Afghans found refuge, but struggle to find a new home

IRVINE, California－After fleeing her home in Afghanistan, Mozhgan Entazari did everything she could to find a new home for her family in the United States.

The 34-year-old mother of two scoured options online with her husband, while the family lived in a hotel in Irvine, south of Los Angeles. She spent $200 for an Uber ride to see an apartment 90 minutes away only to find it had been rented.

Entazari needed a place not just for her immediate family, but for seven members of her extended family.

In the end it took four months. They moved into a five-bedroom house in Corona about 80 kilometers southeast of Los Angeles, paying rent of $4,000 a month.

The family's struggles are emblematic of what tens of thousands of Afghans are finding since they moved off US military bases and into US cities and towns following last summer's dramatic airlift operation. Many hope to settle in Southern California and the Washington, DC, area, where Afghans previously established vibrant communities with Halal grocery stores and mosques.

But these communities are also among the country's priciest housing markets, and units, especially those suitable for often larger Afghan families, are in short supply. Resettlement agencies report that it is taking longer to get refugees out of temporary housing such as hotels, Airbnb rentals and churches.

Without a job, credit history or co-signer, Entazari said it was incredibly difficult to find housing. And without an address, she said she and her husband could not get jobs and her children could not enroll into school.

"All our lives depend on housing," Entazari said in Farsi through a volunteer interpreter.

The US State Department said it does not track how many Afghans are in temporary accommodation.

The top states for Afghans arriving following the Taliban takeover are Texas (nearly 10,500), California (more than 8,200), Virginia (more than 5,100) and Washington (more than 2,800), according to the State Department.

Sonik Sadozai, a volunteer with Afghan Refugee Relief, said she has been doing this work for years and has never faced so many hurdles.

She said she was able to help Entazari and her family move out of the Irvine hotel partly because of luck－an Afghan man she had helped find housing four years ago contacted her about a Syrian friend who had a house for rent.

But she is worried that she will not be so lucky with the more than 100 other Afghan families she is helping in their search.

Agencies Via Xinhua