Housing &Â
Wellness
Using trauma-informed and person-centered approaches, our Housing & Wellness team of case managers and Clinical Social Workers provide developmentally and culturally responsive services focusing on immediate safety as well as long-term support to help young people achieve stability, independence, and overall well-being.
If you’re a young person impacted by homelessness, learn more about the free resources, care, and community My Friend's Place offers.
AVAILABLE SERVICES
Housing & Wellness offers young people a range of services and support to address their immediate, midterm, and long-term goals. We don't wait for housing to invest in young people's futures. We keep them connected to services and support their growth while they wait for a housing opportunity.Â
CaseÂ
Management
Our low-barrier approach is designed to meet young people where they are in order to address their immediate and emerging needs. A case manager can provide immediate referrals and connect young people to housing, mental health, substance use, physical health, legal, and other resources.Â
Mental Health
Services
Many of the young people we serve have experienced complex childhood traumas. Many have had severe and persistent exposure to multiple traumatic events — often within the caregiving system — that have impacted their development and sense of the world. With this understanding, we foster attachment, teach and role model emotional regulation, and build life skills and competencies.
To support healing, our team offers:Â
- Psychoeducation
- Conflict resolution
- Interpersonal counseling and social skills development
- Stress reduction and coping skills
- Emotional regulation tools
- Individual, group, and family counseling, when appropriate
- Substance abuse education
In addition, led by our team of Clinical Social Workers, we offer weekly social-emotional learning groups that support young people in their development of self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision making.
Housing SUPPORT:Â
Placement and
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Retention
Our team works within the Coordination Entry System to secure housing options. Our case management support is all encompassing and addresses a host of needs beyond housing to ensure a young person's success.
As hard as it is to secure housing, for some young people it's even harder to maintain it. For many young people, this is the first time that they are living alone, so we provide home visits and continued support to build life skills, help adjust to a new community, manage isolation, and more.
Crisis
Intervention
For some, the stress of young adulthood and homelessness results in heightened crises. Our highly trained team supports crisis resolution in ways that focus on meaningful opportunities for personal growth.
Documentation
Support
Our team helps young people secure documentation needed for housing, education, and employment readiness such as IDs, birth certificates, income verification, and school transcripts. When young people first become homeless, it’s common for them to lose access to important documentation, which can be a major roadblock in gaining employment and housing.
Partner Provider
Services
In addition to our core services, we work with multiple community partners to provide education, prevention, and treatment options for the following wellness needs:
- Physical health
- Mental health
- Sexual health
- Substance use
- Parenting and pregnancy support and referrals
These 2025 stats reflect real moments of growth, connection, and hope.
Insights
Discover our latest thinking, research, and data on addressing and ending youth homelessness.
Drop-in centers are safe havens for youth experiencing homelessness. We examine drop-in centers within a positive youth development (PYD) framework to explore the role social connections with staff on the psychosocial development and stability of youth experiencing homelessness.
Read More
In this episode of Foster Care, Adoption, and Beyond: Untold Stories, Christian Quijano of My Friend’s Place and Chino Quinlan of the LA LGBT Center share powerful stories of resilience and insight into how dedicated staff and lived experience drive real change.
When I walked through the front door of My Friend’s Place, I honestly didn’t feel homeless anymore. I felt like I was going to be able to get the help that I needed."
