FAWOS (Fachstelle für Wohnungssicherung) is an institution of Volkshilfe Wien on behalf of the City of Vienna. It is a specialist center for housing security and provides advice and support to residents of private, cooperative and externally managed municipal housing in Vienna who are threatened by the loss of their homes. In this way, FAWOS takes preventive action against increasing homelessness. The aim is to secure housing for persons against whom proceedings for eviction of the apartment have been brought before the district court. According to § 33a MRG 1999, the competent district court must notify FAWOS of any proceedings that have been brought, which in turn actively contacts the tenants concerned. The legal situation and social causes are then discussed with the tenants concerned in a personal meeting. On the basis of this discussion, proposals for a way out of the crisis are developed. In Vienna there are about 18,000 eviction suits per year, of which about 7,000 concern FAWOS. Out of these, services are provided for about 3,000 tenants. In about 80% of the cases the flat or housing is secured.

The Competence Center for Nonprofit Organizations and Social Entrepreneurship was commissioned by Volkshilfe Vienna to assess the social added value of FAWOS by means of a social return on investment analysis. The year 2018 has been chosen as the period of analysis. The aim of the study is to present the social added value and the economic effects of FAWOS in Vienna in order to show its significance for society as a whole. In this context, the social added value that results from the counselling of tenants affected by an eviction action will be shown and compared with the situation that FAWOS and the corresponding counselling and interventions do not exist. The identified impacts are quantified and monetised for this purpose and compared with the investments in the programme in the sense of an SROI analysis.

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