Reducing housing poverty
Habitat for Humanity builds strength, stability and self-reliance through shelter. Volunteer or partner with us on housing solutions to support people in need.
Habitat for Humanity builds strength, stability and self-reliance through shelter. Volunteer or partner with us on housing solutions to support people in need.
If you are looking for more information about Habitat for Humanity’s work across the region of Europe, the Middle East and Africa, please contact us.
For the first time, Malawi has explicitly recognised housing as part of its climate response strategy, marking an important shift in how the country approaches resilience and adaptation.
(BRATISLAVA, Slovakia – 17 September 2026) — Habitat for Humanity is contributing to the Transforming Invisible Buildings project, which has been underway since February 2026 and is helping cities turn vacant and underused buildings into affordable, energy-efficient homes. The partnership builds on Empty Spaces to Homes, our flagship initiative helping European cities put unused buildings to work for people who need a decent place to live.
Read our policy papers, housing reviews, shelter reports and advocacy toolkits for a more in-depth look at our advocacy efforts.
Bratislava (August 14, 2025) – Habitat for Humanity is excited to announce the next step in our growing collaboration with the Employee Foundation of the VKR Group. Together, we’re building on shared values and years of impactful work, this time through hands-on volunteer work and collective action in Poland.
On Monday, 8 September, renovation works began at 1 Nadarzyńska Street, led by a team of 21 employee volunteers from Australia, Canada, China, Croatia, Denmark, France, Italy, Latvia, Poland, Slovakia, Ukraine and the United Kingdom. Swapping their work places for paint rollers, the group traded business attire for hard hats and work clothes, following safety training before diving into four days of hands-on renovation.
NAIROBI, October 15, 2025 — A new initiative funded by the Swiss Capacity Building Facility (SCBF) is set to improve access to affordable housing finance and insurance solutions for low and middle income households in Kenya. The solutions propose to use home improvement as a pathway to enhance climate resilience and lower the disease burden of malaria and other climate induced health illnesses
In July 2025, Habitat for Humanity Ukraine, in partnership with the Center of Local Government Studies, released an in-depth assessment of 300 multi-apartment buildings across Lviv, Zakarpattia, and Ivano-Frankivsk oblasts in western Ukraine.
Poland’s housing challenge is often framed as a problem of shortage. Yet across the country, thousands of buildings stand empty or underused—many of them publicly owned—while access to affordable housing remains out of reach for low-income households and vulnerable groups. This contradiction lies at the center of a new research (August 2025) study exploring how non-residential vacancies could become part of the solution.