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Refugees at Home was born in response to the many refugees and asylum seekers who have come to the UK in search of safety and a better life, and have found themselves facing homelessness and destitution.
This doesn’t happen to all refugees or asylum seekers, but unfortunately many do find themselves without statutory support for long periods, or needing some additional help to build new lives in the UK.
We match generous hosts with a spare room with asylum seekers and refugees in need of emergency and temporary accommodation. We continue to keep our processes as simple and immediate as possible so that we can respond quickly to those in need. By early 2021 we had arranged over 170,000 individual placement nights, up and down the country and, bar a few relatively minor issues, this has been largely trouble-free.
Refugees at Home is a community comprising our guests, our hosts, the home visitors who support them, our placement team, admin volunteers and our support teams (IT, media, fund-raising, governance etc.). We work closely with referrers such as the Refugee Council, British Red Cross, and many other local and national organisations around the country.
We hope you will find in this guide all that you need to start your hosting journey fully informed and with confidence. You will have a chance to talk things through with your home visitor when they arrange to see you. Please do get in touch with us on info@refugeesathome.org if you still have any questions, or anything you would like to share.
Refugees at Home will match generous hosts with guests who are asylum-seekers or refugees. We will arrange a home visit of hosts, make relevant checks on guests and may arrange follow-up visits and provide other limited forms of support for hosts and guests. We do not provide social work services or other regulated services (including care, medical or legal services) to guests, hosts or anybody else. We do not expect hosts to provide these either.
Refugees at Home will not be responsible for verifying the accuracy of information provided by hosts or guests or managing the continuing relationship between hosts and guests. It will not pay hosts (apart from the £30 weekly bursary if needed); hosting is an altruistic relationship where no rent or services in lieu are due in exchange for the hosting.
Refugees at Home does not host unaccompanied children or guests with severe mental health issues, convictions for dishonesty or violence, or substance abuse problems. It matches adults who take responsibility for their own actions.
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