Summary
What do they do? THC operates supportive housing. This report isolates a proposed supplemental room-cleaning and repair crew. A 2026 city review reports a historical average of 73 days against a 21-day turnover target; that flags a question to investigate, not 52 causally avoidable days. More
Why this approach interests us
- A small repair bottleneck may prevent an otherwise usable room from housing someone sooner.
Our main reservations
- Observed delay is not proven removable with donations, and health gains from a few earlier weeks are uncertain.
What do you get for your dollar?
Our central analyst estimate is $46.8M per better life (10 QALYs). We model an additional cleaning/repair crew shortening a move-in delay, not the value of the entire housing program. This narrow tranche does not look like a leading health-only donation on current assumptions.
- central estimate
- $46.8M — per 10 QALYs; short-horizon health hypothesis
- positive scenarios
- $1.17M–$4.17B — Null/harm also possible
- turnover allowance
- $2,500 — Hypothetical supplemental labor and supplies
- funding room
- Unverified — Public and landlord obligations need reconciliation
1. What do they do?
THC operates supportive housing. This report isolates a proposed supplemental room-cleaning and repair crew. A 2026 city review reports a historical average of 73 days against a 21-day turnover target; that flags a question to investigate, not 52 causally avoidable days.
Find a repair-limited room
Identify whether cleaning, landlord repairs, inspection, staffing or referral demand is the actual constraint.
Complete authorized safe work
An incremental crew must shorten the critical path without bypassing habitability or inspection requirements.
Verify net earlier housing
Count only reduced time in a worse setting, not an earlier room-ready date or a swap with another available placement.
Scope of this review. The separately reported 12-day referral-to-move-in interval is not added to the cleaning gap. Occupancy and retention are operational measures, not separate causal health benefits.
2. Monitoring and information sharing
Existing supportive-housing operations
City contract performance review. Cleaning/repair turnaround exceeds the stated target.
Our assessment. No randomized repair acceleration, verified donor-sized gap or causal health outcome.
Homeless adults with mental illness
External randomized housing study. Improved housing stability without an established generic-quality-of-life improvement.
Our assessment. A generic 0–100 score cannot simply be divided by 100 and called utility.
Charlotte supportive-housing participants
External nonrandom mapped-utility study. One-year adjusted mapped utility difference around .0824.
Our assessment. Selection, mapping and horizon differ; not an immediate benefit coefficient for a few weeks.
3. Qualitative assessment
A small repair bottleneck may prevent an otherwise usable room from housing someone sooner.
Key reservations
- The 73-versus-21-day gap may reflect constraints a donation cannot resolve.
- Alternative vacancies can eliminate net additional housing days.
- Health improvement from housing is not guaranteed.
- This health-only model excludes dignity, financial and broader housing benefits.
Benefits not included in our estimate
- Full annual supportive-housing contract as marginal turnover cost
- Additional one-year housing-health benefit after the counterfactual move-in date
- Referral speed, retention and occupancy counted as separate causal benefits
- Legal defense, rent-subsidy and other providers' housing benefits
- Unsafe acceleration before required inspections
4. What do you get for your dollar?
Central scenario: $46.8M per 10 QALYs.
We model one occupant-equivalent per accelerated turnover—not the portfolio unit count as beneficiaries. The modeled health benefit ends on the date the person would otherwise have moved in. We do not award a full extra year of housing for a few weeks of acceleration.
A better life is our comparison unit of 10 additional quality-adjusted life years (QALYs), potentially spread across people. These are uncertain estimates, not measured returns or verified donation offers.
How we calculate the estimate
DOLLARS PER BETTER LIFE: 10 × $2,500 ÷ (26/365 × .75 × .5 × .02)
$46,794,872 per 10 QALYs
Model inputs and assumptions
- Supplemental crew allowance
- 2500 (range: 1000 / 2500 / 5000). Assumed 32 loaded labor hours at $60 plus $580 supplies/coordination = $2,500 per offered turnover in extra acceleration effort, not ordinary cleaning already funded. Not a THC quote; include unsuccessful repairs and overhead. Analyst assumption informed by context.
- Potentially accelerated days
- 26 (range: 52 / 26 / 7). 26-day judgment is half the observed FY2024–25 gap between 73-day room cleaning/repair and 21-day target. Target is not a counterfactual and does not prove money removes any of the delay. Analyst assumption informed by context.
- Net earlier occupancy realization
- 0.75 (range: 1 / 0.75 / 0.5). 75% assumed fraction of nominal room-days translating into less time in a worse setting, not merely earlier availability or substitution for another available room. Referral delays are separate. Analyst assumption informed by context.
- Additional funded work
- 0.5 (range: 0.75 / 0.5 / 0.25). 50% subjective retention after public/landlord replacement and other planned repairs. Keep separate from occupancy realization; neither is verified. Analyst assumption informed by context.
- Health utility while housed earlier
- 0.02 (range: 0.08 / 0.02 / 0.005). 0.02 subjective gain during the short accelerated interval. Housing stability does not establish a health-utility effect. External randomized generic-quality-of-life results caution toward null; no immediate transfer of a one-year nonrandom mapped estimate. Analyst assumption informed by context.
Illustrative $100,000: 0.0214 additional QALYs; capacity unverified
- Favorable positive: $1.17M per 10 QALYs. 0.855 QALYs per $100,000
- Central analyst estimate: $46.79M per 10 QALYs. 0.0214 QALYs per $100,000
- Unfavorable positive: $4.17B per 10 QALYs. 0.000240 QALYs per $100,000
Uncertainty. Null if money cannot resolve the bottleneck, another equivalent room was available, public/landlord funds replace the gift, or earlier occupancy brings no health improvement. Signed negative utility preserves harm. Positive scenarios are not a confidence interval.
5. Funding and previous grants
No verified incremental crew offer or causal room-to-occupancy schedule.
The full public contract is context, not a quote for this proposed tranche. Additionality must exclude work public or landlord funds would already pay for.
This review does not establish a verified marginal funding offer or a complete history of grants.
We have not verified a suitable donation route for this reviewed activity. Confirm the legal recipient and intended allocation before donating.
6. Sources
- THC supportive housing agreement review. San Francisco Budget and Legislative Analyst. Observed room-turnover bottleneck and public contract context; no marginal causal estimate. Published: 2026-05-27; retrieved: 2026-09-07.
- Housing and intensive case-management randomized trial. Stergiopoulos et al. / JAMA. Housing improved; generic quality-of-life effect not established. Score is not a QALY utility. Published: 2015-03-03; retrieved: 2026-09-07.
- Housing First Charlotte–Mecklenburg outcomes report. UNC Charlotte Urban Institute. Nonrandom one-year mapped utility result; contextual, not a few-week SF coefficient. Published: 2020; retrieved: 2026-09-07.
Annual expenses: years and sources
Average annual expenses (three consecutive fiscal years): $67,967,074. Organization size is separate from the modeled cost-effectiveness of a donation.
Tenderloin Housing Clinic Inc
Whole legal entity Form 990 Part IX total functional expenses; latest original reconstructed filings checked, fiscal-end year from printed reporting dates. Older fallback rows from IRS extracted API.
Latest original filings checked; ProPublica extracted API lags these original returns.