The first stepin realizing temporary accommodation is acquiring a building. Our research shows that optimism and enthusiasm are crucial factors in convincing initiators. The initiator can be the municipality or the Rainbow Group that is looking for a suitable building, or a building owner looking for a destination for his (partially) vacant building and decides to offer it to the municipality or The Rainbow Group.    

 

How do you find buildings?To locate vacant properties, cooperation between different parties is required. We discovered in several interviews that collaboration is possible between housing associations, vacancy managers (such as Ad Hoc) and the municipal real estate department.   

 

What makes a building suitablefor temporary housing of the economically homeless? According to several location managers of temporary housing locations of Ukrainian refugees and employees of the Rainbow Group who work with economically homeless people, the capacity of the building can be up to 150 residents.  

In interviews with employees of the Rainbow Group, it was emphasized that any type of building can be suitable to house the economically homeless. This was confirmed by case studies of temporary housing of Ukrainian refugees, as well as temporary housing of economically homeless people. These have confirmed that practically any type of building (schools, office buildings, shops, theatres, care homes, hotels, houses, etc.) can be made suitable for temporary accommodation. Of course, some need more intensive transformations than others. They all have different issues and costs, especially fire safety and utilities, make a big difference. In the third (realization) phase of the process, the various steps for transformation are further elaborated. According to a property owner, the statement that any building can be suitable for temporary accommodation needs nuance.  

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A building is not sustainable, or worth the investment, if a building is already at or near the end of its life cycle. This is especially clear when we look at the Riekerhof building in Amsterdam Nieuw-West. To transform this building from an old nursing home into suitable temporary housing for Ukrainian refugees, several investments have been made to give the building a bit of a refurbishment, while the building will be demolished in 2 years anyway. This concerned investments in, for example, central heating boilers, while all buildings should be rid of gas in a few years. To determine whether a building is worth the investment, feasibility studies are necessary, you can read more about feasibility in the next phase, "Planning & Preparation". 

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The second stepafter locating a building is to contact the area broker of the area in which the building is located. "The area broker takes an integral look at the area and ensures that complex issues are put on the agenda and implemented with partners and residents of the area" (Municipality of Amsterdam, 2022). The area broker is also the main link to the area teams and has knowledge about plans in the area and what is going on with public safety and contact with other stakeholders in the area. 

 

The third stepis to acquire financing. For this purpose, the Rainbow Group can apply for funding from the Temporary Housing Acceleration Taskforce, worth 12,000 euros per home, via the municipality.https://realisatiehuisvesting.nl/.In addition, the Rainbow Group can ask the municipality for financing through the municipality's care department, or external financing can be sought. One of our interviews with the municipality of real estate suggested looking for investors in the medium-priced rental sector.  

 

The fourth stepis making agreements between the building owner, the municipality and the Rainbow Group. These agreements must state how the cooperation will proceed, what the rent would be and what the term of the temporary accommodation would be.  

 

Finallyit is important to gather the necessary experts. Depending on the initiator, knowledge is already available internally or it is necessary to seek knowledge elsewhere. These experts should include: legal experts, target group experts and financial experts.