Separated families sleeping in caravans
A report highlights that homeless mothers—separated from partners—are resorting to living in caravans because municipal systems have failed to secure family housing for them. The case underlines persistent gaps in how local authorities accommodate vulnerable household types on a tight housing market. (x.com)
In Goirle, a 35-year-old mother named Geeke parked a Knaus caravan outside town hall after moving into it with her two sons, while her ex-partner stayed in the family’s owner-occupied home. Two other separated mothers joined the protest because they also could not get housing big enough for families with more than one child. (ad.nl) The women’s complaint was not that they had no income at all, but that the local housing system had no realistic path from breakup to family housing. One mother told AD she had spent months “kicking at closed doors” while moving between temporary places before ending up at a campsite. (ad.nl) This is the part of homelessness that often stays invisible in the Netherlands. Under the European Typology of Homelessness and Housing Exclusion system used by Statistics Netherlands, people living in a car, shed, squat, or holiday caravan count as homeless because they lack normal housing, even if they are not sleeping on the street. (cbs.nl) That broader count is much larger than the old picture of rough sleeping. Statistics Netherlands said there were about 33,000 homeless people at the start of 2024, including 9,400 seen in registers and another 23,600 estimated outside them. (cbs.nl) Women and children show up especially often in the hidden part of that count. A 2024 ETHOS tally across 55 Dutch municipalities found 6,063 homeless or unstably housed people, and about one-third of the adults counted were women, many staying with children in temporary shelters, holiday homes, or static caravans. (kansfonds.nl) Family shelters are already full in several cities, so municipalities have been pushing families into stopgaps that look more like tourism than housing. Dutch public broadcaster NOS reported in August 2025 that large cities were short of family shelter places and were using hotels as overflow space. (nos.nl) Helmond shows how long those “temporary” fixes can last. AD reported in April 2026 that a mother had been living with her 9-year-old daughter on a campsite for 1.5 years at municipal expense, and that several other single mothers with children were in the same situation. (ad.nl) The national policy goal points in the opposite direction. Statistics Netherlands says the Dutch National Action Plan on Homelessness set a target that everyone in the country should have a home by 2030, with municipalities carrying much of the responsibility for prevention and rehousing. (cbs.nl) What the caravan cases show is a specific failure point after separation. When one parent keeps the old home and the other parent needs a place large enough for children right away, the housing shortage turns a family breakup into homelessness in everything but name. (ad.nl, kansfonds.nl) So the story is not really about caravans. It is about Dutch municipalities counting family homelessness more accurately than before, while still relying on campsites, hotels, and other last-resort beds because the supply of ordinary affordable homes has not caught up. (cbs.nl, nos.nl, ad.nl)
