Summary

A stable, affordable, quality home is a basic human need and a bedrock of health. Whether one rents or owns, a home should provide shelter, dignity, and allow us to be a part of a community’s social, political and economic fabric. Yet, more people are unhoused than ever before, and one million renters received eviction notices last year. Half of all renter households, including those residing in formerly lower-cost rural areas, pay unaffordable rents, or more than a third of their income. That is equivalent to every household in DC, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, and North Carolina struggling with rent each month. This isn't just a housing problem; it's an urgent public health emergency.  As part of a broader effort to make housing a right for all people, rent control is a key tool to help slow rent growth, keep households and communities stable and powerful, and in doing so, protect health.

Though widely supported by voters across the political spectrum, the movement for rent control faces stiff real estate industry opposition.  The partnership of the public health field could help win passage of this important policy, and by doing so, improve health. This paper briefly presents the evidence concerning rent control and health and discusses the roles that public health practitioners and organizations can play in advancing rent control. We hope that it provides a helpful starting point for the public health field to support rent control and allows housing justice advocates to bring a health perspective to their work.

Key Findings

• Housing affordability and stability improve health by reducing financial strain and associated stress, reducing homelessness, and creating stronger, more cohesive communities.
• Rent control is an important tool  for promoting health equity because it disproportionately benefits groups who have been harmed by the continued legacy of racism and other injustices, such as Black, Indigenous, and other people of color, low-income households, families with children, women, people with disabilities, and immigrant families. Rent control can also help remedy the power imbalance between landlords and tenants — especially those facing discrimination — and allow tenants to assert their individual and collective rights.
• Public health has a critical role to play in fighting for housing justice via:
  
  • Policy Development: Framing housing as a health issue is one of the most persuasive ways to promote rent control and other housing justice policies. Public health organizations and practitioners can advocate for rent control in op-eds, reports, and public testimony, work as “insider” allies within government, help to develop, assess, and refine policy, and resource and partner with community power-building organizations.
  • Assessment : Public health organizations, including government agencies, can collect and analyze data to monitor housing instability and affordability, their effects on health and health equity, and the root causes of these issues.
  • Assurance: Public health organizations can train staff to screen for housing insecurity and connect the people they serve to legal assistance and community organizers. They can also evaluate rent control policies from a health perspective, helping to build the evidence base.  

Ready to take action?

Public health has stepped into other high-stakes policy fights — from tobacco control to environmental justice — and won. Housing stability deserves the same level of urgency and leadership, and without it, other public health interventions will struggle to take root. For more information or to connect with the movement for rent control, contact Will Dominie at Health in Partnership: Will@healthinpartnership.org.

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View: Recording of the Health Movement for Rent Control Research Release and Strategy Session HIP hosted on December 15, 2025.