Sweden’s City Missions have long experience working with Housing First and were among the first to introduce the programme together with a few municipalities about 10–15 years ago.

In 2022, the Swedish government launched a national strategy to combat homelessness (find out more here) and allocated state funding for municipalities to apply for within the framework of the strategy.

The purpose of the national homelessness strategy is to reduce homelessness and prevent people from becoming homeless. This is achieved through preventive measures, outreach work, actions against acute homelessness and investments in the Housing First method. The strategy also emphasises the role of social services in housing planning to strengthen the social perspective. The measures should be implemented regardless of the development of the housing market and do not require any legislative changes.

The third goal of the strategy states that Housing First should be implemented nationally, and the development of Housing First initiatives across the country has increased. The Swedish Housing First Hub, the only primary provider of Housing First training, has delivered training to over 100 of Sweden’s 290 municipalities and sustains itself through the state grants that municipalities allocate for training.

The National Board of Health and Welfare was commissioned by the government to map homelessness nationwide in 2023. The report provides an overview of people experiencing homelessness and can serve as a basis for long-term and effective work at the national level. The mapping is part of the agency’s assignments within the government’s national strategy to prevent and combat homelessness from 2022 to 2026. A total of 27,380 individuals over the age of 18 have been mapped in one of the four homelessness situations through two different survey collections in 2023.

Annual open comparisons are conducted across nine areas within social services, enabling the evaluation and analysis of various quality aspects. These comparisons primarily target officials, decision-makers, and politicians at the local, regional, and national levels. The latest figures indicate that approximately 80 out of 290 municipalities in Sweden are currently implementing the Housing First model.