Search Results

Volunteering has a unique power to build team spirit, create shared memories, and fill people with a real sense of accomplishment. It pulls us away from screens and routines and places us into something deeply human, working side by side, learning from one another, and becoming a community.

This same power has been visible across Romania over the past three years. From 2023 to 2025, Habitat for Humanity Romania organized six Hope Builds, bringing people together from Romania and beyond. These volunteer construction events unite teams, strangers, colleagues, and friends to build homes for families facing difficult socioeconomic and family situations.

Over the past year, Habitat for Humanity worked alongside volunteers who contributed nearly 42,000 hours’ worth of time, skills and energy to improve housing conditions in communities across Africa. Today, we highlight how volunteering continues to shape individuals, strengthen community connections, and inspire long-term civic engagement. 

At Habitat for Humanity, volunteering takes on many shapes. Not every volunteer may swing a hammer, but every volunteer helps move us closer to a world where everyone has a decent place to live.

In just the first half of 2025, more than 3,300 people volunteered with Habitat for Humanity across Europe and the Middle East. Some helped build homes in Romania, Kenya, and Malawi. Others organized charity dinners in Poland, sorted donated goods in Irish ReStores, ran upcycling workshops in Great Britain, or supported communications and events in Jordan and Egypt. No two roles are alike. There is something for everyone who is willing to help. 

Empty Spaces News is the official hub for updates, articles, and insights on the project’s progress, featuring developments from both Poland and Great Britain.

Across England, Scotland, and Wales, the housing crisis continues to deepen. Record levels of homelessness, rising temporary accommodation costs, and a chronic shortage of genuinely affordable homes are placing enormous pressure on households and local authorities alike. At the same time, thousands of buildings—many of them publicly owned—sit vacant or underused, representing a missed opportunity to respond more quickly and sustainably to housing need.

Across Africa and the Global South, climate change is transforming the way communities move, settle, and survive. Droughts, floods, and environmental degradation are pushing families from rural areas into cities at unprecedented rates — and urban informal settlements are absorbing the shock.

In November, Habitat for Humanity contributed to critical conversations shaping the future of climate migration, urban resilience, and community-driven adaptation.

Croatia is facing a paradox: while housing costs are rising and many young people are locked out of the rental and ownership markets, nearly a third of all homes meant for permanent residence sit empty. This contrast lies at the heart of a new research report on the country’s housing landscape—one that uncovers not just the challenges, but the untapped opportunities for creating more inclusive, sustainable communities.

Hungary’s housing landscape presents a striking contradiction. Despite a growing number of dwellings—over 4.5 million—more than 570,000 stand vacant, while nearly 3 million people struggle with housing poverty. At the same time, the country’s population continues to shrink, creating a disconnect between where homes exist and where they’re needed most. A new research study from Habitat for Humanity Hungary takes a deep dive into this complex picture, offering an eye-opening look at how a more inclusive, affordable, and sustainable housing future might be built—quite literally—out of empty spaces.

The Resources page offers a curated collection of materials, guides, and tools to support and inform the Empty Spaces to Homes project.

Tanzania Mortgage Refinance Company (TMRC) signed a memorandum of understanding with Habitat for Humanity International (HFHI) in August 2022 to engage in an effort to promote the ability of TMRC in unpacking the potential of Housing Microfinance (HMF) in Tanzania and supporting TMRC to develop and expand its commercial relationships with low-income consumers as a means of increasing their access to affordable and quality housing solutions, a first step in the organizations’ joint-effort to expand and strengthen the low-income housing finance sector in Tanzania.