We do homes that are people and planet positive

Real estate and the urban environment have a profound impact on all of us

We spend 90% of our lives inside buildings. And by 2050 almost 70% of us will live in cities.

The built environment enables life, community and culture. But at the same time, it fosters loneliness and health issues. It counts for almost 40% of global CO2 emissions. It is the biggest living expense for most people. And nowhere is growing inequality more visible than in how we live.

To overcome the challenges of population growth, climate change, growing inequality and social unrest, we need to move to a more conscious and responsible version of capitalism. A version that is market-based, but with equal priority for all stakeholders and with long-lasting impact.

We are a European real estate company setting out to develop urban communities with inclusivity, liveability and sustainability at its core. We do not have all the answers yet, but we aspire to join forces with likeminded investors and partners – and we are a team with the motivation, experience and ambition to be a pathfinder on this journey.

We are Home.Earth

We are looking for a co-founder to join us and build Home.Earth in the Netherlands - read more

The challenges we see

Our urban population is growing rapidly

And much faster than many of us realize. In just 30 years, we need to make room for an additional 2.3 billion people. That means building 10 additional cities the size of London - each year.

The growth is putting our cities under overwhelming pressure and the effects are visible everywhere. Loneliness and depression rates are on the rise. Our neighborhoods segregate, losing the diversity and vibrancy that make them great to live in.

We have created a planetary crisis

Our planet is overheating. Our biodiversity is reducing rapidly. Our natural resources are being depleted.

With 39% of global energy-related CO2 emissions, 47 Gigatons of raw materials used each year and 40% of global landfill waste, real estate plays a major role in our planetary crisis.

People demonstrating about climate change

Inequality is rising around the world

Nowhere is inequality more evident than in where we live. We know that housing is a vehicle for equality, dignity, safety and stability, yet more and more people lack an adequate home. With population growth this will only continue.

Housing costs have outgrown income across European cities for decades. This increasingly leaves low- and middle-income families with the choice between deteriorating living conditions or being squeezed out of the cities they love. Today already, 1 in 8 Europeans overburdened by housing costs, while for bottom income earners, it is 1 in 3.

We need to do things differently

With an estimated 2 billion new homes needed globally by 2100, the result is obvious: business as usual is simply not an option.

We need scalable solutions to develop our cities in a sustainable, inclusive and liveable way.

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Our aspirations

Urban communities that are great to live in

We aspire to bring all we know about urban development into every Home.Earth building. To us, a good city is characterized by inclusivity and diversity in use and its users.

To get there, we believe in art and culture as an enabler for creative placemaking. We believe in community-enhancing design and technology that bring people closer together. And we believe in active ground floors to create vibrant neighborhoods that are great to live in.

Buildings developed in balance with our planet

We aspire to be a truly planet positive company. A company reducing CO2 in the atmosphere rather than adding to it. A company enhancing biodiversity in every community we enter.

We realize the magnitude of this aspiration – and we have no intention of taking shortcuts through too-good-to-be-true offsetting schemes. Instead, we believe that we can get there through embracing circularity, designing our buildings consciously, and investing to remove the carbon we cannot eliminate directly.

Homes and spaces affordable to all groups of society

We aspire to work with like-minded investors and partners towards a more inclusive and fair real estate market. Access to adequate housing is a human right and to us that means using business to provide affordable and healthy homes for all income groups – including the homeless.

It also means ensuring that there are affordable spaces available for culture, local community activities and other uses at risk from gentrification.

We start building in the summer

We have acquired our first site and aim to begin construction in the summer of 2022. We are buzzing to start translating our aspirations into real homes and spaces.

Our initial focus will be on the largest cities in Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands.

Download Executive Summary

Founding team

We are a team that share the desire to be a changemaker in the urban environment. Some of us have experience with real estate and construction, some with building purpose led organizations, while others understand how to enable communities.

Many of us are entrepreneurs. All of us care for each other and for the whole.

We are Home.Earth

We'd love to hear from you on hello@home.earth

In partnership with

Home.Earth is in many ways an extension of NREP and the purpose-driven journey Rasmus Nørgaard and NREP has been on. NREP generously supports Home.Earth with both resources and shared aspirations, and while Home.Earth is independent and controlled by its purpose, NREP will always be part of the story of Home.Earth

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Breathe is an investment company that works with organizations with a purpose to be in service of the whole. The Breathe team is an integral part of Home.Earth and ensures alignment of purpose with values, culture and governance. Breathe also enables Home.Earth to organize according to the principles of Holacracy.

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