This document, available in two versions (a short -9 pages- and a long one -30 pages-), is the first of the Access to Decent and Affordable Housing in Europe: Case Studies and Innovative Solutions series. It aims to gather and highlight innovative affordable housing solutions in Europe, and to feed the European thinking around how to provide better and cheaper housing for all.

One in six properties are unoccupied in Europe; vacant real estate therefore represents a significant and under-utilised windfall of housing that could be used to respond to the growing and alarming issues of housing exclusion in Europe. This paper should not be read as a comprehensive and exhaustive list of Europe’s silver bullet solutions for reusing vacant real estate to provide affordable housing. Rather, it is a brief overview of the various – and sometimes controversial – initiatives that have used these vacant resources for short- and long-term housing of those who do not have the means to find housing at market prices.

Contact person: Chloé Serme-Morin