The City of Ghent has earmarked 55,000 euros to pay for professional mediators whose job it will be to find homes for recognised refugees and homeless people. The mediators or more properly “home seekers” are needed because of the housing shortage in the East Flemish capital.
A specialised charity, Thope, which tries to find homes for refugees helped over 160 people to find a home over the past four years.
Two professional home seekers will now set to work finding homes for 25 families with the help of the charity Een Hart voor Vluchtelingen (A Heart for Refugees) and the Ghent Solidarity Fund. Until now the job was done by volunteers. Ghent believes a professional approach is needed.
The new home seekers will not only look for accommodation but will provide the families with guidance over the following months. The city is acting after aid organisations sounded the alarm. Even people who qualify for social housing end up on long waiting lists and in the meantime, they are obliged to live in appalling circumstances.
The home seekers won’t be able to sort all the problems. Demand is higher than supply. It’s hoped existing organisations like the charity Thope will continue to play their role. Over the past 4 years they helped 168 people to find a home. Thope rents accommodation and lets it to recognised refugees.
Ümit, a guy from Turkey, recently got his refugee recognition. Finding accommodation for his family proved a challenge:
“I emailed ten landlords a day. I spent hours on the Immoweb website. I contacted 400 people. I did 50 house visits and was rejected every time. I contacted Thope and they found somebody willing to let”.
Many landlords are reluctant to let to refugees. It seems estate agents are little help either. Candidate tenants are all looking for the same type of accommodation, have little Dutch and often don’t have a job.
Thope guarantees landlords are paid on time and will advance cash on occasion. “We want to give landlords confidence. Our aim is to make ourselves redundant and if everything goes well that we are no longer needed” says Els Goetghebeur.
Today more and more landlords are coming forward of their own accord. Katrien De Smet lets to a Syrian family with 5 children: “Everything went very smoothly and the family is getting good follow-up”.
Thope has 50 buddies all willing to point refugees in the right direction, but the arrival of a fresh influx of refugees and the failure of the Belgian authorities to provide accommodation to all while asylum applications are being processed has exacerbated the situation. More and more refugees are ending up on the streets of Brussels, Ghent and other cities as a result.