Founded by a La Jolla resident, the nonprofit has a 98 percent effectiveness rate in clients staying housed, breaking the cycle of homelessness.
With furniture and festivity, Humble Design San Diego celebrated its 500th home transformation April 24 to help a local family leaving homelessness.
Humble Design, founded by La Jolla resident Treger Strasberg in 2009 in Michigan, with several subsequent locations nationwide, creates personalized, fully-furnished homes from empty residences.
Humble Design San Diego was established in 2018, and a family of five transitioned from homelessness to the 500th Humble Design San Diego home April 24 in San Marcos.
“We’re just so excited,” said Humble Design San Diego Executive Director Laura Lavoie. “It’s an incredible milestone for us. We’ve come so far in not a very long period of time.”
Since opening its doors, Humble Design San Diego has transformed the homes and lives of more than 1,200 people, including more than 700 children and 60 veterans.
A 2024 UC San Diego Homelessness Hub study found that 98 percent of clients remain housed after receiving services from Humble Design, a housing retention rate more than 10 times the San Diego County average.
“That’s a staggering, amazing number that you never see,” Lavoie said.
The research clearly indicates that “having a home, which is what we create, is a social determinant of health and well being,” she said.
Humble Design’s success can be attributed to its process as well as its product, Lavoie said, noting the nonprofit works “with every player in the sector.”
A client is referred after receiving support from other organizations, including shelters, community nonprofits and more.
“The trust that our clients have in the people who have helped them is what allows us to have access to our clients’ spaces and stories.” Lavoie said.
The trust is critical, she added, as “most of our clients are used to having promises made in the system and then broken.”
Once referred, a Humble Design client meets with staff interior designers, sharing their journeys through and out of homelessness.
“Many of our clients feel a sense of healing when they get to share their story with our team,” Lavoie said.
The conversation then becomes a design consultation, and clients share their preferences for color, style and more.
On the transformation day, the Humble Design team “shows up to your empty house in the morning and in the afternoon, we welcome you home,” Lavoie said, to a home “with your family photos on the wall and all of the little things that you’ve told our designers that you like.”
The Humble Design effect, she said, is “our clients begin to see themselves the way we see them, as these beautiful, valuable neighbors who should be loved.”
Humble Design’s model is dependent upon community-donated furnishings, philanthropic funding and volunteer power.
“Every single person that walks through these doors is dedicated to helping our neighbors to begin the next chapter of their lives,” Lavoie said.
To volunteer yourself, business or team of friends for a day of service, visit
humbledesign.org/day-of-service.
Humble Design’s Logan Heights warehouse receives new and gently used donated furniture and home goods by appointment. Learn more at humbledesign.org/sandiego.
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