Housing Counseling Process Evaluation and Design of ... - HUD User

“Funds for administrative responsibilities, such as marketing and community outreach,
should be made available to a greater degree. It is very costly to market and reach the clients
who desperately need assistance.” (Neighborhood development agency in CT)
The agency survey asked agencies to identify the most common sources of client referrals for each
type of counseling service, with a maximum of three sources identified. Exhibit 7-1 shows the share
of agencies identifying each type of outreach as among their most common source of clients.
Averaging across all types of counseling services, the most common ways of reaching clients are
passive. The single most common form is word of mouth (65 percent of agencies), followed by either
the HUD or agency web site (49 percent). One agency commented that it viewed the listing on
HUD’s web site as one of the biggest benefits of HUD approval: “participation as a HUD-approved
counseling agency… has facilitated referrals of many consumers to our program” (legal services
organization in ME). Other passive sources of clients were also fairly common, including referrals
from other non-profit organizations (34 percent), referrals from financial institutions (31 percent),
and, less commonly, referrals from government agencies (20 percent). Only 41 percent of agencies
report that responses to outreach or marketing are among the 3 most common sources of clients.
There were some notable variations in the most common sources of referrals by the type of
counseling service:
• HUD or agency web sites are most common as sources for delinquency and HECM
counseling.
• Marketing and outreach is most commonly used for all types of workshops, with 52
percent of agencies reporting these efforts as one of the three most important sources of
workshop participants compared to 33 percent of agencies reporting these efforts as
important for all types of counseling clients. As one agency noted: “We currently do not
market one-on-one counseling for fear of not having the time and resources. We get
these clients mostly by referral or from clients finding us though the various web sites”
(Community action agency in ME).
• Renter and homeless clients are much more likely to be referred by other non-profits and
government agencies and least likely to be referred through the Internet.
• Financial institutions are an important source of referrals for HECM clients, pre-purchase
clients, and other homeowner clients.
• HECM clients are the least likely to be referred by word of mouth, followed by
delinquency counseling.
As will be discussed further in Chapter 9 on Policy Considerations, the issue of client outreach is an
important one for the industry. To the extent that counseling can help households make better
housing choices, it is important that they are aware of the availability of this assistance to be able to
obtain advice and guidance early in their decision-making process.
98
Chapter 7. Client Characteristics and Outcomes