In 1984, SRO Housing Corporation was founded to improve horrific housing conditions in the Los Angeles Central City East area commonly known as "Skid Row." Over more than 30 years, SRO Housing Corporation restored and reclaimed dilapidated dangerous Single Room Occupancy Hotels and built new residences from the ground up to create safe, affordable housing for low-income and homeless residents of Skid Row. Along the way, tens of thousands of men and women received the keys to new homes. Many had been homeless for years, even for decades. Cramped and crumbling hotel rooms were transformed into comfortable contemporary studio apartment homes. Often, the first thing new residents did, before opening the window or fluffing the pillow...was to stand still and weep, overcome by the extraordinary impact of opening the door to a new life. SRO Housing Corporation has gathered here a moving collection of first-person narratives of lives transformed through housing.