How are prior living situation and current living situation different?
Author: Betty | Date Created: December 12, 2025 | Date Updated:
What this is
This articles explains the meaning of prior living situation and current living situation and how they are different.
What is the difference between prior living situation vs. current living situation?
Prior living situation and current living situation are two different questions, or data elements, that are collected in HMIS.
What Is Prior Living Situation?
Prior Living Situation (PLS) describes where the person was staying the night before they entered your project (or before they enrolled).
Think of it as looking backward at the client’s circumstances.
This information is used to understand how and why people enter the homelessness system.
It also helps funders and communities see larger patterns—such as whether more people are entering from unstable housing or from other programs.
Where is it located?
It is located on the Universal Data Assessment (UDA) form within the project entry assessment
PLS is collected for all projects in HMIS at entry.
What Is Current Living Situation?
Current Living Situation (CLS) describes where the person is staying tonight, at the time of the contact.
Think of it as looking right now at what’s happening.
You record it when:
- You meet with a client during street outreach
- You have regular check-ins in certain project types
- There is a new contact during their enrollment
Where is it located?
The CLS form is located in the project entry, update and exit assessment workflows as well as an option under Profile in the client workspace.
CLS is mainly collected for Street Outreach (Collected at project start and every contact with the client.) and Coordinated Entry projects (Collected at project start and at each assessment event (when applicable).
How are they different?
The key difference is timing.
| Term | When it's recorded | What it describes |
|---|---|---|
| Prior Living Situation | At project entry | Where the client slept last night. |
| Current Living Situation | During contacts after enrollment | Where the client expects to sleep tonight. |
Together, these fields help communities understand how clients enter the system and how their housing situation changes over time.