What Does It Mean To Have A Place To Call Home
I recently traveled back to Michigan to visit my parents and attend my 40th high school reunion. My sister, Maureen, had agreed to be my plus-one and my driver for the evening. When she was late picking me up, I was irritated. Then she told me why.
On her way to get me, Maureen had stopped to grab a Diet Coke and noticed a man sitting off to the side of a parking lot with his dog. She suspected that he might be unhoused and went over to say hello. She asked about his dog and offered them something to eat and drink. The man, whose name was Paul, was hesitant at first, but eventually accepted a meal for himself and food for his dog, Simba. Before Maureen left, Paul asked if she would write down his phone number. He didn’t ask for hers. She told him she would check on him again.
By the time Maureen finished telling me what had happened, my irritation had disappeared. I felt embarrassed that I had been annoyed and found myself thinking about Paul and Simba throughout the evening.
The next day, Maureen went back and found them in the same place. She learned that they were living in a small tent nearby and that Paul needed to keep whatever he owned light enough to carry. When she offered to bring several cases of water, he explained that he wouldn’t be able to transport them. Dog food would help. Large quantities of water would not.
That detail struck me because even something offered with the best intentions isn’t necessarily useful if we haven’t first taken the time to understand what someone actually needs.
Paul did mention one immediate problem: his tent had torn and would soon need to be replaced. He had already done the research and knew where to find the least expensive one. Maureen offered to help, and with contributions from a few of us, we were able to purchase a new one.
I returned to Rhode Island shortly afterward, but I could not stop thinking about Paul and Simba, or about how this brief encounter had changed the way I was thinking about something that sits at the center of my work every day: home.
“Even something offered with the best intentions isn’t necessarily useful if we haven’t first taken the time to understand what someone actually needs.”
Seeing Home Through a Different Lens
I work in real estate, and much of my professional life revolves around homes. We list them, sell them, help people find them, negotiate for them, prepare them for new owners and help families move from one chapter of their lives to another. In many ways, I am in the business of transacting the roofs over our heads.
My experience in Michigan didn’t suddenly teach me that homelessness or housing insecurity exists. Of course I knew that. But Paul and Simba made something I understand professionally feel much more immediate and personal. They have become the lens through which I see things more clearly, and they made me think more broadly about what we mean when we talk about having a home.
Housing insecurity doesn’t begin when someone is sleeping outside. It can begin when a family can’t find a rental they can afford, when a homeowner falls behind on utility bills, when a heating system fails and there isn’t enough money to repair it, or when increasing housing expenses consume so much of a household budget that food, medical care or another necessity gets pushed aside.
We see some of those pressures every day in real estate. I often receive a dozen applications for one reasonably priced rental. We talk with buyers struggling with affordability and availability. We see homeowners managing increasing costs and older homeowners trying to determine how long they can reasonably maintain the homes they love. We also routinely work with people moving, downsizing or clearing homes filled with furniture and household goods they no longer need, while other people in our communities may be starting over with very little.
“Housing insecurity doesn’t begin when someone is sleeping outside.”
What we’re seeing through our work reflects a larger challenge. HousingWorks RI’s current data shows that in Southeast Rhode Island, 47% of renters are housing cost-burdened, meaning they spend more than 30% of their income on housing. The same data shows that 82% of households in the region cannot afford its median-priced home.
Numbers help put the scale of the problem in perspective, but they still represent individual people and families. They are the renter trying to compete for one reasonably priced apartment, the homeowner falling behind on utility bills, the older adult struggling to keep up with the cost of maintaining a longtime home, or the family for whom one unexpected repair can disrupt an already tight household budget.
Starting by Listening
Homes By Connect is a real estate company, not a social-service agency, and we don’t pretend to have solutions to problems this complex. But we do know something about connection. It is in our name, and it is at the heart of what we do every day as we connect buyers and sellers, clients and properties, and people with lenders, attorneys, contractors and other professionals who can help them move forward.
Paul’s story has made us start asking how we might use those connections differently.
Members of our team have begun talking about food and clothing drives, ways to connect usable furniture from homes being sold or cleared with people who need it, and the neighborhoods where our agents live and work. There are plenty of things we could do, but Paul’s experience was also a reminder that the place to begin isn’t by deciding what other people must need. It’s by asking.
Before we organize a collection, gather furniture or decide what helping should look like, we want to learn from the community organizations already doing this work. What do they need? What don’t they need? Where are the gaps? And where might the relationships and resources of a real estate company genuinely be useful?
“The place to begin isn’t by deciding what other people must need. It’s by asking.”
We are just beginning those conversations. In the meantime, one thing we can do right now is help make people aware of resources that already exist. We’ve gathered a few starting points at the end of this post.
Making Our Connections Count
If you work with or know of a local organization providing housing, food, utility, household or other basic-needs assistance, we would like to hear about it. We are especially interested in learning where there are unmet needs and where the network of people connected to Homes By Connect might be useful.
Before my sister left Paul that first day, he asked her to write down his phone number. I don’t know exactly what that meant to him, and I don’t want to presume that I do. What I do know is that the encounter has stayed with me and made me think more deeply about connection, about listening before trying to help, and about something we talk about every day in our business.
Home is much more than a property or a transaction. It is shelter and stability. It is safety, comfort and dignity. Sometimes, maintaining it depends on knowing where to turn when help is needed.
Paul and Simba have made me think differently about what it means to have a place to call home, and about how we can pay closer attention to the needs around us and make the connections we already have count for something more.
“Home is much more than a property or a transaction. It is shelter and stability. It is safety, comfort and dignity.”
If You Need Help, Start Here
As we began researching available assistance, we discovered something we think more people should know: there are already centralized resources designed to help people find the right program for their particular circumstances. You don’t necessarily have to know the name of the program you need before you start looking.
- Rhode Island 211: United Way’s 211 is the statewide starting point for trusted local social services, including housing, food, utilities and other basic needs. Rhode Islanders can call 2-1-1 or search the 211 resource database online themselves.
- Rhode Island LIHEAP: For households struggling with heating costs, Rhode Island’s Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program provides heating assistance and help during certain heating emergencies. The application period for the 2026-27 season opened October 1, and applications can be started online or through a local Community Action Agency.
- Massachusetts 211: Massachusetts residents can also call 2-1-1 for help locating housing, utility, food and other services. Mass 211 also provides online resource information, including searchable assistance for housing and utilities.
- Massachusetts HEAP: Massachusetts’ Home Energy Assistance Program helps eligible homeowners and renters pay a portion of their winter heating costs. Applications for the current heating season opened October 1 and can be submitted online or through a local administering agency.
These are starting points, not an exhaustive list. As we learn more about local organizations and the services they provide, Connect Cares will continue to share information that we believe may be useful to our Rhode Island and Southeastern Massachusetts communities.
Know an organization we should be listening to? If you work with or know of a local group providing housing, food, utility or other basic-needs help in Rhode Island or Southeastern Massachusetts, we would be grateful to hear from you. Email Katy or learn more about Connect Cares.
