Guides and reference

Written for the part of the job nobody trained you for.

Plain explanations of the HUD requirements small organizations get handed without a manual. Free, no signup, no email gate, and useful whether or not you ever run COMPASS. We update them in place when the requirements move.

Reporting and compliance

7 published

Guide How to run a CoC APR What the report asks for, how to work out when yours is actually due, and the five things that send one back. Includes a ninety day sequence built backward from the deadline. 9 min read · Updated Aug 2026 Guide HUD system performance measures, explained Your CoC files them, not you. They still decide part of your score in the local competition, and two of them pull against each other in a way nobody puts on the slide. 11 min read · Updated Aug 2026 Guide Coordinated entry assessment, explained What HUD requires, what it deliberately does not, and why the tool most communities standardized on was abandoned by the people who built it. Includes the six things an assessment may never do. 10 min read · Updated Aug 2026 Guide Documenting chronic homelessness The hardest paperwork in the sector, and the three percentage caps that decide whether your file survives a monitoring visit. You can be compliant on every file and still fail the portfolio test. 9 min read · Updated Aug 2026 Guide What changed in the FY2026 data standards The change list is long and most of it is not yours. The short version for a CoC funded organization, plus six checks on whether your system actually made the change. 8 min read · Updated Aug 2026 Guide The FY2026 CoC competition, and what happens to your grant A court vacated the notice on August 7. What that means for an expiring grant, what was in the document, and what to watch. Updated in place as the situation moves. 11 min read · Updated Aug 2026 Reference HMIS exit destination categories Four categories, one rule for telling them apart, and the single row where most agencies get it wrong. Staying with family appears twice on the list and only tenure separates the two. 7 min read · Updated Aug 2026

In the queue

Two per month

Written in this order. If you need one sooner than it is coming, say so and we will move it up.

GUIDE PIT count data collection for small organizations

GUIDE Housing stability plan template

GUIDE YHDP grant requirements

REF CoC funding cycle, month by month

Why we write these

HUD publishes thorough documentation and almost nobody reads it, because it is written to be complete rather than to be used on a Tuesday by someone with a caseload.

These pages are the other half. What the requirement is, what actually goes wrong, and what to do about it. Each one is sourced to HUD's own documents and says so at the bottom.

Tell us when we are wrong

Requirements move, local practice varies, and a page written in August is a page that will need correcting. If something here does not match what you are seeing, write to us and we will fix it rather than leaving it up.

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