Besides being customizable, the little houses are versatile. Each house is loaned to a family, rather than given outright. Then, once the family’s permanent home is rebuilt, the modular one can be repurposed.
“The modular house goes to the next family, or maybe gets converted into a medical station or a classroom,” Balfour says.
Modular housing also serves as an alternative to refugee camps for displaced people, Zavadskyi says. Since the modules can be placed almost anywhere – even atop existing basements and crawl spaces – they allow residents to stay on or near their own land.
“Previously, the major approach used in towns and cities for people who lost their housing was to create camps,” Zavadskyi says. “But we thought that for Moshchun it wasn’t a good solution, because every citizen of the village would like to stay somewhere close to their land plot. In addition, if you create a camp, you need to organize a special electricity supply for 100 houses or more, and a water supply. It’s a really big project.”
Most of the recipients get water from their own wells, but electricity is more of a problem. The houses are heated by ceramic electrical panels, but since the power often fails, the residents needed backup generators. Zavadskyi quickly put out an international call for donations.
“We had really big problems with blackouts, especially in the rural areas,” he says. “That’s why we organized additional projects to supply generators to each family that has a module. Now most of these families have generators, so they’re independent. If there is no electricity supply, the generator can – in a very cold situation – provide the electricity for heating.”
Balfour notes one more benefit to the modular homes: They don’t just help their recipients. Because they’re built in Ukraine, they provide jobs as well as shelter.
“The word ‘sustainable’ comes up in Rotary a lot, and this is what I call sustainable,” Balfour says. “It is a sustainable system by which the Ukrainians can help rebuild – and not only a village, but also the rest of the country. They can use the same system to rebuild other villages – and some of the same houses, maybe.”
Perehrestenko and her family received their modular home in September 2022. She says she wept for joy when she returned to her land and found the little house in place.
