofit founded to combat homelessness, found that, although rates have been high and rising across the country over the past several years, they may be stabilizing. The report estimates a roughly 2% decline in total homelessness since 2024.

The county’s new numbers come from its annual point-in-time count, which was conducted Feb. 4 to provide a snapshot of the number of people experiencing homelessness, according to the county’s Department of Health and Human Services. Led by volunteers and nonprofits, teams look for people experiencing homelessness under bridges, in wooded areas and other places where they seek shelter.

Although it’s just an estimate — officials said the survey tends to undercount the true number of people experiencing homelessness — it helps the county decide how to invest in programs to get unhoused people into housing.

Montgomery County’s survey is conducted in partnership with the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments, which compares results across the D.C. region. The council’s 2026 report has not been released, but county officials expect it in the next few weeks. Other member jurisdictions haven’t publicly released their numbers yet.

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According to the county’s report, 1,117 people — 742 individuals and 375 people living with their families — were identified as homeless in Montgomery County during the Feb. 4 count. Within this group, 53 people were 18-24 and 45 were veterans.

Montgomery County’s improvement marks a stark reversal from last year, when it had the largest increase in the number of people experiencing homelessness from 2024 to 2025 among the jurisdictions in the regional report.

“Just a year ago, we were facing an 80% surge in family homelessness because of post-pandemic economic instability, the eroding safety net, the fact that rents are still too high, and [because] the number of evictions has been rising,” Elrich said.

Not all the trends in the county’s new survey were positive.

It saw a 14% increase in chronic homelessness, which Hong said could be attributed to a shortage of housing for individual adults.

“This is some of the work we have yet to do,” Hong said.