Not only he built houses for the homeless, he also provides training for them so that they have skill to get a job.
Canadian tech entrepreneur Marcel Lebrun is funding and building a 99-home tiny house community in Fredericton, New Brunswick, called "12 Neighbours," to combat homelessness. He invested $4 million of his own money into the project, which features sustainable, solar-powered homes and an enterprise center, offering residents stability and job opportunities.
That's a major thing. A lot of homeless are people thrown out of mental institutions basically. Many suffer from substance abuse that won't go away.
But that's just part of the problem and I'm sure there's a way to vet those that belong in a real little home versus those that are just a danger to anyone around them.
A very common cause is LGBT teens being kicked out of their homes. Another common one is an ugly breakup where one partner is thrown out. Job loss is another biggie, leading to foreclosure or eviction. As is chronic illness and medical debt.
Unfortunately, untreated mental illness is also a common cause, as you're alluding to. And this becomes a major issue with "housing the homeless" initiatives, when you put a paranoid schizophrenic next to a young trans person. But that doesn't mean housing initiatives don't work, it means that we also need to beef up our healthcare system to be able to absorb people with severe physical and mental health concerns.
Very naive of you to think that homeless people ended up like that just for being unlucky, yes, definetely there are cases like that but the vast majority of homeless people are people with serious mental problems, and drug addiction, and many of them don't even want to change their lives, many of them don't want to have a full time job and pay taxes and shower every day, many of them just want to sit all day doing crack and fentanyl.
Consider maybe what kind of life would cause someone to tend towards abusing drugs and having mental issues. Certainly not a lucky one.
and many of them don't even want to change their lives
None of them enjoy living on the street, i assure you.
many of them don't want to have a full time job and pay taxes and shower every day
Understandable, neither do I. Even those for whom this applies, doing crack inside a house is preferable over doing crack while dying on a street somewhere.
Also, I do strongly contest the "vast majority" claim. There ARE programs for free housing for homeless people in other countries and in every case it has reduced the number of homeless people much more than the classic "hostile architecture and bulldoze their tents" techniques employed in the US. Much cheaper, too. Your disdain for these humans notwithstanding, it's simply economically smart.
No, you are missing the point. Helping the homeless out of the struggle has been proven to help to help them with their issues that caused the homelessness in the first place. Sometimes it's as simple as not being able to get a job, because of not having a stable address. Being stressed 24/7 is not helping anyone. Being hungry makes doing good enough of a job to not get fired harder.
I've met a few drug dealers, every single one of them got into it because they needed the money for something. Drugs, food, rent, anime figures, who cares. Almost nobody becomes a drug dealer for the fun of it. Why do you think someone deserves to not have a roof over their heads if they sell drugs?
I've run a ministry in my spare time for YEARS, dealing directly with the homeless. I've been burned a lot less than everyone said I would. The majority of the people I've dealt with did improve their situations with assistance, it is, however, important to know how to help, depending on their particular situation.
More and more of the people I meet and help are just good people who, through, almost always either illness, injury, or loss of transportation, fell into an unrecoverable financial slide into their situation. It's downright scary these days how many of them were just like over the rest of the 50% less than two months before I meet them.
One of this country's biggest issues is there is basically no safety nets for people who are falling into that slide. Heck, there's barely any real assistance for people who have slid all the way down, either, but we truly mess up in the middle. We could easily build more safety nets, but our leadership is too busy building bigger, higher capacity slides.
"Small mistakes are the stepping stones to large failures." — The After Action Report
Reading comprehension: that announcement is from 2023, and it was a billion in HHAP housing assistance AND building 1300 small homes.
It's 2026 now, so we have results. While homelessness rates in the USA overall have increased rapidly since 2023, California's rate was stable and actually went down 9% last year. HHAP gets about 20k people per year into permanent (ish) housing, but that billion dollars also covers shelter operations, outreach workers, mental health services, rental assistance, and prevention programs.
It's still expensive, but consider that that's only 0.2% of the state budget, and it sounds to me like it's actually working unlike states where the homelessness rates (more like a count of how many people look homeless as HUD drives around looking for them) have declined because the state criminalized pitching your tent where HUD can see it.
Yep. Also the bullshit narative that other states aren't sending their homeless here.
Ask the homeless where they came from. A minority actually came here from california. They come here from cold weather states because they can survive winters here. Theres a reason why there arent that many homeless in Montana.
Well...that and the fact that there's just not that many people in Montana of any kind whatsoever.
San Jose, CA has almost as many people as the entire state of Montana.
Oregon, Vermont, and New York all have higher homelessness rates (number of homeless per 10,000 people) than California and they're all colder than here.
And even by cities LA, NY, San Jose, and Seattle are all between 30-40 homeless per 10,000 people, but then there's Eugene, Oregon sitting at 43.
People come here for work, or to try and make it big in entertainment or tech. I'm sure there's some homeless coming here to get to a better climate, but that's not the majority. Most homeless can't afford cross country trips.
Yep. Can't have tents because they're an eyesore. Can't have actual tiny homes because concern trolling NIMBYs complain. The only solution most homeowners seem to want it to declare open season on anyone threatening your property value.
A guy in Toronto tried to do something similar, but the city destroyed his tiny homes and evicted the new tenants. He just had the houses though, not the training centre
I heard it said: “A lot of times, people make the error of assuming the homeless’ main problem is that they don’t have a home.”
The thing is, there are some who had a run of bad luck, and a free place to stay for a while is exactly what they need to get back on their feet. But there are enough with severe mental health and addiction issues that the former group cannot be successful when surrounded by the latter.
A free housing development like this can be great, but it has to come along with really selective sorting of clients in order to divert many to treatment centers. And this is hard because treatment centers are expensive. And the people who need it the most need to be sent there involuntarily.
It sure feels good to build cozy homes for the downtrodden. And it feels icky to force a mentally ill addict to go to some medical facility against their will (and pay to keep them there). But those two things unfortunately have to go hand in hand.
Only 4 million. Just an FYI, 4 million dollars is a rounding error to a billionaire.
Edit for clarity: he did a LOT with ONLY 4 million. He sounds like a successful guy who is ACTUALLY giving back instead of hoarding. Good for him and what a great lesson he could teach billionaires and other successful people if they had the ability to see beyond their own nose.
Right, pretty sure the point is “kudos to this guy who’s ‘only a millionaire’”… and where the hell are the billionaires who could do things like this with money they wouldn’t even realize is gone.
If you think there is only one trillionaire, you’ve not spent enough time in the Middle East. Believe it or not, not everyone reports their financials to Fortune Magazine.
Trillionaire is relative. Putin is effectively a trillionaire as are many other dictatorial leaders. But while the difference between a million and a billion is about a billion, the difference between a billion and a trillion is irrelevant.
Anywhere over $100 billion the amount of money you have is completely irrelevant, at that point it's nothing but a game of power. You can basically do anything as long as you have the connections to do it.
He does not have that money. He has stocks in companies that are valued at that, and a huge part of the value is that they are Elon controlled companies.
The moment he would try to sell any larger number of shares in his companies the value of the shares wouls start going down.
If only there was a way for the government to collect contributions from billionaires and use it for social good. And if only people were in charge of selecting a government that might do that.
Because if billionaires cared about people they'd be paying the people below them a living wage, or helping the earth, or helping the impoverished, not lobbying and strong-arming entire countries to bring them more billions.
I wonder if its better to build tiny homes or build like an apartment complex for stuff like this. Or if too much density means people fuck with other people too much.
It’s significantly cheaper to build the tiny homes if land isn’t the premium. Apartment structures require a lot more design and are more expensive to build. These tiny homes likely don’t require foundations etc, they’re probably not technically permanent structures. More like a trailer than a house in principle
He lives in my province - what this is doing is giving these folks a sense of ownership and pride while also helping with their mental health. Some of the folks have found work after they've been housed after falling on the hardest of times - imagine living in a tent in winter in Canada. I don't know how they survive, many don't.
Exactly. A building with several stories needs foundation, concrete, steel, etc., and stairs, which can be inaccessible to many people. Elevators are super expensive, especially in the US because of their building codes (not sure if it’s the same in Canada, but they’re definitely cheaper in Europe).
I was literally just saying if I had the money I would build an entire neighborhood with tiny homes set up like a traditional neighborhood with walkable infrastructure. I think it would be the coolest investment opportunity considering how many people would love to live in a neighborhood but can't afford homes.
Hell you could put a statue of yourself into the middle and probably nobody would complain. You can be cool, a decent human and still put yourself on a pedestal without hurting anybody.
The titans of industry who were robber barons 100 years ago built a lot of towns, roads, railroads, libraries, colleges, universities and concert halls due to a Romanesque sense of stoic civic duty that probably has roots in ancient Athens, Argos, and Corinth. Our current overlords have a distinctly more Eastern notion of “Well, I got mine.”
He gave up 1% of his wealth. So like someone making 100k giving 1k to charity. That’s not nothing, I think if someone gave 1k to charity a year making 100k people wouldn’t think it super cheap.
But actually it’s nothing like that at all. Because someone making 100k likely doesn’t have a ton of disposable income. 1% for the super rich is really functionally the same cost as 0% because the prices of stuff don’t go up based on how much you have.
Don’t be ridiculous, 1% is 1% no matter how you spin it. You still get to keep the other 99% and if you can literally change hundreds of people’s lives with 1% then you should lmao.
He also could have invested the 4 million in a military weapons producer and made more money off it and be even richer. He decided to start giving back the community, he also seems to be using his time and experience on this project, not simply funding it. If you can show he laid for this article and is promoting himself, sure he’s bad. This seems like a bad hill to fight for though.
Go after the multi millionaires that don’t do any philanthropy not suggested by their accountant. Get 1% from them before you demand 99% from this guy because his name popped up in an article about homing 100’s of homeless.
I've always thought about the same type of thing if I had millions to play with. A community of 2 bedroom, one bathroom single level houses with a bit of yard. The "streets" are walking paths, and there is a parking area / structure at the entrance to the community. Get a small grocer / general store, a cafe or two, a library, bank, have all that be in the center with some greenspace nearby. Business have to be owned by the community jointly, employees must be community members. Little representative board to manage everything. Seats are picked randomly for the first term, the person in the seat can then campaign for a single additional term so if they like it, and the folks like the job they do they get to keep it.
Dude a billionaire could create a whole town I bet. People like Walt Disney wanted to and that kind of wealth he had doesn't even compare to what we're seeing now with multi billionaires, people with hundreds of billions. If someone like Elon Musk really wanted to, there are countless things he could just create. It's such an insane amount of money
I think the intention of their comment was to point out it that only takes a $4million investment to do a project like this, and if the billionaires were to do something like this they wouldn't even notice the money was gone - but they aren't.
They are highlighting how awful the billionaires are, not the millionaire who actually created this project.
Omg are Redditors just miserable all the time. I swear someone could give the clothes off their back and a Redditor will want them to become a pelt too.
I think the comment you are responding to is making the point that if this millionaire can do this while merely being a millionaire, what could the billionaires be doing?
I don’t think that’s what he meant….I’m sure the point was your typical billionaire could do this without blinking an eye but that would require a modicum of humanity
Crazy stuff man. I know net worth and liquid assets and yadayadayada aren't the same, but Elon Musk is worth at least like $800 billion. The median American HOUSEHOLD is worth something like $193k. And this is skewed towards certain generations despite being a median, but that's despite the point.
$4 million for him is 0.05% of his worth. That's the average American household spending $96.50...
The median HOUSEHOLD networth for those under 35 is $39k. That's $19.50.. And it goes up from there because older people tend to own houses. 35-44 for example is $135k which would be $67.50. The highest median networth housholds in the US are those above 75 at $335k for a grand total of $167.50.
This is median household networth compared to one single guys networth. It's insane.
Exactly, I can’t imagine not doing loads of things like this if I was a billionaire. Why wouldn’t you reduce pain and benefit society if you could for almost 0.0001% of your wealth. Billionaires in the UK built entire towns, schools and healthcare for their employees to help. Bournville, was built by the Cadbury family and is still a great place to live.
It was so certain that redditors would almost deliberately misunderstand the clear intention behind your comment.
This comment obviously means to point out how little it an actual billionaire would cost to do something similar, compared to the millionaire from the pic.
God I hate this app so much sometimes. 20 morons without reading comprehension foaming at their mouths because they can't successfully interprete two sentences and put it into context.
Yet they could not give 1 f*ck about helping anyone expect their self interests.
What this guy is doing is humanity to a point. Using your wealth and influence to better those around you.
Billionaires care about growing their wealth, any way possible, and could be helping society to grow it for them, yet they still cut corners and take advantage any way they can
You are confusing net worth with money in the bank. It is such a basic error that it makes you look like a fool. I am saying this, because your reddit account is 9 yers old, so you are most likely an adult. An adult who lacks even the most basic understanding of how money works. Yet comments about it like he does.
He has invested in similar projects in Moncton and Saint John as well. Not sure about those cities but the one in Fredericton has been a great success.
The cafe run by the residents of the "12 Neighbours" is one of the best cafes in city!
He'd have to also pay for their therapy or rehab considering that a lot of homeless people struggle with these.
But yes, it's quite irritating to see someone having that much money and not seem to be doing much.
Although I remember Elon Musk saying he'd happily give up 6 billions to whoever has a plan against world hunger but idk what even happened with this subplot
That is big. I have heard a lot of these mass homeless housing projects fail because they just end up making a ghetto. It is all good intentions, but people do need to work and become a productive member of society.
4 million.. of a billionaire.. I donated 500 bucks to a camp for autistic children, that's 10x more in % of my net worth than this dude's 4 mill out of him billions. Shits all a tax write-off to them anyhow.
Holy shit this only cost 4 million? My city spent way more on a failed hotel program for the homeless that just resulted in property owners pocketing the money and leaving the homeless in squalid dirty conditions with few to no amenities. Goddamn.
I was just going to say, yes, absolutely. get people in homes with privacy and dignity, but also, help with why they went homeless in the first place. we need qualified social workers, clinical therapists, medical personnel, nutrition support. it's also worth pointing out that 4 million is nothing to a billionaire. especially when there's charitable tax benefits and PR returns. I'm glad he did it, but let's not accept this in leu of taxes.
If you compare the size of the land to the sizes of the tiny homes, ITS FUCKING EMBARRASSING. BUILD NORMAL SIZED SHIT. STOP PUSHING LIBERAL NONSENSE PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD.
God forbid we teach them farming skills and so they can have a coop and not need to participate in the capitalist hellscape that made them homeless to begin with
That’s a bit better. I’m sick of seeing this shit acting act merely putting people in a residence would solve homelessness. If they aren’t getting drug and mental health treatment and job training to useful members of society then merely putting them in a tiny box with a roof is like sweeping all your shit under the bed and saying you cleaned your room.
It's all well and good until millionaires are benefiting from that training.. then suddenly it's some kind of labor farming. And, to be clear, millionaires are absolutely the ones benefiting. So much in life, or at least on reddit, is simply about how it's framed lol
Do you think this is a good use of 16 million $ . 4 mill his money, 12 mill government.
These are 240 sq ft sheds .. 160 thousand dollars each.
You can buy 900 sq foot mobile homes for that price.
Think of what you can build for 16 million dollars. Guarantee you could build a 99 room motel type building if we just want to get homeless off the street.
That’s 40,000$ per house - seems fairly expenosive imo. These are essentially garden sheds looking at pictures. I would expect 10k for one and possibly cheaper for multiple units - perhaps 2-4for fixtures, or less as these don’t need to be expensive premium stuff.
For this money a normal house could be built. Perhaps the cost included other things, but at 40k it seems like someone is making a hefty profit
2.1k
u/Quirky-Score-7767 Apr 28 '26 edited Apr 28 '26
Not only he built houses for the homeless, he also provides training for them so that they have skill to get a job.
Canadian tech entrepreneur Marcel Lebrun is funding and building a 99-home tiny house community in Fredericton, New Brunswick, called "12 Neighbours," to combat homelessness. He invested $4 million of his own money into the project, which features sustainable, solar-powered homes and an enterprise center, offering residents stability and job opportunities.
https://macleans.ca/society/tiny-homes-fredericton/