It’s a very different situation than being homeless in cities with more typical seasonal weather patterns; I nearly lost a number of toes due to frostbite when I was homeless in Saint Louis during a major blizzard. San Francisco’s climate and permissive camping policies help absolve a lot of the housing related issues that are involved with being homeless.

Of course they don't. Living out of a tent on a street makes it extremely hard to get your life onto target for rejoining the economically healthy portion of society. I'm sure you know that. I don't know what you were trying to say.

As a long-time participant in the bay area rental housing market, $1000 is enough to rent a bedroom in many homes, but how would such a listing get onto apartments.com?

If you’re paying more than $1000 to share a bedroom, you’re getting ripped off.

Check Craigslist, that’s the main place people who are looking for randoms to rent a room will post:

https://sfbay.craigslist.org/search/roo?max_price=1000&min_p...

Of course, most people would prefer to room with family or friends (especially if we’re talking about multiple people in the same room). That’s not an SF issue, it’s human nature. So a lot of roommate groups are going to be formed through word-of-mouth, or smaller community group chats/boards.

Check how long those apartments have been listed for, some of them have been listed for a year. If it's an actual competitive price it will get rented immediately.

There are shared housing groups on facebook that will reflect the situation more accurately.