Transitional housing
Year-long stays in furnished single-family homes on the former Williams AFB campus. 88% of families leave for stable housing of their own.
480-988-9242 · Southeast Mesa
A house with a front door, for a year.
House of Refuge is a neighborhood of 88 single-family homes on the former Williams Air Force Base, where families with children and pregnant women in Arizona's East Valley rebuild their lives — paired with a case manager, employment counseling, and on-site classes.
Families live here. Not in a shelter — in a home.
Families arrive in crisis and stay about a year. They get a key to their own front door, a case manager, and access to employment counseling, on-site classes, an after-school program, a community garden, and a free donation center where they shop for what they need. Last year, 514 people lived here. 62% of them were children. 88% left for stable housing of their own.
If your family needs a home
What we run
Five things, on one campus.
Everything happens within a few blocks of a family's front door — case management, classes, after-school, the garden, the donation center.
Case management
An individual case plan for every household, paired with trauma-informed support, food boxes, clothing, and home furnishings as families settle in.
Employment & education
On-campus computer access and classes covering financial literacy, job readiness, and résumé building. 90% of graduating heads-of-household leave employed.
After-school + teen center
Homework help, reading, and youth activities for the K–8 kids on campus, plus a teen center focused on life skills and financial literacy. Children are 62% of residents.
Donation center + garden
An on-campus center where resident families shop for clothing, hygiene, and household goods free of charge, alongside a working community garden.
Adopt a Home
The Jessica's House sponsorship funds a designated home for a full year — rent, case management, school supplies, and the whole stay for one family.
Three ways in.
Need a home for your family
Families with children and pregnant women in the East Valley can apply directly. Call 480-988-9242 or start the housing application — a case manager calls back, usually within two business days.
Apply for housingSign up for a shift on campus
Most shifts are 2–3 hours — sorting at the Donation Center, after-school reading, group landscaping or painting projects, or the monthly Outreach Group. Workplaces and faith groups welcome.
VolunteerSponsor a family for a year
Adopt a Home funds one family's full stay — rent, utilities, case management, employment counseling, school supplies, and on-site classes for the duration of their year.
Donate
30 years on the same campus
A neighborhood, not a shelter.
When Williams Air Force Base closed in 1993, dozens of military family homes in southeast Mesa sat empty. In 1996, community leaders converted 88 of those houses into something the East Valley had never had — a neighborhood where families experiencing homelessness could live in an actual home, with their own key, while they rebuilt their lives.
Three decades later, the same campus still operates as House of Refuge. Last year, 160 families — 514 people — lived here, and 62% of them were children. Families arrive in crisis and leave, on average a year later, employed and into housing of their own. In 2026, the organization marks its 30th year on the former base.
More about House of Refuge