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

Chapter Three. Characteristics of Counseling
Agencies
It is generally understood that the housing counseling industry is marked by incredible diversity in
organizational types. In some cases the delivery of housing counseling is the primary mission of the
organization, but in many cases these services may be ancillary to the agency’s primary mission. In
addition, not all agencies offer the full spectrum of housing counseling services. In particular, a large
share of agencies focus on homeownership-related counseling and do not serve significant numbers of
rental or homeless clients. Finally, agencies vary substantially in size.
The goal of this chapter is to provide systematic information on the characteristics of counseling
agencies, including their organizational missions, the range of services they offer, and how housing
counseling fits within their broader objectives and organizational structures. Having identified the
organizations in the industry, the next chapter explores the relationship between counseling agencies
and the national and regional intermediary organizations and state housing finance agencies (SHFAs)
that support the housing counseling industry.
Organizational Mission and Services Provided
Primary Mission of Counseling Agencies
The counseling agency survey asked agencies to select from 11 categories the term that best described
the primary mission of their organization. As shown in Exhibit 3-1, a majority of agencies identify
their primary mission as housing counseling, neighborhood or community development, or
community action agency.
Based on these findings, we collapsed the 11 categories into 5 agency mission types:
• Housing counseling (includes “housing counseling”);
• Housing/neighborhood development (includes “housing stabilization” and
“neighborhood and community development”);
• Social service (includes “community action agency,” “anti-poverty agency,” “economic
development,” and “human services organization”);
• Consumer credit (includes “consumer credit counseling”); and
• Legal assistance (includes “legal services” and “fair housing”).
Exhibit 3-2 shows the breakdown of agencies into these categories. The largest share of agencies (36
percent) has a primary mission of housing/neighborhood development, followed by social service,
and housing counseling. The smallest categories of agencies were those whose primary mission was
consumer credit counseling (6 percent) and legal assistance (4 percent). However, as described in
Appendix B, none of the more than 130 branches of a national intermediary specializing in consumer
Chapter 3. Characteristics of Counseling Agencies 25