Northpine Foundation and Happipad are proud to announce their partnership to address the pressing issue of affordable housing for refugees in Canada. The Northpine Foundation announced an investment of $600,000 to support Happipad’s refugee housing home share platform.
Refugees face significant barriers to accessing affordable rental housing in Canada, including high rental costs, discrimination, lack of documentation, and no Canadian credit history. Happipad’s innovative solution supports home sharing programs at scale by providing a digital home sharing application designed specifically to make home sharing programs possible in any community, matching refugees with compatible hosts who have extra rooms to rent, allowing them to access affordable housing as soon as possible after arriving in Canada.
This investment will support Happipad in expanding their Refugee Housing Platform to provide affordable home-share housing rentals for refugees in Toronto and the surrounding areas. The Happipad solution supports the entire lifecycle of home sharing rentals from background screening to compatibility matching, rental contracts, rent payments, as well as conflict prevention and resolution.
“Lack of affordable housing is one of the top concerns of the many refugee families I’ve connected with over the years,” said Bayan Khatib, Impact Director – Refugees at the Northpine Foundation. “As we wait years for new homes to be built, the proposed solution of many, we now have an incredibly smart solution that we can tap into today: utilizing empty bedrooms across the country!”
This investment will help provide a critical foundation for refugees to establish their lives in Canada, enhancing their wellbeing and productivity over the long term. The impact for refugees and the wider community covers a wide gamut of tangible and intangible benefits, including a reduction in costly emergency shelter stays, enhanced tax revenue, and the promotion of dignity, inclusion, and social cohesion.
“At Happipad, we are dedicated to supporting refugees in Canada and fostering inclusive communities. By connecting them with compassionate home share hosts, we are not just providing housing; but helping create a genuine sense of belonging and a place they can call home through the resettlement process,” said Cailan Libby, CEO at Happipad.
Northpine Foundation and Happipad are committed to creating meaningful impact for refugees and the wider community. This investment is a significant step towards achieving that goal and creating a self-sustaining model of scalable change for refugees and others in need of affordable housing, across Canada.
Learn more about Happipad here and see the Northpine Foundation’s investments in Refugee support initiatives here.