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Some Homeless Turn To Self-Storage Units For Shelter

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Self-storage units are serving as homes for a growing number of homeless people.

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By KEITH MORELLI | The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 19, 2008

TAMPA - Along with dusty family heirlooms, mattresses and furniture, self-storage units are serving as homes for a growing number of homeless people.

It's not a widespread practice, but there are more people renting space and sneaking in at some storage units around Hillsborough County. There's no plumbing, and it's strictly against a myriad of rules, but people without homes are finding the rent cheap and accommodations safer than on the streets.

"I've heard of people doing that," said Lesa Weikel, community relations coordinator with the Homeless Coalition of Hillsborough County. "When people are faced with not having shelter, they do whatever they can to find shelter that they can afford."

She said that a slight majority — 56 percent — of the homeless people in the Tampa Bay area do have some sort of income.

"Homeless people are working," she said, "or they have Social Security or disability checks. They just don't have enough to afford an apartment."

Shelter space is limited, and living on the street isn't safe, she said.

"We know there are people who are living in motel rooms, for one night or two, or in campgrounds or in cars," she said. "People are just trying to find some place safe that they can afford."

A storage unit, she said, "is not ideal place to call home."

Barbara Brown, manager of Hillsborough Avenue Self Storage, said the trend of people trying shack up in storage units started about a year ago.

"I check the gate every morning to see who's been here at odd times, what time they come in and what time they left," she said.

She was recently showing a prospective customer a unit that she couldn't open, she said. She later returned and found a man standing outside the door. She asked him what he was doing, and he told her he was relieving himself inside the unit when she came knocking earlier.

Brown lives in an apartment on site, she said, so she can check on who comes and goes, but some storage businesses don't have someone to watch their lots at night, and they are finding that more and more people are sleeping in units, she said.

She has run into differing opinions when confronting people about sleeping in units, she said.

"One man thought he had every right to do it," she said. "I told him, 'You can't do it here.' "

Reporter Keith Morelli can be reached at (813) 259-7760 or kmorelli@tampatrib.com.

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