Afghan refugees who fled their country following the Taliban takeover six months ago are struggling to find affordable housing in the high-cost U.S. cities where they’ve chosen to settle
Afghan refugee Mozhgan Entazari, right, talks about the challenge to find proper housing for her family in Southern California, during an interview at a hotel lobby in Irvine, Calif., Tuesday, Feb. 15, 2022. Entazari, 34, said it took four months to find a home. On Sunday, they will move into a five-bedroom house in Corona, about 50 miles southeast of Los Angeles, that is renting for $4,000. IRVINE, Calif.
The family’s struggles are emblematic of what tens of thousands of Afghans are finding since they moved off U.S. military bases and into American cities and towns following last summer’s dramatic airlift operation. Many hope to settle in Southern California and the Washington, D.C., area, where Afghans previously established vibrant communities with Halal grocery stores and mosques.
His sister, who housed him until he got a place of his own, lives there. He was hired to work in nearby Arlington, by the same nonprofit that employed him in Kabul. But with some 76,000 Afghans arriving in the United States since the Taliban takeover of their country last year, many of these cities are reaching their saturation point, said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of the Lutheran Immigration Refugee Service.
Zabi is working to convince area landlords and property owners that Afghan refugees are worth granting some leeway. “They’re getting more and more entrenched in town, especially the children, and it would just be more trauma to uproot them and start the whole process over again," Mercer said.
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