About Us

Helping Irish Hosts (HIH) began in March 2022 when ordinary people in Ireland opened their homes to people fleeing Ukraine. There was no system. There were no templates. Just people saying: “come in, we have room.”

 

A small group of people - most of whom had opened their own homes - came together to make it safe, supported and organised.
That group became HIH. We built the basics that didn’t exist yet - a "how to" toolkit, a website, a peer support network, advocacy for financial and other supports. We helped turn goodwill into something people could actually do at scale.

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What happened next

Over the following three years, hosting grew faster than anyone imagined. With the right support, simple frameworks and community leadership, it became a central part of Ireland’s humanitarian response.

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HIH directly matched nearly 3,000 displaced Ukrainians into1,500 homes. Thousands more matches formed independently and lasted well beyond the initial six-month period. By October 2025, more than 40,000 displaced Ukrainians were living in host-owned homes and properties across Ireland, a scale accelerated by the Accommodation Recognition Payment.

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Why it worked

People didn’t just open spare rooms - they made space at the table and in everyday life. They offered belonging, routine, conversation, connection. Refugees became neighbours, colleagues, teammates, not statistics or service users. HIH’s role was to put structure under that generosity - to provide the safeguards, information and ongoing support that made hosting safe and sustainable, not just an act of charity, but a real contribution people could trust.

 

What we're doing now

Three years on, HIH is no longer part of the emergency State response and the context has changed. What worked in 2022 is not what is needed in 2025. Community participation still matters, but it cannot be the only option for displaced people arriving and building their lives here. Any future welcome model must be fair, equitable, and realistic about pressures on both hosts and newcomers.
 

Our focus now is on applying what was learned through the largest community-led act of welcome in modern Irish history to help design planned, long-term pathways to belonging and stability - grounded in evidence, lived experience and community voice - for all refugee cohorts, not just Ukraine.

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Innovation: Co.Here

With EU support, in partnership with UCD and Pairity we are building Co.Here - a new, evidence-based way to match displaced people with communities, not just with beds.

 

Co.Here blends lived experience, local knowledge, and ethical tech to match people to the places and supports that actually make sense for them, to the benefit of newcomers and local communities. We're starting in Kildare.

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This isn’t about directing people. It’s about putting people in the driving seat and strengthening our communities.

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Why this matters

Ireland - and Europe - are seeing rising anti-migrant sentiment.

The way we design integration from here will either build division… or build genuine belonging.

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HIH believes that what was learned from hosting - in its original spirit of solidarity - and the lived experience of the people who actually made it happen, must shape what comes next.

 

We now know that community-led, supported, human-first welcome is not only possible - it works.

And this is the moment to build it for the long haul.

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We are opening a new chapter, if you'd like to be part of it, please get in touch.

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Company Info

We are registered as a not for profit Company Limited by Guarantee (CLG). We are not a charity. We were seed funded by The One Foundation, The Sunflower Foundation, The Community Foundation, The Shapiro Foundation and Choose Love.  From August 2022 - April 2025, our operational work was delivered under a Service Level Agreement with the Irish Red Cross, who are funded and mandated by the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (DCEDIY) to lead the State consortium for the activation and support of public pledges.

 

Our audited accounts are available here (2023) and here (2024).