Help build ReHome: a new solution for refugee housing

A rental unit can be so much more than just an address: it’s a place a resettled refugee family can finally call “home,” and a place to build restored lives.

But what would you do if you arrived as a refugee to the US and had no home? ReHome exists because we've seen this challenge first-hand, and in response we've created first-of-their-kind solutions to match pre-vetted refugees with quality homes. But we need your help!

ReHome exists because every resettled refugee who is flown to the US deserves a stable home so they can build a restored life.

Housing access is critical

In 2023, tens of thousands of resettled refugees were homeless upon arrival to the US.

Refugees collectively spent 30,007+ days in emergency housing, in a system where every single day counts. Within 90 days of arriving, refugee households are expected to:

The resettlement program does an excellent job at placing refugees into jobs, but housing issues hold it back. The average emergency housing stay in 2023 ate up 21 of 90 precious days, and thousands of families like the Mutombos in the picture above* were still homeless at day 90.

Finding solutions

I started ReHome because I have seen the pains of refugee homelessness first-hand. I also know the rental market pain points that continue to keep resettled refugees out of homes, because I witnessed these challenges during 18 months working as the resettlement Housing Specialist in my hometown of Lancaster, PA.

My job also gave me ideas for how to strengthen the refugee housing system, but I was too busy swimming upstream to keep family after family out of emergency housing.

In 2023, while completing my Master in City Planning degree at MIT, I found time and support to dive into system-level solutions. I wrote my Master’s thesis about the intersection between the rental market and refugee resettlement, uncovering many practical ways for these two systems to support one another.

I came to understand that using technology and data analytics will be fundamental for a smoother refugee housing market, and teamed up with Zachary Moring - a software developer & data scientist from Boston University - who jumped in to work with me full-time.

The result is ReHome, a refugee-welcoming real estate platform that brings landlords and tenants together in new ways to make sure every refugee has a stable home as they start a restored life.

ReHome's model

ReHome is about optimizing to find the right landlord who has the right unit available at the right time for every incoming refugee family.

ReHome understands that finding all these matches for refugees means we also need to optimize the refugee housing market for landlords.

Match by match, we want to improve and expand our services to build a better Refugee-Welcoming Rental Market (RWRM) for everyone.

We’ve piloted our services in Lancaster, PA and we’re now gearing up to scale across the country.

Call to action

We need your help! ReHome needs time to build the tech systems that will help us make refugee housing matches at scale!

Like resettled refugees, we’re ready to become fully self-sufficient as long as we get the right early support. We aimed to raise $250,000 by September 18th so we can grow our team and launch toward our potential. We've accomplished a lot with the first $10,000 we were given, and we still hope to reach our funding goal.

We will report back to our supporters on:

Zach and I plan to grow ReHome as quickly as we can, and we look forward to speeding up growth in the resettlement system and in landlords’ real estate businesses.

Every landlord can open the door to restored lives in the US. Thank you for helping ReHome unlock these opportunities!

*family name changed for privacy